The earthquake was mainly felt in the east and south of the North Island. Image / geonet.org.nz
An earthquake has struck close to Tauranga, but it appears no one in the Bay of Plenty noticed.
The 5.0 magnitude Labour Day shake happened at 5.44am.
It was 276km deep and 20km south of Tauranga.
As of 8am, just over 900 people reported to Geonet they felt the shake,
most of whom were located along the East Coast and the bottom of the North Island.
Geonet posted on its Facebook page the deep earthquake was on the Pacific tectonic plate, far to the west of where it dives under the Hikurangi fault.
