Wild Land

Another earthquake struck off the coast of the North Island near Porangahau this afternoon.

Thursday 9th September 2010

A magnitude 5.3 earthquake struck 10 km south-east of Porangahau at 4:18 this afternoon. The quake, centred 80 km south of Hastings (50 km south of Waipukurau), was 20 km deep.

Shaking was felt from Tauranga in the north across to Taranaki and Westport in the west, and as far south as Canterbury. Strong shaking was experienced in the Manawatu and Wairarapa regions and it is thought that minor damage may have been sustained close to the epicentre. GeoNet’s instruments indicate that MM6 shaking occurred near Porangahau where damage to household contents may have occurred.

In 1904 a magnitude 6.7 earthquake struck about 20 km south-east of today’s event, and a magnitude 6.2 quake struck onshore 15 km to the west in 1990.

On Tuesday two earthquakes were recorded close by. At 10:48 a.m. a magnitude 5.2 quake struck 20 km south-east of Porangahau (90 km south of Hastings) at a depth of 15 km. That evening, at 6:36 p.m., a magnitude 4.2 earthquake struck the same location at a depth of 12 km.

Last night (Wednesday), at 11:53 p.m., a magnitude 3.3 quake was recorded within 5 km of Porangahau at a depth of 11 km.

To the north, a 40 km-deep magnitude 3.6 earthquake struck 40 km south of Hastings at 10:03 on Tuesday morning.

[Compiled from data provided by the GeoNet project and its sponsors EQC, GNS Science and FRST.]

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 9th, 2010 at 5:53 pm and is filed under Earthquakes - Observations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.