A swarm of earthquakes struck near White Island in the Bay of Plenty overnight.
The quake activity began at 8:19 p.m. on the evening of Monday the 27th of October 2008 with a shallow magnitude 3.1 quake. By the time activity ceased at 6 minutes after midnight, sixteen quakes of 3rd and 4th magnitude had been recorded over a period of about 4 hours.
Quakes of magnitude 4.0 were recorded at 9:33 p.m. and 4.1 at 10:33 p.m. The swarm included three quakes of magnitude 3.8 and three of 3.9. Activity was relatively quiet until another quake of magnitude 4.0 struck at 4:13 this morning, at which point the swarm seems to have run its course.
All of the quakes were located within 30 km of White Island volcano at depths of 5 km.
[Compiled from data provided by the GeoNet project and its sponsors EQC, GNS Science and FRST.]