
2023 Annual Meeting – Day One
August 30, 2023
2023 Annual Meeting – Day Three
September 1, 2023Day Two of the QuakeCoRE 2023 Annual Meeting in Ahuriri Napier
Early-career Researcher Network Breakfast
Day Two of the Te Hiranga Rū QuakeCoRE 2023 Annual Meeting began with an Early-career Researcher Network Breakfast.
Attendees appreciated the frank advice, insights and assurances from a range of more established researchers over breakfast. QuakeCoRE is hoping to build upon this whakawhanaungatanga (process of establishing relationships) to create a network that provides support across our community.
If you'd like to join the Early-career Researcher Network contact Alice Chang-Richards (University of Auckland) and Tim Stahl (University of Canterbury).


Opening Session: State of QuakeCoRE
Always a highlight, Director, Brendon Bradley's State of QuakeCoRE address gave a fantastic and broad overview of QuakeCoRE's research accomplishments and current activities which have already been achieved in the past year.
Brendon also highlighted the diverse range of attendees we have in attendance at this Annual Meeting.


Community Portfolio - Communication, Education and Engagement (CEE)
Caroline Orchiston, Associate Director with responsibility for the Communication, Education and Engagement (CEE) portfolio shared some updates on the CEE programme and activities.
Research Stories
Engagement Highlight: QuakeCRAFT
A popular hands-on building activity that students can test the earthquake resilience of their building on a custom-made programmable shake table.

“Our students were completely hooked during your QuakeCraft session at Kererū School. Your hands-on, interactive, fun approach to teaching our tamariki about earthquakes was brilliant. All students walked away with new learning and a greater understanding of how earthquakes happen and how they can impact us.”
Caroline concluded her session with opportunities for attendees and the wider community to engage with QuakeCoRE:
- Express an interest in joining the CEE Committee
- Engage with us through: LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter
- Seminar Series bit.ly/2023QCSeminarSeries
- receive our Newsletter bit.ly/QC-Subscribe
Lightning Talks
The QuakeCoRE Student Chapters (QSC) recently held heats to establish the best Lightning Talks to be presented at the QuakeCoRE 2023 Annual Meeting.
We heard excellent talks from:
• Kristian Azul (The University of Auckland)
• Chandrakumar Chanthujan (Massey University)
• Felipe Kuncar (University of Canterbury)
• Karin Stahel (University of Canterbury)
• Ayushi Tiwari (University of Canterbury)
• Katharine Vincent (The University of Auckland)
Unfortunately Melanie Roundill (Victoria University of Wellington) was unable to attend to give her Lightning Talk.






Plenary: Lifting. Shifting. Transforming? Cyclone Gabrielle's lessons for Aotearoa New Zealand's disaster resilience
- Chair: Liam Wotherspoon (University of Auckland)
- Tom Wilson (National Emergency Management Agency, University of Canterbury)
- Anna Madarasz-Smith (Hawkes Bay Regional Council
- Chad Tareha (Napier City Council)
This session explored the key issues that arose from the response and recovery to Cyclone Gabrielle. All speakers covered what has gone well to-date, important lessons learnt, and thoughts on future response and recovery efforts. Speakers covered the local, regional and national perspectives of Aotearoa New Zealand's third ever declared National State of Emergency. Tom reflected in particular on the increasing tempo and scale of events that have happened in Aotearoa New Zealand over the last ~20 years. Speakers brought into focus the state of semi-continuous response and recovery of many communities, infrastructure networks and emergency management systems.
The evolving lessons from this event in terms of impacts in urban and rural areas, as well as to critical infrastructure, will provide insights into what we can expect from future earthquakes and other natural hazard events in this region. These lessons can also be transferred to other locations across the country.


