Swarm of quakes off East Cape felt around NZ, but by only one Gisborne person

A swarm of earthquakes struck off East Cape over the weekend and was felt by hundreds around the country - but only one person in Gisborne reported noticing anything.

This was despite the largest quake being a 4.6 magnitude tremor at a depth of only five kilometres.

Around 30 quakes were recorded by GeoNet, from Saturday afternoon through to Sunday afternoon, in a small area between 60 and 70 kilometres north-west of Te Kaha, to the north-east of Whakaari/White Island.

Most ranged from magnitude two to three.

Further quakes were recorded over a wider area through to Monday morning.

After two preliminary tremors, the largest quake measured 4.6 at a depth of five kilometres, 65km north-west of Te Kaha, and this was reported to GeoNet by 266 people from Auckland right down to south of Christchurch.

This hit at 10.20pm on Saturday night.

The majority of those who felt it, reported it as “weak", a handful as “moderate” but a report from Rakaia in the South island amazingly reported it as “severe”!

Surprisingly, only one “felt” report came from Gisborne, while 70 came from Whakatane and most of the rest around the Bay of Plenty to Coromandel coastal region.

Other reports came in from as far afield as Taranaki, the Waikato, Wellington, Nelson, the West Coast and five at Christchurch.

GeoNet’s instruments pinpointed the quakes to a depth of between five and 12 kilometres, in an area where the depth of water is around 300 metres or more, by a line of ridges to the west of the Kermadec Trench.

No damage appears to have been reported from the 4.6 event.