It’s been an active 24 hours and some Cantabrians remain nervous as a swarm of aftershocks continue to rattle the region.

More than a dozen tremors have been recorded and felt  in and around Christchurch inside the last day with one or two small shakes centred directly underneath the city.

This last week has seen an increase in activity with significant aftershocks rattling the city and outlying areas.

Yesterday morning began with a 4.1 shake just after 9.30 and weather analyst Richard Green was surprised at the intensiity. “It started off fairly lame but built over a period of time and as I was standing outside the shed door burst open and all the wood came tumbling out”.

Later in the afternoon a sharper jolt centred just off Goldley Head hit the area and was felt as far south as Timaru.
It registered 4.8 on the richter scale at a depth of 8 kilometres and was felt by many city wide.
This had quite a few people guessing it was more than magnitude 5 because of the abruptness of the jolt and many were surprised of the lower magnitude recorded. The Port Hills and eastern suburbs bore the brunt of this aftershock.

Throughout the evening more than half a dozen shakes of 3 to 3.5 magnitude reminded locals that the sequence that many believed had either tailed off or were easing overall haven’t quite disappeared yet.

Apart from a few reports of dishes crashing on the floor or  books falling from shelves there were few reports of damage.

Prior to the last seven days there had been little activity in the province for approxiamately six weeks and although the shakes have not been severe as many previous aftershocks it’s the mental toll for some locals which is the biggest battle of all.

Story by R.Green