Christchurch earthquake: Heroism, endurance and tragedy inside the Pyne Gould building

Christchurch earthquake: Heroism, endurance and tragedy inside the Pyne Gould building

Five days after the earthquake hit New Zealand, Jonathan Pearlman pieces together the dramatic events in one building, revealing stories of heroism, endurance and tragedy.

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By Jonathan Pearlman, Christchurch 6:00PM GMT 26 Feb 2011

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It was the building that came to symbolise New Zealand's darkest hour – a once solid office block, crumpled and concertinaed by a devastating earthquake.

Images of the five-storey Pyne Gould office in central Christchurch were beamed around the world, as rescue workers raced to the office block to save those caught up in its mangled wreckage.

Seventy survivors were pulled out in the first 25 hours after the disaster struck, but since then no one has made it out alive.

Now, five days after the earthquake hit, The Sunday Telegraph has pieced together the dramatic events on each floor, revealing stories of heroism, endurance and tragedy as workers took cover under desks, rushed to save colleagues and lay trapped in the dark concrete rubble for hours. Some survivors escaped unscathed, others were only freed after limb amputations using improvised tools.

With the death toll at 145, and 200 still missing, Prime Minister John Key called for a two-minute national silence on March 1 to grieve for people killed in the country's worst natural disaster for 80 years.

It was just before 1pm on Tuesday when the earthquake, which measured 6.3 on the Richter Scale, turned what should have been a day at the office into a frantic struggle for survival.

Roslyn Chapman, 30, was five hours into her very first day at her new job as an accountant with the firm Leech & Partners, based on the second floor. She was at her desk waiting for a colleague to resume a training session as the clock showed 12.51pm.

"The building just started moving quite violently," she recalled. "At first I wasn't sure if it was just a minor tremor. Then I realised it was major."

It was not the first time that workers in the 1960s office building had experienced an earthquake. After a 7.1 magnitude tremor last September, they had joked that the only thing to fall in the building was a filing cabinet. This time, though, was very different. The structure simply crumpled, folding inwards around a central shaft.

Ms Chapman scrambled under her desk, but it began to collapse on top of her as a mound of debris shut out the light. She pushed herself away, and found a space to lie down.

"There were six of us," said Ms Chapman, who was rescued eight hours later. "We were able to call out to each other. We kept each other's spirits high... It was my first day on the job but I made some friends pretty quickly."

One of the six was Emma Howard, 23, another accountant. For most of the morning, her mind had been on other things than work. It was only three days until her wedding, and she was eagerly anticipating walking up the aisle at Christ the King Catholic Church, wearing her strapless ivory gown and celebrating with her friends and family.

Suddenly, she was thrown from her chair and took cover in a foetal position on the floor, shortly before debris smashed her desk into pieces.

In desperation, she sent a text to her fiancé, Chris Greenslade, to try to help him find her. "For about five hours, I thought I was going to die," said Ms Howard. "I went through crying fits." With the help of directions from her fiance, Ms Howard was rescued by a team which tore through the roof with jackhammers.

On the first floor, Tracey Stanners, 28, was working in the office of Pyne Gould Corporation, a financial advisory firm with almost 70 employees. A data entry clerk, Ms Stanners had stayed at her desk while others went out to buy their lunch. As the building collapsed around her, she found herself trapped in darkness under her desk. She too began sending SOS text messages, telling her family: "Trapped at work ceiling fell in on us can't get out," it read.

"I was hysterical, I couldn't really hear anything," said Ms Stanners. "The darkness really started getting to you."

All around her, colleagues did their best to avoid panicking. "Stay awake and keep breathing," went the constant refrain.

Keeping calm was not easy. Near Ms Stanners, a 52-year-old colleague, who has been named only as Brian, was in grave danger, his legs trapped beneath a mass of mangled concrete slabs.

Dr Stuart Philip, a Brisbane-based urological surgeon, was in the city for a conference and ran to the building with two other doctors. They spent five hours crawling through debris to get to the survivors.

Dr Philip and his colleagues were forced to amputate Brian's legs to free him, with a female urologist using an army knife and a hacksaw.

"There really wasn't any other option," Dr Philip said. "Essentially the procedure was performed with a Swiss army knife. A builder arrived with a hacksaw. I know that sounds terrible, but that's all we had."

The first survivor to appear had been Kristy Clemence, who clambered through the ceiling of the fourth floor onto the unstable rooftop just shortly after the tremor had finished.

The 1960s building, as experts explained later, had "pancaked" inwards. But amid the murky jumble of wiring and concrete, she spied what seemed like a passageway leading to the sky, and clambered through to find a flat section of roof.

Amid continuing aftershocks, she waited – the fear visible on her face – as workmates shouted at her from the footpath below to avoid the roof's edge. Her anxious rescue onto a crane then played out live on television.

"I thought, I have to get out of the building," she recalled later, in a tearful interview. "Either the building is going to go down and I am going to get crushed, or I'll get electrocuted.

