While they will be heard for roughly three minutes, Christchurch City Council Civil Defense and Emergency Management Manager Brenden Winder says there’s nothing to be alarmed about.
“If you are near the coast on Sunday morning and hear the sirens going off, you don’t need to evacuate or be alarmed.
"This is just a test to make sure the system is working.”
It comes as a yearly tradition, where the alarms are tested at both the beginning and end of every daylight savings period.
And just in case anybody is not aware it’s a test, nearby residents will be able to hear 'this is a test of the tsunami warning sirens. Do not be alarmed. This is only a test’.
The system is designed to trigger a warning in advance, up to three hours before a tsunami can even reach the coastline.
Environment Canterbury (ECan) says the Canterbury region has previously experienced four damaging tsunamis in the past: in 1868, 1877, 1960 and 2010, all out of the South American coast.
Modelling by ECan shows a locally sourced tsunami could take an hour to reach the shore, which would mainly be caused by earthquake fault lines both on land and under the sea off the North Canterbury coast.
