Project AF8: developing a coordinated, multi-agency response plan for a future great Alpine Fault earthquake

The utility of earth science information in post-earthquake land-use decision-making: the 2010–2011 Canterbury earthquake sequence in Aotearoa New Zealand

“…Many district councils around New Zealand (n ≥ 11) have fault 305 avoidance zones in their district plans, or are revising plans to implement fault avoidance zone provisions. In contrast, despite well characterized scientific information that indicates ~20 to 50% 50-year conditional probabilities of a ground-rupturing earthquake on the Alpine Fault (Biasi et al, 2015) and advice that its mapped trajectory through populated regions define a major risk to life, dwellings and infrastructure (Orchiston et al, 2018;Zorn et al, 2018), in 2016 local decision makers (Westland District Council) voted against enforcing a fault 310 avoidance zone due to public concerns including perceived inadequate compensation for relocations, property devaluations, and autonomy over personal choice (https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/87604696/restrictions-onbuilding-along-alpine-fault-in-franz-josef-scrapped). Richardson (2018) suggests this represents an example of how challenging it may be to enact anticipatory (i.e., pre-disaster) deliberative policy making on issues that may be subject to inter-generational equity problems.…”

Infrastructure failure propagations and recovery strategies from an Alpine Fault earthquake scenario

“…Focusing on a 7-day Alpine Fault magnitude 8 earthquake scenario, based on decades of prior research activity [40], Project AF8 ran six regional and one national response planning workshops, aiming to integrate regional and national planning. In total, more than 500 participants attended these workshops, including emergency managers, policymakers, lifeline utilities, and community representatives, amongst others [41]. The intended outcome was the South Island Alpine Fault Emergency Response (SAFER) framework [42], focused on identifying likely impacts and addressing these through strategic planning and coordination activities.…”

“…The AF8+ scenario adopts the AF8 scenario northeast-directed 411 km rupture of the Alpine Fault between Fiordland and Lake Kaniere (F2K) with corresponding ground shaking determined by Bradley et al [51] (Figure 3). While this aspect of the scenario was considered highly uncertain by the Project AF8 science team, it was adopted given the frequency of reverse-slip earthquakes at the southern end of the Alpine Fault in recent decades [36] progressing from a SW to NE direction [52,53], and because it produces stronger ground shaking in populated areas on the west and east coasts than comparable scenarios [40,41].…”

Tercentenary of the 1717 AD Alpine Fault earthquake: advances in science and understanding hazards

“…The seismic hazard represented by this fault has been known for some time (e.g. Yetton et al 1998;Rhoades and Van Dissen 2003) so it is encouraging to see coordinated action being taken to prepare (Orchiston et al 2018).…”

“…The final two papers in the collection address the human face of the next severe earthquake along the Alpine Fault and our preparedness for that event. Orchiston et al (2018) outline the development of Project AF8, a multi-agency initiative aimed at improving emergency response capability for a future magnitude 8 Alpine Fault earthquake. The process of developing a robust, credible science scenario is presented, and current gaps in knowledge particularly in impact and consequence resilience science are described.…”