A Little About Me

I'm back from holiday and...

As my second blog post as I rejuvenate this blog, I thought I would write out a post explaining how I have got to point where I have decided to focus on historical seismology. As one prominent current historical seismologist has stated a few times, those who study the subject are a rare breed. How one gets interested in this topic then is perhaps something of interest to you.

A Quick History of My Interest in Seismology

As I stated in my last blog post I visited New Zealand's South Island in February 2010 with my grandfather and parents. I was in my mid-teens, quite impressionable, and I felt I knew what I wanted to do in the future (an author of fantasy fiction, having already gone through dreams of wanting to be an ancient historian & architect - all of these represent key interests of mine today). I had never been on a long-haul flight before (my only previous flight having been in autumn 2009 from Southampton Airport to Dublin, a journey not much more than an hour in length, as opposed to the 9 hour flight to Singapore, the 8 hours to Sydney, and the 2 hour or so to Christchurch). This was an adventure I was unlikely to match in a long time, if ever.

Both my grandfather and my father are avid motorcyclists, and my Granddad had been to New Zealand on two or three occasions in the previous 14 years. During his three visits - all for biker international rallies - he had befriended two different biker couples who lived in Christchurch. In February 2010 there was an International Rally for BSA bikes in Christchurch, and as my Granddad was nearly 80 this was likely to be his last chance to visit them. We arranged to go with him, and despite a very cold January feeling like it was threatening being able to fly away the weather relented by the time we left in early February.

Winter 2009-2010 was a tad bit cold in the UK. Exact date unknown

The first week was spent in Christchurch and involved several runs out to various sights. The first ride out was to Cust, a small village on the road between Woodend and Oxford in the Canterbury Plains. The second involved a ride across the Port Hills, round the north-west side of Lyttelton Harbour, and down to Wigram Airfield & Air Museum. The third day was a free day to do what you wished with, and we went into central Christchurch and saw the Cathedral Square, as well as a small bike museum hidden away in a small brick building, before going through the Lyttelton Tunnel and looking around Lyttelton itself. We saw the Timebell Station from the road (at the time it was having necessary renovations made to it, so sadly we could not take a look around).

Our fourth day took us down to Akaroa Harbour and a nice boat trip around it. The fifth took us to Godley House in Diamond Harbour, on the south side of Lyttelton Harbour. On the return trip I took my favourite picture from the entire holiday - the view of Lyttelton Harbour from the Summit Road looking east, from some point above Governors Bay. This was effectively the final day of the International Rally.

Godley House, 12th February 2010

The remainder of the holiday was spent touring around the southern half of the South Island in a rather cramped and poorly-maintained campervan. Despite the problems, we enjoyed visiting many places in South Canterbury, Otago & Southland - Oamaru, the Moeraki Boulders, Dunedin, the Otago Peninsula (to see the great albatross on a rather cloudy day), Curio Bay, the Bert Munro (The World's Fastest Indian) exhibitions in a department store in Invercargill, the Mirror Lakes and Milford Sound, Queenstown, Cromwell, Wanaka's National Transport and Toy Museum, Mount Cook & the Tasman Glacier (which we landed on), Lake Tekapo and Geraldine.

Unsurprisingly the whole holiday had a profound impact on me. What had struck me wherever we went was how welcoming, compassionate and kind New Zealanders were. That feeling stuck with me as we witnessed from afar - on the television news and in letters from our family friends - the devastating earthquakes which wracked Christchurch and it's surroundings. Places we had seen - the Anglican Cathedral, the Press Building, Lyttelton Timebell, Godley House - were ruined. All of these places, and many more besides, have subsequently been demolished or left to ruin. I witnessed from afar as the soul was ripped from the heart of Christchurch by forces of nature we were powerless to stop or combat.

The Lyttelton Timeball Station, 10th February 2010

At the time they struck I had little knowledge of earthquakes. I had seen news reports of several significant quakes over the years: I believe I can recollect Gujarat in 2001, as well seeing the news reports on Bam in 2003, Sumatra in 2004, Kashmir in 2005, Sichuan in 2008, L'Aquila in 2009 and of course Haiti in January 2010. All of these had been significant moments in my lifetime, but I had never had need to look, nor was taught about, how and why these events occurred. I had no real idea what a fault was, although I had some knowledge about tectonic plates and many previous earthquakes (having an adult Atlas is an invaluable learning tool, even when you are primary school age!).

