Earthquake(s)!

Well, after all of my dad's tasteless comments about 'the big one', the lower North Island was rocked by not one but THREE earthquakes in the early hours of Monday morning. I woke up around 1.30 am to loud rumbling noises and the room, as Morrissey might say, 'oscillating wildly'. Feeling that the end was nigh, I spent an adrenalin-filled moment or so thinking that the roof was going to cave in and crush us. We're six storeys up in a twelve-storey apartment building, so would be in a dodgy position if, and when, the big one does strike. Suddenly, a one-storey house on a quarter-acre section in Lower Hutt doesn't seem quite so unappealing. I didn't sleep much for the rest of the night, and some hours later there was a smaller tremor. Not quite as alarming as the first one though. Checking Geonet the next morning, I discovered that first quake was centred 100km west of Wellington and measured 5.4 on the Richter Scale. Check out the details at: http://www.geonet.org.nz/earthquake/quakes/2737984g.html

There were two further earthquakes at 5.17 and 5.45 am measuring 3.6 and 4.1 respectively. I think it must have been the second of these that I felt. Both of these were centred much further away: near Murchison in the North-west of the South Island.

And Dan? He slept right through it all....