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Story: Historic earthquakes

Slips at Utapu, 1861

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Slips at Utapu, 1861

The explorer J. C. Crawford travelled up the Whanganui River in 1861 and recorded many landslides. In this sketch he depicts a sandstone slip behind the village at Utapu in Whanganui, noting where the hill has slipped down. There are records of earthquake-caused landslides in 1838, and there may have been further landslides from the widespread shaking of the 1855 Wairarapa earthquake.

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Alexander Turnbull Library

Reference: E-041-042

by James Coutts Crawford

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Eileen McSaveney, Historic earthquakes – Earthquakes in Māori tradition, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/artwork/4381/slips-at-utapu-1861 (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Eileen McSaveney, published 2 March 2009, updated 1 November 2017.