Quake Trackers, an educational programme designed to promote science education and earthquake hazard awareness in New Zealand, was first started in 1998. However, the relatively expensive and complex equipment required led to limited participation by schools.
The programme is to be revitalised by using a simple, robust and reliable seismograph.
Total hydro-electric lake storage passed below last year’s levels during the week, dropping to 76% of average for the time of year on Friday 27th April, 2007.
New Zealand’s national storage stood at 2305.2 Gigawatt hours (GWh) on Friday, having steadily declined from 3037 GWh on March 19th. Storage has been below average since February 21st.
Inflows from catchments have often been below average since January, reflecting the dry conditions that persisted during the late summer. Above average lake inflows were recorded on only 3 days during February, 9 days during March and 1 day during the detailed reporting period to April 21st.
Full details for April are expected to be available by the end of next week.
[Compiled from data supplied by M-co.]
A portfolio worker is someone who works for a range of clients in various roles. This breaks the tradition which has a technician working solely on technical work, a writer simply producing text, a software expert only hacking code or an accountant just working on budgets.
In many ways, most small business operators are portfolio workers ”“ carrying out a range of duties within their own businesses whilst providing professional services to their clients.
A series of four moderate to strong earthquakes have struck at varying depths near Vanuatu since Sunday morning, New Zealand time. Three of the events have been located within 180 km of Luganville and all within 450 km of Port Vila.
The perversity of the weather usually makes an early start to get to a dawn parade on ANZAC Day an uncomfortable one. But this year’s Indian summer has changed that with dry weather in the North Island and the upper two thirds of the South Island encouraging good turnouts for the dawn commemorative services.
The continuing trend of mild days but with cooler nights poses the question ”“ Is this April drier than normal for Tawa?
Some residents of the Bay of Plenty were jolted from their slumber by a 4th magnitude earthquake just before midnight, last night.
A strong, deep earthquake struck near the interface between the Pacific Plate and Bismarck Microplate near Papua New Guinea this evening, New Zealand time.
A moderately strong earthquake struck to the south of the Kermadec Islands this morning, New Zealand time. It follows a series of similar quakes along the west of the Pacific Plate during the past day.
Geonet has invited feedback on its new website. The completely revamped website went live on April 12th, and Geonet has now posted a news item asking for visitors’ feedback.
Yesterday’s earthquake south of the Kermadec Islands was the latest in a series of light to strong quakes both north and south of New Zealand during the past week.
Earthquake activity continued at a low level, apart from a swarm of quakes near Matata. White Island, Mt Ngauruhoe, and Mt Ruapehu remained at Alert Level 1.
Geonet, the USGS (NEIC) and IGNS reported 58 earthquakes in the New Zealand area between the Kermadec Islands in the north, and the Auckland Islands to the south during March 2007. The magnitude distributions were as follows:
M6 to 6.9 (none), M5 to 5.9 (4), M4 to 4.9 (12) M3 to 3.9 (32).
An additional 10 events in the magnitude 1 and 2 range were deemed worthy of mention.
A major makeover of the Geonet website went live late today. The completely changed website layout was originally scheduled for launch at the end of February, in order to bring together news on geological events with relevant background material of public interest.
Data published on the Geonet website for quakes associated with the Matata earthquake swarm indicate that the earthquakes have become shallower during the first week of April. However, this is not the case, according to seismologist Bryan Field.
New Zealand’s hydro lake storage remained below average during March 2007, due to a month of mainly below-average inflows.