"I was able to climb through but my hair got caught on some wiring and it stopped me from going forward. I remember ripping out a big chunk of my hair to get out of the building. I was thinking about my daughter. Who's going to look after her? That gave me the strength to get through and be strong."

It would be a long wait before any further survivors were seen emerging from the building.

In dark pockets amid the debris, co-workers who survived communicated via lights on their mobile phones and knocked pieces of concrete together to guide rescuers by the noise. Some lay alone for more than 24 hours, uncertain whether the building would cave in further or whether their cries would ever be heard.

"It happened so quickly – it was like a bomb going off," said Paul Howison, a former teacher who worked on third floor at the Education Review Office, a government department which reports on quality of schools.

"The floor went from underneath us and we fell some distance, and then a concrete slab from the floor above came crashing down next to where we had landed."

Rescuers poked cameras through holes in the rubble to search for signs of life. They sent in remote sound sensors, or yelled for any survivors to call out or make a knocking sound. Frequent aftershocks also raised fears the wreckage would further collapse. After each one, rescuers retreated from the scene and used static lasers to see if anything had shifted.

Anne Vos, a 57-year-old from Australia, who switches from office work to receptionist during the lunch hour, remained lying in the dark on the first floor for 24 hours. Certain of death, she used her mobile phone to say her last goodbye to her family. She then spoke to a Melbourne radio station.

"I hope someone knows I'm here," she said on radio. "A couple of hours ago, I thought that's it. I managed to wiggle out a bit. Now I have a wee bit of air here. I'm a bit happier ... I'm not giving up now."

Shortly after Ms Vos was dragged alive from the rubble. Then rescuers arrived at the building's last known survivor.

Two reporters were examining the building's ruins when they heard a tapping sound – and then a voice.

Deep inside the wreckage of Education Review Office on the third floor, Ann Bodkin, 53, lay on her back, wet and cold from the sprinklers, in a quiet vault she later described as a "concrete coffin".

A small hole allowed in a ray of daylight and much-needed air. At 2.25pm, amid cheers from onlookers, she was pulled out of the ruin.

"I thought, 'I have air and room, I can survive this'," she said. "I pushed negative thoughts away and was determined to get out."

Miss Bodkin's extraction, 25-and-a-half hours after the quake, brought elation to a nation that has endured its worst natural disaster.

But the boosted hopes were short-lived. Despite occasional rumours of survivors in broken church spires or other crumpled buildings across the city, no one has been found.

Three days after the earthquake, though, Emma Howard pressed ahead with her marriage plans, determined that life should carry on as normal. "I'm fortunate that everybody we invited originally will be there," she said. A bruise on her left arm was the only sign of her ordeal.

Officiating at the ceremony, Father John Adams said: "We are affirming that the final victory will go to love, not to despair."

But for other families, the pain continues. Since the rescue of Ms Bodkin, no more taps, text messages or voices have emerged from the rubble.

Among the dead was Philip McDonald, one of the directors of Leech & Partners, the second floor accountancy firm. Married to Sharon, Mr McDonald had three children, Michael, Chantelle and Andrea.

Chantelle McDonald said a colleague told the family her father did not make it out alive.

“She was talking to him and the next minute happened and she couldn’t see anything. But she just reached out for his hand and.... she couldn’t feel a pulse,” she said.

Mr McDonald was a sportsman with a passion for sailing and skiing. He was also chairman of Mid Canterbury Rugby Union, and on the board of the Canterbury Crusaders. “He was a great guy and board colleague and we will miss him greatly,” said Murray Ellis, Crusaders chairman.

Adam Fisher, 27, a financial advisor with a fiancee and young son, worked on the first floor and is still missing.

His mother, Gaye Fisher, appeared on national television last night and pledged to keep hope of his survival. “If there is any message I can send out to the families of other missing people it is – just be patient,” she said.

Irish accountant JJ O’Connor was also still missing inside the building.

The 40-year-old moved to New Zealand with his New Zealand-born wife, Sarah, last September to take up work. His wife is expecting their second child in May. They already have a two-year-old son.

Catherine O’Connor, Mr O’Connor’s cousin, said: “We’re hoping for a miracle. We’re all just hoping now.”

The majority of those killed were working on the first and second floors, as the building crumpled on top of them. No one based on the third floor Education Review Office died - partly because they had less debris falling on them, and also because many of them were out on school visits.

Mark Maynard's wife, Kelly, who had just started working the week before as a legal executive on the first floor, rang him 20 minutes before the quake to say she left her mobile phone at home. There has been no word since.

On Thursday, he returned to the building with a rose from his garden, which he handed to a rescuer to place on top of the site.

Yesterday, a team of British rescuers was searching for her body.

"It's a waiting game." he told The Sunday Telegraph. "I've got two daughters and I need to continue for the kids."

Asked if he held any hope that his wife could be recovered, he said: "No. When you look at the building, there is no way."
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