THE TAUPO QUAKES.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 172, 22 July 1922, Page 7

THE TAUPO QUAKES.

• ■ — ".•* THERMAL, NOT VOLCANIC CAUSE. A SCIENTISTS CONCLUSIONS. (By Telegraph. Corresnondent.) TAUPO, Friday. Mr. J. F. Stenberg has just spent five weeks at Wairakei. During that time, he assisted Professor Marsden by keeping a general seismic record. The instruments recorded the distance of, source, depth, and general direction. So far as the shakes were concerned, he felt far heavier ones in other parts of -\ew Zealand. Even the heaviest had nothing of a terrifying nature, and most of them were minor tremors. So slight, were they that when one wa.3 sitting still all "that was noticeable was a rattling of windows. There were a few cracks in different parts. According to the instruments the origin of the shocks was seated in the flat country lying between Wakaipo Bay and Oruanui, a distance of 6 to 8 miles. Mr. Steriberg said he had gone over all the country and found the worst cracks in Wakaipo. One of the most notable effects of the shocks was a subsidence of ISm in depth and 12in in width which he and Professor Marsden had photographed. It was this which had produced so called "gushers." It would have been astonishing if they had no. been produced. Compared with this the cracks at Oruanui were trifling. According to the records the forces producing vrsc shakes were three miles deep, while it was computed by the professor that the big shake on last •Friday week came from 7 miles away, and the direction pointed to White Island. The cause of these shakes, he pointed out. was not volcanic, but thermal, and were due to a block fault and steam tiring to force its way through. Mr. Stenberg mentioned a curious coincidence. In conversation with Mrs. Grierson, former owner of Wairakoi and the hotel, she referred to the record of shakes in nSO7. which she had kept at Wairakei and Taupo. It was a particularly complete record, and, said Mr. Stenberg, if you did not know ivou might think you were reatog a record of the recent seismic disturbances, and, he added, they are gradually fading away now as they did then. The fact that the disturbance was conj fined to within an area of 20 miles , showed that it was not of a serious .character. Everything was percect-y; I quiet when he left Wairakei.