Quake costs Wairarapa beach park

MILLION DOLLAR VIEW: Kerry Ellis, manager of the Castlepoint Holiday Park and Motels, shows the cracks that formed during the quake on Monday. PHOTO/LYNDA FERINGA

The anniversary weekend earthquake has opened the ground beneath several hillside caravan sites at a Castlepoint holiday park and jeopardised up to $15,000 in annual revenue, says site manager Kerry Ellis.

The 6.2 magnitude earthquake, which struck shortly before 4pm on Monday, created a fissure in places up to 4cm wide under a number of premium hillside caravan sites, some of which have been occupied for up to two decades at the seaside Castlepoint Holiday Park and Motels.

Engineers were to inspect up to five caravan sites, spread between the top and a lower terrace, that could each be at risk of slipping down the hillside, he said.

"Most of the campers had gone by 10 or 11 in the morning on Monday but a few stayed on because it was such a beautiful day. The wind dropped off, the sea was like glass. It was just gorgeous. Then it hit."

Mr Ellis, who with wife Lynell has lived in the area "on and off" for about 20 years, said each of the threatened sites was vacant on Monday afternoon, with the owner of the caravan sitting above the worst of the damage having left only hours before the quake struck.

He said there had been about 400 campers at the holiday park on Saturday night and people had been turned away before heavy winds sprang up early on Sunday morning and "43 sites were blown out".

Two-thirds of the park guests had left by late Sunday, he said, and he later dumped two loads of tents that were destroyed in the early morning winds. Most of the remaining campers checked out on Monday morning and despite about 15 guests staying on at the site yesterday, Mr Ellis said, the earthquake had completed a "very damaging" weekend at the park. "The damage we had really is significant. We've definitely lost two caravan sites on the top terrace, but we could lose up to five - right where they have million-dollar views of the bay."

Mr Ellis said the loss of the five hillside sites, where the land was classed as an erosion zone, would equal about $15,000 annually in lost revenue.

Holiday park owners Anders and Emily Crofoot said yesterday district council engineers were yet to assess the quake-damaged terraces, where an initial inspection was made yesterday afternoon.

He said the quake had also left a trail of damage at their Castlepoint Station homestead, sited across from the holiday park. Damage included food and household supplies strewn across the floor, pictures tossed from walls and glasses from shelves, and the toppling of a carved figure of Atlas that had crowned an ornate 3m-high grandfather clock, circa 1750.

Mr Crofoot, who is also the Castlepoint volunteer fire brigade chief, said there had been no callouts for the rural crew in the wake of the earthquake, despite a large rockfall from Castle Rock and a car mired in the sand in the area known as the lagoon.

He strongly doubted reports that nine seals had been crushed in the rockfall, which had tumbled two large fragments weighing "about 20 tonnes" only part-way down the side of Castle Rock, where seals do not venture.

Department of Conservation rangers had yesterday searched the area, where they discovered some distance from Castle Rock the carcass of a seal that is thought to have died several days before the earthquake struck.