Earthquakes near Wellington, 1927–2026

It was also the deadliest: NOAA records 261 deaths for it. 6 earthquakes here in these years are on NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 6.5 on August 16, 2013 (29 km SE of Blenheim, New Zealand). NOAA lists 2 tsunamis that began within 100 km of Wellington, and 2 from elsewhere that reached it with deaths or a metre of water or more. The highest water NOAA records here was 3.9 m, on November 13, 2016.

• November 13, 2016Tsunami · 3.9 m hereOff East Coast Of South IslandNOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• August 16, 2013Earthquake · M 6.529 km SE of Blenheim, New ZealandUSGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• February 2, 1931Earthquake · M 7.447 km WSW of Hastings, New Zealand · 261 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• June 16, 1929Earthquake · M 7.368 km S of Wakefield, New Zealand · 17 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia

• An event counts for Wellington when it began within 100 km of its centre, or 200 km for an earthquake of magnitude 7 or more. Damage can reach further.
• USGS counts here start at magnitude 6: the catalogue’s smaller quakes thin out going back, where few instruments listened.
• NOAA lists significant events only: earthquakes that killed, did about $1 million of damage, reached magnitude 7.5 or intensity X, or raised a tsunami, and eruptions and tsunamis by like measures. Magnitudes before 1900 are its estimates from written accounts.
• Deaths are NOAA’s total for each event, wherever people died, its tsunami and fires included. A tsunami counts the dead its runup records give for this place: NOAA’s total for a tsunami includes its source quake’s.
• A tsunami from elsewhere counts where one of its runups killed or rose a metre or more.
• Counted to October 19, 2026, as is the map. The last 30 days ask USGS again.

How the layers work, where their data comes from and what they can’t tell you: Earthquakes, live, The world through history