It all started like this – what’s wrong, my legs feel really strange? We were walking across the supermarket car park and the ground started bucking up and down. Holding on the the trolley as our legs tried hard to hold us up, we looked in wonder as the parked cars started bouncing up and down. Wow – that was a big earthquake! The biggest one we have felt for some time. Let’s hope it is not “The Big One” which is well overdue in the Wellington region.
GeoNet said the big quake stuck at 2.31pm and it was graded as a 6.6. Its centre was 10km south east of Seddon at a depth of 8km. Police said it appeared there was buildings were severely damaged in Seddon, which has been the centre of seismic shaking since a magnitude 6.5 tremor struck on July 21.
Damaged house in Seddon, photo by Sam Wallace / Twitter
In Wellington, Mayor Celia Wade-Brown said at 4pm that there was no indication of severe damage in the capital, but she described the traffic system as "chaos". Roads were gridlocked and the situation was compounded by the cancellation of all rail services. Hundreds of people were stranded at Wellington Railway Station.
Traffic in and out of Wellington centre blocked - and no trains.
We are staying at Paekakariki Holiday Park for the weekend, and everyone felt the earth move. There have been quite a number of after shocks, in fact, while I am writing this, another earthquake is shaking the caravan. Paekakariki is quite close to the coast line and we are relieved that there has not been a tsunami warning to worry about as well. It may well be a restless night for us, we expect.
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