New Zealand and Crusaders fly-half Dan Carter's world shaken by Christchurch earthquake

New Zealand and Crusaders fly-half Dan Carter's world shaken by Christchurch earthquake

Dan Carter has revealed the full drama of how he had to flee for his own safety during the earthquake which struck Christchurch.

Shaken: All Black fly-half Dan Carter admits that his world was shaken when the earthquake hit Christchurch earlier this year Photo: AP

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By Ian Chadband 11:59PM GMT 21 Mar 2011

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When the disaster enveloped his home town in New Zealand, the world’s best rugby player, talking exclusively to Telegraph Sport, told of how his world shook, too.

The New Zealand fly-half, who arrives in London on Tuesday with his Crusaders team-mates for Sunday’s unique Super 15 game at Twickenham, has talked of the fear, the sense of helplessness and his shock at witnessing scenes which will live with him always.

Carter tells of how he was forced to move out of his damaged home and ended up joining the relief operation to help stricken neighbours. He also had to comfort his grieving fiancée, whose friend died in the disaster.

The “crazy, disturbing” time, as he calls it, all began to unfold just before 1pm exactly a month ago today for Carter and five of his teammates for the Christchurch-based Crusaders, who had just finished training and were in the changing rooms beneath the old grandstand at the club’s Rugby Park HQ.

“I was going to take a shower when, suddenly, there was violent shaking and we just had to get out there as fast as we could. You don’t have time to think but as we tried to get out of the grandstand, it was being shaken from wall to wall, throwing us from side to side and our hands and elbows got grazed,” he explained.

“Outside, we realised it had been a bad one and that we had to get home quick but it was only when I jumped into the car that I realised the extent of the devastation. It’s something I’ll never forget; the shock on people’s faces, all the traffic lights out, water gushing out in the streets, cracks in the road, traffic jams. It was a pretty scary time.

“A normal five minute ride to my house in the eastern suburbs took 45 minutes. By the time I got there, there were people coming out of their houses crying and neighbours returning home shocked. There was liquefaction, silt all over the roads, fire sirens going off everywhere, it was just like a bomb site.

“Most of the damage to my house was on the outside. Inside, pretty much everything had fallen down. Everything smashed in the pantry, wines bottles smashed, paintings had come off the wall and cracks in the walls. The water was out.”

So he went to his parents’ place in Southbridge, the little town 30 miles south of Christchurch on the Canterbury Plains where he grew up. “I flicked on TV there and saw the devastating damage. Unbelievable. Then I realised we were the lucky ones.” And that is exactly how he feels today, even as four weeks since the disaster which killed more than 180 people and injured over 2,000, a semblance of normality is at last returning. Only last week when the water supply was finally restored was he able to move back into his house which will cost several thousand dollars to properly repair.

“It’s a bit of damage but I can still live there,” shrugged Carter, with the unfussy air which Cantabrians expect from their strongest, quietest heroes like Carter and Richie McCaw.

“I feel fortunate, in that my friends and family have come through it all pretty unscathed so it’s nothing compared to what a lot of other people here are going through; the loss of loved ones, houses and properties completely destroyed .there’s a lot in a much worse position than me.”

But Christchurch’s is a small, close-knit world. “So many stories everyone seems to know someone who was affected,” Carter said. “One of the Crusaders’ board members, Philip McDonald, who everyone knew and liked died. It’s been pretty tough.”

Carter has also been comforting his fiancée, Honor Dillon, the former New Zealand ‘Black Sticks’ hockey star. “She was pretty cut up because she had hockey friends who had been stuck in one of the main buildings when it collapsed in town. Really sad. So I shot up to Auckland, where she lives, to spend some time with her.” Dillon’s former team-mate, Amanda Hooper, died, aged just 30.

Amid the chaos, Carter admitted he felt a responsibility as his nation’s most popular sportsman to do something, anything, to help. “But I wasn’t sure how; I felt a bit powerless.” So he just rolled up his sleeves to help in the relief operation.

