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NZEALAND-QUAKE-TSUNAMI
New Zealand cancels tsunami alert after powerful quake
WELLINGTON, June 16, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – A powerful 7.2-magnitude earthquake
stuck near the remote Kermadec Islands northeast of New Zealand Sunday,
briefly prompting a tsunami warning.
After initially forecasting “a threat to beach, harbour, estuary and small
boat activities”, New Zealand’s Civil Defence organisation gave the all-clear
eight minutes later.
The earthquake was give a preliminary magnitude of 7.4, but later
downgraded to 7.2 by the US Geological Survey.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center also lifted its tsunami warning for
parts of the South Pacific but said “minor sea level fluctuations may occur
in some coastal areas near the earthquake”.
The earthquake struck at 10:55am (2255 GMT Saturday) at a depth of 10
kilometres (six miles) some 928 kilometres (575 miles) north-northeast of the
New Zealand city of Tauranga in the North Island.
The Kermadecs are uninhabited apart from a few New Zealand conservation
workers based on Raoul Island, the largest in the area.
The islands are the peaks of volcanoes, some of them active, that rise
above sea level and are often rocked by earthquakes above magnitude 7.0.
In recent years they experienced one in 2006, another in 2007 and two in
2011.
The Kermadecs are part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, a hotbed of volcanic
and earthquake activity at the intersection of several tectonic plates.
BSS/AFP/MSY/0816 hrs