Moderate mag. 5.9 earthquake - South Pacific Ocean, 222 km north of East Island, Gisborne, New Zealand, on Monday, 17 February 2020 at 00:28 (GMT) -
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Moderate magnitude 5.9 earthquake at 230 km depth
17 Feb 00:32 UTC: First to report: GEONET (NZ) after 3 minutes.
Date & time: 17 Feb 2020 00:28:43 UTC -
Magnitude: 5.9
Depth: 230.3 km
Epicenter latitude / longitude: 35.79073°S / 179.35228°E

Nearest volcano: Rumble III (79 km / 49 mi)
Nearby towns and cities:
250 km (155 mi) NNE of Ruatoria (pop: 897) --> See nearby quakes!
340 km (211 mi) NNE of Gisborne (pop: 34,300) --> See nearby quakes!
354 km (220 mi) NE of Tauranga (pop: 110,300) --> See nearby quakes!
422 km (262 mi) ENE of Manukau (pop: 362,000) --> See nearby quakes!
425 km (264 mi) ENE of Hamilton (pop: 152,600) --> See nearby quakes!
428 km (266 mi) ENE of North Shore (pop: 207,900) --> See nearby quakes!
428 km (266 mi) ENE of Auckland (pop: 417,900) --> See nearby quakes!
439 km (273 mi) ENE of Waitakere (pop: 208,100) --> See nearby quakes!
464 km (289 mi) NNE of Napier City (pop: 56,800) --> See nearby quakes!
729 km (453 mi) NE of Wellington (pop: 381,900) --> See nearby quakes!
464 km (288 mi) NE of North Island (pop: 3,749,200) --> See nearby quakes!
Primary data source: GEONET (NZ) (Earthquake Commission and Geological Survey, New Zealand)
Estimated released energy: 4.5 x 1013 joules (12.4 gigawatt hours, equivalent to 10676 tons of TNT or 0.7 atomic bombs!) More info
Data for the same earthquake reported by different agencies
Info: The more agencies report about the same quake and post similar data, the more confidence you can have in the data. It takes normally up to a few hours until earthquake parameters are calculated with near-optimum precision.
Magnitude | Depth | Location | Source |
5.9 | 230 km | New Zealand | GEONET (NZ) |
5.5 | 133 km | South Of Kermadec Islands | EMSC |
User reports for this quake (4)
User reports estimate the perceived ground shaking intensity according to the MMI (Modified Mercalli Intensity) scale.
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Leave a comment if you find a particular report interesting or want to add to it.
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Send your own user report!
Whangarei (433.7 km W of epicenter) [Map] / not felt : Over 6.0 200km deep is unlikely to be felt u less directly under landmass, 230km deep and 200km from shore is 300km actual distance and softened by the water above the epicenter. Depth to magnitude ratio are the most critical for surface detection.
Auckland / Weak shaking (MMI III) : earthquakes in this location are in the kermedec trench out to sea from NZ, a few people report felt report to our local geonet site.
Warkworth, Auckland / not felt : That all depends on the distance and depth.
TW, Lantz, NS Csnada / not felt : I have been following this site for some time now and I am just wondering how strong does an earthquake have to be to get a rise out of the People of New Zealand. Cause a 5.9 Didn't seem to garner much interest report wise.
Aftershocks
More info
Recorded aftershocks, latest first (12 quakes):- 09 Apr 2020 05:00 UTC| M 3.5 |12 km (7.5 mi) depth|28 km (18 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 05 Apr 2020 01:19 UTC| M 3.6 |176.6 km (109.7 mi) depth|47 km (29 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 01 Apr 2020 14:46 UTC| M 3.4 |33 km (20.5 mi) depth|45 km (28 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 25 Mar 2020 15:59 UTC| M 3.3 |133.2 km (82.8 mi) depth|36 km (22 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 15 Mar 2020 14:53 UTC| M 3.5 |230.2 km (143 mi) depth|5 km (3 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 09 Mar 2020 05:39 UTC| M 3.3 |212.4 km (132 mi) depth|48 km (30 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 03 Mar 2020 03:40 UTC| M 4.6 |98.2 km (61 mi) depth|37 km (23 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 29 Feb 2020 07:21 UTC| M 3.5 |100 km (62.1 mi) depth|16 km (10 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 25 Feb 2020 17:08 UTC| M 2.8 |117.2 km (72.8 mi) depth|23 km (15 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 23 Feb 2020 12:16 UTC| M 3.9 |177.7 km (110.4 mi) depth|49 km (31 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 19 Feb 2020 07:25 UTC| M 2.9 |100 km (62.1 mi) depth|12 km (7 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
- 17 Feb 2020 14:54 UTC| M 3.8 |215.2 km (133.7 mi) depth|53 km (33 mi) distance| GEONET (NZ) | Details
Earlier earthquakes in the same area
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