A seismologist says Christchurch can expect to be rattled by more aftershocks after a series of earthquakes rattled the quake-battered city on Friday.
A cluster of earthquakes, the largest registering 6.0, rocked the city on Friday afternoon causing minor damage to some buildings, liquefaction and dozens of minor injuries.
They came more than six months after the last quake of note had hit the region - a 6.3 shake on June 13. GNS natural hazards research manager Kelvin Berryman said the latest quakes mean the area would be in for a period of sustained seismic activity.
"We've re-sparked the aftershock sequence and so we are going to expect more in the coming months," he told Radio New Zealand.
Dr Berryman said aftershocks following the June jolt had started to taper off in the last few weeks before Friday's renaissance.
"It takes this sort of length of time for the stresses to build to release the next piece of a very complicated fault network." He had begun to think they might have seen the end of the quakes despite GNS forecasts that they could expect a 5 or 6 magnitude.
"I had my fingers crossed, everything crossed, hoping we were turning the corner and things were dying away in the last few weeks but the stats and forecast model were saying yes, but."
He said aftershocks would continue to rattle the region with scores of smaller earthquakes expected to rattle the region well into next year.
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