WELLINGTON, (Reuters) – A major earthquake hit New Zealand’s second biggest city Christchurch last night, bringing down power lines, ripping up roads and wrecking building facades, but authorities reported no deaths.
Authorities declared a formal civil defence state of emergency to coordinate recovery operations in the city, which has a population of about 350,000 people, after facades collapsed into streets, crushing cars and blocking roads.
Two men suffered serious injuries and police closed off the central business district.
The earthquake had a magnitude of 7.1 and a depth of 10 kms (6 miles), hitting the South Island city and a large surrounding area of farms at around 4.35 a.m. local time (1635 GMT Friday).
“There’s a lot of damage that I’ve been able to observe in the central city area, mainly of the old brick and masonry buildings, a number of those have got walls that have fallen into the street,” Christchurch mayor Bob Parker told Radio New Zealand.
