"So stay out of the water on the East Coast this morning."
Those worried that the quake had triggered a tsunami were officially told there was no threat - about 50 minutes after the quake struck.
A tsunami alert was never issued by the National Emergency Management Agency when the quake hit at 12.50am off the east coast of New Zealand.
It would be 47 minutes later when those living on that side of the country would know for sure that they were safe from a tsunami.
A spokesman for NEMA told the Herald this morning that a notification was issued on its social media sites, including Twitter, that an assessment was being made to figure out whether or not a tsunami had been triggered.
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That notification appeared on the NEMA Twitter page at 1.07am. Another post saying "there is no tsunami threat" appeared at 1.37am.
Asked why it took so long for that to be established, the spokesman said it took time for scientists to analyse the situation to establish if a tsunami was coming or not.
That is why the official advice has always been if an earthquake was "long or strong - get gone", he said.
'It would have been too late'
Some people thought that was too long a wait to know whether or not they needed to evacuate or get to higher ground immediately.
"If there was a tsunami, it would have been too late," one person said on Twitter.
"The wave travels 600 to 700km per hour - not impressed."
Another man felt confirmation of a tsunami threat, or no threat, should be known "within seconds" particularly to those who would potentially be affected the most.
In this case, the quake was felt by almost 9000 people in areas including the Bay of Plenty, Hastings, Gisborne, Napier and Wellington.
Another poster commented: "Totally agree. I'm not on the coast, but that's way too slow."
One man joked: "Our borders are tight. No need to panic."