At 12:51 pm on the 22nd of February, 2011, Christchurch was violently shaken by a 6.3-magnitude earthquake, causing wide-spread damage and multiple fatalities. Massive disruptions have been experienced by everyone within the region and OCS, like many New Zealand organisations, has devoted resources to assisting those in need.
Immediately following the event we contacted our staff and key clients to check on their wellbeing and to offer our assistance. Given the national state of emergency, we assigned priority to those key clients whose services were most essential to the people of Christchurch such as Christchurch Hospital, Christchurch City Council and Christchurch International Airport Limited (CIAL). Special assistance was provided to the emergency evacuation centres.
Since having restored a satisfactory level of services to those essential clients, our attention has turned to our other clients who have been so desperately working to get their businesses back on their feet. The Christchurch earthquake has severely hampered businesses of all shapes and sizes (many irreparably so) and OCS has been doing everything it can to assist those in need. We brought in three 12-seater vans for our rapid response teams. We have been working in cooperation with our competition in many instances, providing our hard-working staff with meals and food parcels, and even delivering milk for Civil Defence teams. Our WasteLine Division has been coordinating waste removal requirements for many of our clients, relieving them of the need to worry about waste removal following the efforts of our cleaning teams.
We, as a company, are proud of our staff's response to the crisis. Many letters of thanks were received and serve as a testament to how our people stepped up and went far beyond the call of duty.
"Please pass our thanks and appreciation to all the OCS staff who have worked at the airport in the last week since the earthquake," Jim Boult, Chief Executive of CIAL writes, "The demands on your staff have been great, and their role has been crucial in ensuring that the airport functions well, looks good and meets standards for health and safety. This has been vital for keeping the airport open and giving travellers a clean and comfortable environment at a difficult time."
Our hearts and priorities remain in Christchurch and will continue to be until the city is back on its feet and on the road to recovery.
