Quake leaves residents rattled
Items thrown from shelves in late-night shake, aftershocks
Central North Island residents were woken by a late-night earthquake, with dozens of aftershocks also reported. The 5.6 magnitude quake struck about 20km southwest of Taupō shortly before midnight on Wednesday, at a depth of 5km.
More than 5000 people reported feeling the quake on Geonet.
Oruanui resident Beth, in her 70s, told Newstalk ZB: “Never felt anything like it before.
“Things fell down and next thing I could hear water.
“It shook the hot boiler so violently it’s ruptured all the pipes at the top. Water was spraying all over the floor down and through the carpet.
“First thing I did was dive into the room and get my grandson — he looked quite frightened.
“And then I ran outside in the dark to turn the water off.”
Taupō resident Karen felt the quake.
She, her family and their newborn baby got “shaken up pretty badly”.
“We’ve been through the big quake in Whakatā ne years ago and this was not nice.
“It was a complete reminder of what we went through back then.”
Taupō resident Stacey Fox, whose house is on a hill, said it shook all night; breaking glass and spilling books and cans from the pantry onto the floor.
CCTV security footage showed the moment the quake hit at the Asian Sari-sari store.
Just after 11.48pm, items on the shelves began to shake, before some fall to the ground.
Dozens of aftershocks
By 5.23am, there had been at least 29 aftershocks.
The biggest was reported at 12.40am as a 4.5 magnitude shake at a depth of 5km about 20km southwest of Taupō.
Those who felt the quake also took to social media to share their experiences.
On the GeoNet Facebook page, Taupō local Brittany Rose said: “Was that a good one. Still rumbling here for [the] past hour and hasn’t stopped.”
Katie Howie said over at her house, drawers “flew open” when the quake struck.
That was “a biggie”, she wrote. Taupō resident Les Pepper said the shakes brought back memories of being in the 1987 Edgecumbe earthquake.
Pepper, who lives in the Rangatira Park area, said they usually get regular small earthquakes, but the latest shake was different.
“This one woke me up in a real rush. Our two-story house was rocking and creaking. I could hear things falling off of shelves,” he said.
“I hope this isn’t the volcanic events in the lake starting to ramp up. We lived through the Edgecumbe earthquakes whilst based at Matahina hydro power station.
“It’s brought a lot of those memories back.”
Pepper said things had settled down by yesterday morning and there appeared to be no major damage on his street.
Earthquake activity ‘sharply increased’ overnight
Taupō Volcano’s seismicity — the occurrence or frequency of earthquakes in a region — had “sharply increased” overnight, as a result of the 5.6 magnitude quake.
Hauraki Gulf Weather reported about 6.30am that there had been over 150 earthquakes in the area in the past 12 hours.
“Since April’s unrest started, 1000 (plus) earthquakes have been recorded,” according to the site.