Reports of widespread damage in New Zealand quake

There are reports of widespread damage, with electricity and phone services cut in many areas after a powerful quake hit New Zealand just after midnight.

Although no injuries are reported, a tsunamni warning has been issued, calling it “an event of life-threatening or national significance”

Magnitude 7.5 earthquake jolts New Zealand's South Island  https://t.co/STfnviskbk via @MailOnline

— Susie Blackmon (@SusieBlackmon) November 13, 2016

The main tremor was followed by a series of strong aftershocks and there are reports of damaged buildings in the small rural township of Cheviot near the epicenter.

“It was massive and really long,” Tamsin Edensor, a mother of two in Christchurch, says. “We were asleep and woken to the house shaking, it kept going and going and felt like it was going to build up.”

— AFP