SCIRT’s Fulton Hogan Beckenham site engineer Fritha Bevin-McCrimmon at her Waimea Terrace work place yesterday.

SCIRT work before, during and after the Christchurch floods

It’s been a massive week for Christchurch with extreme weather and SCIRT’s infrastructure repair teams have also been busy.

“A huge thanks to everyone who worked in these conditions,” said SCIRT general manager Duncan Gibb. “We are very proud of the preparation work done to minimise damage and ensure people stayed safe. We are also proud to be working alongside the Christchurch City Council today to check on the structural integrity of structures like retaining walls and bridges.”

On Tuesday with the storm showing no signs of abating, SCIRT’s traffic management teams were out ensuring sites were safely fenced with high winds and heavy rain in mind. The winds were so strong some of these teams had the doors blown off their four-wheel drive utes and trucks.

Wednesday, with parts of the city under water, SCIRT’s Fulton Hogan and McConnell Dowell teams were available to help out Christchurch Hospital ensuring the basement was pumped out and equipment was able to operate.

Other crews continued to ensure sites were standing up to the wind and extreme rainfall.

In Beckenham, Fulton Hogan’s site engineer Fritha Bevin-McCrimmon door-knocked people so they knew to keep away from the flooded Waimea Terrace work site. Crew members were able to use diggers to get people out of flooded homes and sections and to tow cars to higher ground.

Lyttelton’s Canterbury Street, where a new SCIRT retaining wall was completed last year, was one of the main channels for flood water off the Port Hills. It was inspected by a SCIRT structural engineer and found to be safe.

Thursday and SCIRT crews are back at work, tidying up and getting on with where they left off before the storm slowed things down. Meanwhile the structural engineers working at the design hub of SCIRT are out working alongside the Christchurch City Council staff, inspecting retaining walls and bridges city-wide to ensure they are safe for the public.

The digger came in handy for helping people trapped in flooded homes around Waimea Terrace.

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