Gordon Amner was a young farmhand, cutting scrub at the time of the 1931 earthquake. He rode into Napier in time to witness the fires spreading and uplift of the Ahuriri Lagoon. When the inner harbour was uplifted, these horse mussels were left high and dry. Listen to Gordon Amner recalling the event.
Transcript
The next minute there was just this terrific roaring and the ground shaking you couldn't stand up, the cattle were rolling down the hills. The boulders were all coming down and all the fence lines were creaking and the staples and the twinging and the rumbling noise and then the two cliffs alongside the beach, they were falling down. There was dust all over and I thought it was the end of the world.
And I thought, well gosh, I don't know, there's nobody for me to talk to. So I said, oh well, I thought, well, jeez there could be a tidal wave. What made me think of that? I wouldn't know. But I mean, its amazing what different thoughts go through your mind.
Anyway, I got up in the hill and instead of being a tidal wave I saw this sea go right out leaving all the rocks uncovered. But when I got to the beacons I could see the whole of that inner harbour there, our sailing, used to be our sailing area, dry and millions of fish of every different type lying on the ground. And I said, gosh, couldn't believe it because to think that we used to go sailing there and it was dry. That is the land where your airdrome is now.
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
MTG Hawke's Bay Tai Ahuriri, Hawke's Bay Museums Trust/Ruawharo Ta-u-rangi collection
Reference: 950
Sound file: Gordon Amner, interview by Helen McConnochie for ‘Reflecting on disaster: memories of the Napier earthquake’, 1997–98 (2’02”–3’11”)
Permission of MTG Hawke’s Bay, P.O. Box 248, Napier, New Zealand must be obtained before any re-use of this image