“The day after the earthquake in our neighbourhood which was pretty badly affected, we went out with wheelbarrows and shovels, clearing up all the liquefaction and silt all around, and delivering water to those in most need.”

Didn’t the sight of New Zealand’s sporting poster boy, their answer to David Beckham, rallying to the cause cheer his neighbours? “I don’t think they were surprised but I guess seeing us giving a helping hand was a bit of a morale booster.

“As All Blacks, we are kind of held on a pedestal here in a nation of rugby fanatics. So you’ve got to make sure people know that you’re just like everybody else, you’re just human, going through the same emotional roller-coaster. Just because you’re an All Black doesn’t mean you’re not going to get your hands dirty to help out when needed.

“Actually, it was really rewarding. I didn’t know my neighbours that well, now I do because we’ve been working so closely together on a big clean up.

If there can be any positive to come out of such a disaster, it’s the real fantastic sense of community which has built up here.”

Ultimately, though, it dawned on Carter that the biggest help he could offer was by getting back on to the rugby pitch again. “The following week, our game against the Waratahs had to be moved to Nelson [near the tip of the South Island, 250 miles south of Christchurch] and it was a very emotional occasion.

“There was a minute’s silence before the boys went out and played a great game. And I felt it made a difference. Maybe only a small difference but people had something to cheer. And, honestly, I feel the best thing we can do, that we have to do, is to put the smile back on the faces of the people of Christchurch by going out there and playing good rugby.” Wherever that may be. If he wanted a measure of how his world has shifted, Carter reckons that playing a ‘home’ Super 15 fixture against South Africa’s Durban-based Sharks 12,000 miles away at Twickenham on Sunday will provide it.

“Yeah, another unique experience. It is a hell of a long way to go for one game,” he laughed, reckoning he could never imagined being back at HQ so soon after orchestrating in his customarily silky fashion the All Blacks’ familiar triumph over England last November. “But if it can raise funds for the earthquake appeal, then it’s a great idea.”

But for Carter, there is no place like home at the moment and he hopes that enough revenue can be generated from, say, a 50,000 crowd at Twickenham to enable the Crusaders, with their finances having taken a massive hit with the earthquake, to afford to be able to play their other home fixtures in small stadia back on the South Island, like Nelson or Timaru.

“This is a time when it is important we play our home games in front of our own people,” he said. “Especially now the World Cup won’t be coming to Christchurch.”

Carter had desperately hoped the Crusaders’ AMI Stadium would still have been able to stage Christchurch’s seven scheduled World Cup matches in September but major structural damage caused by the quake has made it impossible.

“Cantabrians are rugby fanatics and for us not to have any World Cup games is just more depressing news for the people here,” Carter said. “Obviously, it’s been done for the right safety reasons but it’s really sad.” All the more motivation then for the All Blacks to deliver the trophy to New Zealanders, who have had to endure a traumatic six months, what with two earthquakes in Christchurch and the Pike River tragedy in which 29 trapped miners lost their lives. “That all does add an extra significance to the World Cup to an extent. To win it would bring a lot of joy to people who’ve known tough times recently. There’s motivation to have a big year.”

Yet the eerie feeling to the start of his year continued when Carter turned on his TV to learn of the Sendai earthquake. “We feel deeply about what’s happened in Japan, it’s just so devastating, so much worse than what’s happened here in Christchurch but we can feel for what people are going through.”

And as he watched the stoic way in which the Japanese people have reacted in the teeth of the tragedy, Carter recalled his pride at how his own compatriots had responded to their own crisis.

“I’ve been really impressed by the resilience shown. New Zealanders are tough people. Complaining and moaning is not our way; you do what you can to help and then you get on with the job.”

This weekend, it will be Twickenham’s privilege to watch Carter, 12,000 miles from where his heart is, getting on with the job he does better than anyone.

Tickets for Investec Super Rugby Crusaders v Sharks at Twickenham on March 27 (4pm) can be purchased online via rfu.com/tickets or by telephone 0844 847 2492. £5 from each ticket sold will go to the Red Cross Earthquake Appeal.
Telegraph.feedsportal.com