The Night the Earth Moved for Us

Tonight was the first time that I'd ever seen mentioned on television one of the very many earthquakes which we have in New Zealand every year. It was a severe enough earthquake to have moved the earth for most people in New Zealand - even in Christchurch on the East side of South Island. This one merited 15 minutes of the late evening bulletin. There was, apparently, property damage in Gisborne (North of Napier at the North end of Hawkes Bay) and the phone lines and mobile phone masts were damaged or out of action because of power lines being down. So far there are no reported casualties and the incident has not been declared a civil defence emergency. There was no tsunami although there were fears in the Gisborne area that there might have been.