Zachary Conat was enjoying a day of sightseeing in New Zealand Tuesday when the tremors started
RaeAnne Conat said it was difficult to understand a hurried message from her husband, Staff Sgt. Zachary Conat, who is in Christchurch, New Zealand, with the U.S. Air Force.
That was before she saw news accounts of the devastating earthquake that hit the city Tuesday.
Zachary would later call and tell his wife that he had been in a restaurant eating lunch in the city center Tuesday when water glasses began clanging, she said, repeating his story. Lesser tremors had been commonplace during the two weeks he had been in and out of Christchurch; but as the ground began moving under them, he and other diners rushed from the building.
Conat told The Journal that Zachary described the ground as “like Jello,” and by the time they made it outside, buildings in the city’s center were collapsing around them.
“There was none,” Zachary told Conat of the historic buildings that had once been there. “We were completely helpless.”
Zachary is from International Falls, but his family is stationed at McChord Air Force Base near Seattle, Wash. Zachary is on the crew of a C-17 military transport aircraft and makes frequent trips around the world.
But Conat described this trip to New Zealand as “the trip of a lifetime.” The Air Force members were participating in Operation Deep Freeze, lifting scientific equipment and other supplies from Antarctica before winter. Military support missions flown from Christchurch International Airport to Antarctica are conducted during the late September to early March time frame (summer in Antarctica) each year.
Zachary had a day off between trips to Antarctica, and had been enjoying a day sightseeing Tuesday. “He was right in the middle of everything,” Conat said.
Conat said she is her husband’s biggest supporter and this event helped underscore the sacrifice military members make.
About 35 McChord airmen, 15 of them reservists from the 446th Airlift Wing and 20 active-duty from the 62nd Airlift Wing, were in Christchurch when the earthquake struck, according to a report on the 446th Airlift Wing’s website. All of the McChord airmen were accounted for and uninjured, the report said.
The Air Force members had been at the Christchurch airport when Zachary called Conat Tuesday evening. She said at that time he had no idea when they would be leaving the island. She said this would likely be his last trip with the C-17, as he was recently promoted. He was to have returned stateside Saturday; she was not sure when to expect him home after the disaster.
Since Tuesday, Conat said she has had radio feeds from New Zealand on 24 hours a day.
The magnitude-6.3 quake struck just before 1 p.m. local time Tuesday, when the city was bustling with mid-day commerce and tourism. Reports Thursday morning estimated nearly 100 people dead and another 200 missing.
A more powerful 7.1 magnitude earthquake hit Christchurch, a city of 350,000, on Sept. 4, but caused no deaths. The latest quake was deadlier because it was near where people live and work, centered 3 miles from the city, and shallower, experts say.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake was an aftershock from September’s event. A strong aftershock in December caused further damage to buildings. The city was still rebuilding from those quakes when Tuesday’s hit.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
