Fires extinguished
Whanganui fire crews were kept busy with scrub fires over the weekend. The Whanganui Fire Brigade was alerted to a small shed fire on Morgan St just before 7pm on Friday. Crews arrived to find scrub and rubbish on fire, with the blaze extinguished in just under an hour. Fire and Emergency was called to an out-of-control burnoff in Feilding around 4pm on Saturday. The Feilding crew took around 15 minutes to extinguish the 40m x 40m fire. The Marton Brigade was called to a scrub fire on Bruce Rd near Turakina around 5.10pm on Saturday. A Fire and Emergency spokesman said it was the size of a rugby field but firefighters had no issues putting out the blaze.
Quake recorded
A magnitude 4.9 earthquake near Waverley was recorded just before 5pm on Friday. The tremor was centred 60km southwest of Waverley, offshore in the Whanganui Basin, at a depth of 120km, Geonet reported. Thousands of people in the lower North Island and top of the South Island reported feeling the earthquake.