A major earthquake struck the Southern Ocean at half-past midday today, Saturday 12th April 2008 New Zealand time.
The magnitude 7.3 earthquake, which struck at 12:30 p.m. was located 110 km south-south-west of Macquarie Island (755 km south-west of Auckland Island) at a depth of 10 km. The epicentre is about 1400 km south-west of Dunedin.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre issued a bulletin at 12:44 indicating that no tsunami threat existed for coastlines in the Pacific. However, it added, “This centre monitors only a limited number of sea level gauges outside the Pacific so it may not be able to quickly detect or measure a tsunami if one was generated.”
[Compiled from data supplied by the U.S. Geological Survey and its contributing agencies; and the U.S. National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration’s Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre.]