Christchurch Earthquake Reinstatement Program

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At a Glance

14K

Projects Completed
4

Years

Location

Christchurch, New Zealand

Offices

Christchurch, NZ

Client

Vero and AA Insurance

News

Lessons learnt 10 years on from the Christchurch earthquakes

Christchurch Earthquake Reinstatement Program

On September 4, 2010, New Zealand’s south island was hit by a 7.1-magnitude earthquake that caused widespread damage and power outages. About two months later, our team was brought in by Vero and AA Insurance to manage and coordinate the repair and rebuilding effort for a significant portion of their claims.

We assessed and dealt with damage properties, sourcing and managing a multitude of local engineers, architects, builders, and contractors. On February 22, 2011, when a devastating aftershock hit the city of Christchurch, we were able to rapidly respond with essential make-safe and emergency works.

By April 2011, the team had tackled more than 1,000 make-safe repairs (including many urgent demolition jobs), most of which were completed within one day of receiving the request. In September, the scope of work had expected around 2,500 residential projects, but that number had expanded five-fold.

On February 22, 2015—four years later—we officially wound up the contract, having resolved over 14,000 projects.

At a Glance

14K

Projects Completed
4

Years

Location

Christchurch, New Zealand

Offices

Christchurch, NZ

Client

Vero and AA Insurance

News

Lessons learnt 10 years on from the Christchurch earthquakes

Services

Remediation & Revitalization

Markets

Environment

Christchurch Earthquake Recovery Program

With repairs and assessments, we helped rebuild Christchurch following the 2010 and 2011 earthquakes.

skip transcript

[Music]

00:08

the original earthquake happened on

00:10

September 4 2010 in terms of world

00:13

global disasters it registers in the top

00:16

10 since 1950 the scale of the

00:19

Christchurch earthquakes was mess of for

00:21

New Zealand and it was our job to get

00:23

our customers soldiers and back into

00:26

their home so by the the start of

00:28

October 2010 we were on the ground we

00:31

had people up and running we were

00:33

receiving claims from their own a

00:36

insurance and we were we were helping

00:38

customers from that point on the support

00:41

help we got from MWh was significant in

00:44

that it provided not just a technical

00:48

view on how to reinstate these

00:50

properties but also professional view on

00:53

how we should be interacting with

00:55

regulators with government and with

00:57

other suppliers and professional bodies

01:00

that we needed to engage with to help

01:02

develop against a recovery plan

01:12

[Music]

01:13

you

01:15

the ability to bring the two teams

01:18

together and take the strengths of an

01:20

insurance company a program management

01:22

team and turn them into truly a

01:24

high-performance organization really

01:27

added a lot to what we did in

01:28

Christchurch MWh recovery where eyes and

01:31

ears on the ground and they looked after

01:34

the health and well-being of our

01:35

customers every single day I'll never

01:38

forget particularly after the February

01:40

event the number of elderly customers

01:44

who they actually went picked up and

01:46

took to the airport when needed they're

01:48

really cared about those customers and

01:51

very challenging times the collaboration

01:53

between our client and MW HS is what I

01:56

believe really made this the the success

01:58

that it was

01:59

having having MWh and véro and AAA

02:03

staff all working together in the same

02:05

environment really allowed us to to lead

02:08

the industry in terms of our response

02:10

and customer service so when WH came to

02:14

the table with very much a mentality

02:16

around partnership which was significant

02:19

for us and ultimately allowed us to work

02:21

much closer together to develop the

02:23

outcomes and achieve the outcomes that

02:24

we want to achieve I guess the second

02:27

thing that we were looking for from our

02:29

partner name WH was technical expertise

02:32

and certainly MWh being a global

02:35

organization we're able to tap into

02:37

their resources from a global point of

02:39

view and and ship them into your very

02:43

small city in a very quick period of

02:45

time so that was engineers geotech

02:48

people structural engineers it was

02:50

project managers and at every step

02:52

people at MWh were always willing to

02:56

think outside the box and to progress

03:00

things in any way possible to reduce

03:03

stress and uncertainty for our customers

03:06

the ability to help 12,000 people get

03:10

back to some semblance of a normal life

03:12

early really added a lot of value

03:16

to what we did in Christchurch

03:17

[Music]

skiped transcript

Meet Our Team

Gavin Gilchrist, Vice President, Program Development

Stay curious and ask yourself why you are doing something—always look at things from the perspective of others.

Fritha McCrimmon-Robinson, Civil Water Team Lead, Senior Civil Engineer

I want to know I'm making a positive impact on communities.

Mike Smith, Principal Transport Engineer, Road Safety

My goal is to have a positive influence on road trauma reduction using community-based solutions to support road safety.

Grant Maxwell, Growth Leader, Infrastructure Resilience

I want to build geo-resilient communities that can cope with an uncertain future.

Jim Bradley, Technical Director, Environmental & Public Health

I'm dedicated to my clients, iwi, and stakeholder groups to navigate challenging projects that provide sustainable and valued outcomes.

Gavin Gilchrist

Vice President, Program Development

Fritha McCrimmon-Robinson

Civil Water Team Lead, Senior Civil Engineer

Mike Smith

Principal Transport Engineer, Road Safety

Grant Maxwell

Growth Leader, Infrastructure Resilience

Jim Bradley

Technical Director, Environmental & Public Health

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