Wellington

Emergency response teams were already flying by helicopter to the region at the epicentre of the original 7.8 magnitude quake, which struck just after midnight some 91 km northeast of Christchurch in the South Island, amid reports of injuries and collapsed buildings. New Zealand’s capital Wellington was a virtual ghost town with workers ordered to stay away while the local council assessed the risk to buildings. Severe weather with 140 kph galeforce winds was forecast for the area, which could cause more damage, such as from glass loosened by the tremors.

The new tremor, a 6.2 quake recorded at about 1.45 p.m. local time (0615 IST), was the most powerful of hundreds of aftershocks in the South Pacific country. It rattled frayed nerves in an area where memories of a deadly 2011 quake are still fresh. Christchurch, the largest city on New Zealand’s ruggedly beautiful South Island, is still recovering from the 2011 quake, which measured 6.3 magnitude and killed 185 people. Powerlines and telecommunications are down, and daylight revealed sizeable cracks in roads and damage to infrastructure after the original quake just after midnight shook New Zealanders from their beds. “It was the most significant shock I can remember in Wellington,” Prime Minister John Key told reporters at a dawn news conference from the parliament’s underground bunker in the capital city.

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