Plenary: Seeing Red: How can we bring our earthquake-prone buildings up to scratch?
- Chair: Olga Filippova (University of Auckland)
- Alistair Cattanach (Dunning Thornton Consultants)
- Kelvin Tapuke (Massey University)
- Glen Hazelton (Dunedin City Council)
Speakers in this plenary presented a number of different approaches that can be considered in bringing Aotearoa New Zealand’s earthquake-prone buildings up to scratch.
The recent earthquake-prone building (EPB) legislation that came into effect in 2017 requires buildings in high and medium-risk areas to be strengthened at pace, and for good reason. EPBs are 10-25 times more likely to collapse in an earthquake.
Although many building owners have successfully strengthened their buildings, there is still much to be done, with hundreds of EPB notices expiring this decade. This will inevitably put financial pressure on building owners, and strain the professional and construction industry to complete the level of work required.
This session discussed the retrofit decision-making process, the influence of Mātauranga Māori and its contribution to resilient building practices, and the role of urban regeneration in enhancing seismic resilience. As a panel they discussed the challenges and opportunities to improve the resilience of our most vulnerable buildings.
Olga offered a link at the end of the session for a VR field trip of Opeke Marae, you can access that virtual tour here.


Poster Showcase Session 1
A new addition to the 2023 Annual Meeting line-up, our first Poster Showcase Session was a real test for researchers to share their research to the full plenary audience in under 60 seconds. With some timing challenges and quite a few laughs we look forward to the second session on Thursday.
Today's presenters were:
• Christopher de la Torre (Poster #8)
• Dr Aisling O'Kane (Poster #29)
• Julián Rincón (Poster #32)
• Holly Faulkner (Poster #46)
• Wendy Saunders (Poster #50)
• Zheng Luo (Poster #65)
• Esther Aigwi (Poster #67)
• Mitchell Anderson (Poster #75)
• Cécile L'Hermitte (Poster #77)
• Raj Prasanna (Poster #89)




Poster Session
With 95 posters to review our afternoon poster session was well attended and provided an opportunity for our community to connect and discuss their current research.




QuakeCoRE 2023 Directors' Award was presented to Roger Fairclough
This annual award is given to members of our QuakeCoRE whānui, to recognise significant dedication and service to the mission and values of QuakeCoRE.
This year’s award recognises the huge dedication and commitment of Roger in supporting the advancement of the Te Hiranga Rū QuakeCoRE mission since its inception in 2016.
Roger has been involved in a wide range of QuakeCoRE activities, guiding the programme’s research direction at a strategic level. He has been generous with his time in reviewing and assessing research plans and RfP rounds. He has been actively involved in projects across a range of areas, particularly in the infrastructure space. Roger provides an important bridge between research and practice, offering a pathway into numerous government departments and infrastructure organisations. He has helped to initiate and nurture these relationships through various roles, supporting the translation of research into impact. Roger’s deep experience in the lifelines infrastructure and other resilience spaces has helped to align and leverage research across multiple research programmes, a difficult task but something that adds great value to the wider research eco-system.
Roger is regularly found in deep discussion with QuakeCoRE PAL’s, AI’s and students at various events and is a regular attendee at the Annual Meeting. His enthusiasm for QuakeCoRE’s work is clear to see, and he is a big part of the success of many projects.

Evening
Before the QuakeCoRE Community Dinner we were treated to an incredible kapa haka performance by students from Tamatea High School of Ahuriri Napier. Attendees were also taught a waiata (song) with actions.
We then had an address from Sarah-Jayne McCurrach, Head of Risk Reduction and Resilience at Toka Tū Ake EQC, the sponsor for the QuakeCoRE 2023 Annual Meeting.
Attendees then shared a delicious family-style meal before taking to the dance floor to show off some impressive moves!


The 2023 Annual Meeting Programme Overview (PDF) is available here.
The full Annual Meeting Programme booklet (PDF) is available online here.
The Programme includes all speaker abstract and bios, attendees and ways you can connect with QuakeCoRE.
The Poster Abstract book is available here
Thanks to our 2023 Annual Meeting sponsor: Toka Tū Ake EQC