Township rallies to help storekeeper after quake

TWISTED: An earthquake-damaged railway line in Mauriceville. WTA210114KHRAILWAY01

The community came together to help Eketahuna Four Square and bottle store manager Tanmay Patel get his store back up and running following the 6.2 quake on Monday, which left him with products and alcohol scattered across the floor.

"They all offered to help as much as they could ... they [the community] all came to help me out, one after the other.

"The damage wasn't too bad, just things falling off the shelves, there was quite a few bottles that were broken and needed to be cleaned up," he said.

Mr Patel said his major concern was making sure the building was structurally safe.

Tararua Council workers have since declared the building safe and the store was reopened at 6am yesterday, having only been closed for a couple of hours after the earthquake.

Mr Patel said Eketahuna was still shaking and GeoNet reported more than 20 aftershocks in the region yesterday.

The strongest was a magnitude 4.5 jolt, which occurred just after 1pm.

"The experience when it was shaking was very scary, you don't want to have any more of these but I think it's still shaking, since it [the earthquake] hasn't stopped yet completely, we just had quite a big one, more than a four I think."