Earthquakes, Upper West South Island

A pair of shallow 4th magnitude earthquakes struck the Kahurangi National Park in the upper South Island this morning, waking several residents.

The quakes were located on-shore in the park near the coast between Karamea and Takaka.

The first of the pair was a magnitude 4.3 quake which struck at 2:11 a.m. on Wednesday 12th December 2007, 40 km north of Karamea (50 km south-west of Collingwood) at a depth of 20 km. This quake was felt from Karamea on the western coast of the South Island to several settlements at Golden Bay.

A magnitude 4.0 quake occurred at 6:53 a.m. at a location 40 km north-east of Karamea (40 km south-west of Takaka) at the shallower depth of 12 km. This quake was also felt from Karamea to settlements in Golden Bay.

Three 3rd magnitude earthquakes were reported north of Murchison during November and another south of Reefton. A magnitude 3.9 quake struck in a similar location to this morning’s events on the 1st of October.

Back in May, a burst of activity saw four earthquakes with magnitudes between 3.5 and 4.1 recorded near Takaka, Karamea and Murchison. During March, three quakes with magnitudes between 3.2 and 4.7 were recorded near Karamea, and a deep quake of magnitude 4.7 near Murchison, as well as a shallow magnitude 3.9 event near Reefton.

Two quakes of magnitude 3.0 (shallow) and 4.4 (deep) were reported near Murchison during February, and a pair of shallow 3rd magnitude events during January.

[Compiled from data provided by the GeoNet project and its sponsors EQC, GNS Science and FRST; and the US Geological Survey and its contributing agencies.]

Leave a Reply