A small magnitude 1.9 earthquake occurred this morning at 2:33am in an unusual location. GeoNet pinpointed the epicentre 30km south west of Whangarei on an old inactive fault that runs from the Kaipara Harbour northward past the Tangihua Range.
Historically, GeoNet has never recorded a quake in this location. It's around 22km north west of the M4.3 Waipu earthquake from 17th December 2003 which triggered 20 nearby aftershocks in the days following.