5.1 Te Aroha quake: Fear of the 'big one' as aftershocks rattle New Zealand town

A magnitude 5.1 earthquake has rocked New Zealand's upper North Island on Wednesday morning, with a report of a freezer rolling 30cm across the kitchen near the epicentre.

The quake struck at 5.39am, five kilometres south of the Waikato township of Te Aroha, GeoNet says.

It's been the talk of the town, with people recounting their shaky wake-up and a gift shop manager wondering if something bigger is coming.

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The shallow quake had a depth of seven kilometres and GeoNet classified it as "strong" in its preliminary report.

More than 7000 reports of the quake had been registered at 5.53am with the majority considering it light or moderate – and several aftershocks have been reported, including a moderate one at 11.21am.

Te Aroha resident Rowene Potaka woke up when the bed moved, and stuff fell off the shelves.

"It gave me a big fright, this is the biggest I've felt in Te Aroha. It does make me wonder if we are heading for a big one."

Potaka manages Addictions gift shop on the main street and said products had fallen off shelves.

"I knew the shop would have been affected, so I have been putting stuff back on shelves this morning."

Jan Llewell was working in one of the second hand shops and said a lot of dishes, crockery and glasses had fallen off shelves.

She woke up just before the earthquake.

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"I heard quite a big bang before the shake. There was one last week - it lasted longer but wasn't as severe as today's."

This time the freezer rolled across the kitchen floor about 30cm, she said.

"My little dog was shaking and whining, so I brought her to work. She must have known it was coming as she didn't want to come out of bed."

Williams Furniture and Hardware store owner Andrew Hight said the cat jumped off the bed when the shaking started.

"It was a good one, it was a rolling shake that went for a while.

While it didn't scare him, his wife Lisette got a fright.

"I haven't seen her get out of bed so early or so quickly," Hight said.

The couple's pool was surging for quite a while after.

Jo Gifford said she was in the shop getting an emergency kit basics for a friend, like a water container and bucket.

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Gifford said it felt like being on a boat when the shaking started.

"The house didn't move, but it was shaking"

She is used to earthquakes as she grew up in Morrinsville and in the 1970s they had earthquakes all the time.

"If you laid concrete you would just wait and then see the little cracks appear. You grow up knowing you are by the Kerepehi fault line, but we didn't have significant quakes in the region….not like Edgecumbe. That was incredible – it ate cows and part of the railway line went into the ground."

Matamata-Piako District councillor Sarah-Jane Bourne said the shake was "a bloody good one".

She was sitting in her car outside the milking shed about 10 kilometres west of Te Aroha when the earthquake occurred.

"The car started rocking and rolling, and I thought that was pretty windy, but I looked outside, and it was still."

She said she hadn't felt the aftershocks but was aware there had been "a couple of decent ones".

Bourne said the council would be sending people out to check on possible damage to infrastructure, but she didn't know of any reported damage as of 8am.

She said they had a couple of earthquakes in the last couple of weeks, but they're generally a rare occurrence.

Matamata-Piako mayor Adrienne Wilcock lives in Matamata and said it wasn't strong enough to wake family visiting from Christchurch.

A ring-around revealed some people had objects fall off their shelves but, as of 10am, she wasn't aware of any serious damage.

"There are staff out checking infrastructure and bridges."

Meanwhile, Shayne Downey in Cambridge said the quake woke him and sent his bed "bouncing".

"It reminded me of a loaded truck passing by, but it carried on for about 39 seconds," he said.

There were also reports of it being felt in Leamington.

Six more – smaller – shakes in Te Aroha were reported by Geonet as of 11.40am on Wednesday.

Most were classed as weak, with one moderate, and all were listed as being five kilometres south of the town.

GeoNet expects these to continue over coming hours and days with frequency and size tapering off.

The last strong earthquake in Te Aroha area was in 1972 and was magnitude 4.9, GeoNet said.

Wednesday's 5.1M earthquake comes after a 3.9M shake rattled the same area on December 29 at 6.56am.

It, too, struck five kilometres south of east Waikato town.

Earthquakes are somewhat uncommon in the area, but in the wake of the 3.9 event GNS Science seismologist John Ristau said it's a good reminder that, in New Zealand, "you can still get larger and damaging earthquakes no matter where you are".

Ristau said that quake did not occur on a known fault line.

"Most earthquakes don't actually occur on any known fault line or a fault line we have mapped before. This is assuredly the case with this one too."

A police spokesperson said they were not aware of any damage, but people were calling in to make them aware of the quake.

This story originally appeared on Stuff and has been reproduced with permission.