New Zealand was startled this morning (local time) by a major earthquake. The quake, with a magnitude of 5.8 on the Richter scale, was mainly felt in the capital Wellington. This was also noticed by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who was in the middle of a TV interview at the time. “It shakes quite a bit here.”
“We are dealing with an earthquake here,” said Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in the middle of an interview for the television program AM Show. “It shakes quite a bit here,” she continues. When asked if the interview could be continued, she replied: “Yes, I am not under hanging lamps and this looks like a solid building.”
The epicenter of the earthquake was located 30 kilometers northwest of the town of Levin, on the North Island of New Zealand. That city is not far from the capital Wellington, where the earthquake was felt by tens of thousands of New Zealanders. The quake occurred at a depth of 37 kilometers and was followed by 19 aftershocks.
New Zealand’s finance minister, Grant Robertson, also felt the “massive” earthquake. “That’s not what we need,” he writes on Twitter:
Not what we need right now #eqnz
— Grant Robertson (@grantrobertson1) May 24, 2020
According to the authorities, there is no risk of a tsunami, but as a precaution train traffic has been stopped and the tracks are being checked. There are no reports of damage or injuries, but there are images on social media of shops where products fell from the shelves.