Therefore I began to actively find out what was causing these earthquakes, using the Internet as my guide. I stumbled across GeoNet at some point, and can recollect what I believe was the original layout of the website (if it was not the original, it was certainly the second iteration). I began to glean information on my own, and by the end of secondary school made the decision to find a local college where I could do a qualification in Geology. I had decided that if I could do anything in the future to help mitigate future earthquakes like Christchurch, I would feel I had done something worthwhile. I had also been encouraged by one of my grandfather's friends in Christchurch to try and do my university degree in New Zealand - something I have not done yet, and perhaps will be able to satisfy her wishes at a later date.

Towards the end of my first year at college a qualification opportunity arose in which one could complete a piece of research on a topic of their choice (it was encouraged that the topic of this Extended Project related to one of the other courses you were studying, though it was not limited to this). I decided I had to do one on New Zealand earthquakes. For several months I had few ideas what exactly to do the project on, until on the morning of the 19th July 2013 a moderate magnitude earthquake struck in the Cook Strait between Wellington and a small Marlborough town called Seddon. The sequence intensified over the next two days, and by the middle of August there had been two mid-M6 strike-slip earthquakes which had caused significant damage in the Seddon and Ward townships and minor damage in Wellington. My topic was found, and by hand-in date in November 2013 I had a document which I was proud of. I got top grades, which greatly pleased me, and I went off to university at Plymouth with high hopes for the years to come.

Fault Map of the Cook Strait Sequence showing the different faults involved (Gurney 2013, unpublished)

Personally, those hopes were somewhat dashed, though through no fault of the department or staff. As many undergraduates find, living away from home is a tough ask, and perhaps my failure to socialise well led to the problems later on in my degree which resulted in my two-year hiatus from education. Whilst my education continued, I kept up with my own personal research. I began my original blog (United Kingdom Earthquake Bulletin) at the start of my Bachelors degree in September 2014, and set up a Twitter account alongside it. Most of you who are reading this will be doing so purely because I started this endeavour 6 years ago. Perhaps this Twitter account has been the most influential part of my development - I have encountered many brilliant and kind people who have helped me learn so much about my passion.

My research into Cook Strait had led me to encounter the concept of stress triggering, particularly relating to the Landers & Big Bear Earthquakes in 1992, and the North Anatolian Fault's unzipping between 1939 and 1999. This seemed to be a way in which future earthquakes could be forecast, if not predicted, and indeed it is still used as a crucial tool in understanding seismic hazard for the near future. Unfortunately I always felt I lacked the skills in mathematics and physics to pursue this (at secondary school I had been fantastic at these subjects; at college I suddenly & inexplicably struggled), and it was never taught during my Bachelors. Nonetheless the idea intrigued me, and I floated the idea of using the method on the November 2016 Kaikoura Earthquake to a couple of lecturers at UK institutions when looking for a Masters in late 2016 and early 2017.

As luck (or perhaps lack of luck) would have it, as I laboured to complete a now deferred dissertation in an unplanned fourth year, a lecturer (Dr Zoë Mildon) began at Plymouth who specialises in stress triggering. By the time she started I had been forced to leave my lodgings in Plymouth (twice, but I digress & do not wish to discuss this subject in a blog), so I managed to have a meeting with her in late February. Despite my misgivings, the fact she had begun at Plymouth made me seriously consider staying on to do a Masters in Geology (which would have been a fifth year at Plymouth). 

During the meeting, we forged an idea inspired by Zoë's work on the historical earthquakes in the Apennines and how stress triggering explained why the earthquakes over the past few centuries had occurred in the order and places they had. Once back home I began to look into how I may be able to find information on historical earthquakes which had occurred in the area of interest in New Zealand, and any which might possibly have been missed. The project never got off the ground - I decided against staying on at Plymouth for personal reasons - but the seed had been sown. Now all that was to be done was to begin the search...

[To Be Continued]

A rather snowy Plymouth & Roland Levinsky Building, 28th February 2018

P.S. I promised to tell you share some exciting things from my recent holiday. I shall do so soon, but I think I'll do this in small doses. Besides I am using my exciting things for research currently and will need to find a good way to photograph them in all their glory!