Friday morning got off to a shaky start, and there was little respite for thousands of coastal residents who were sent scrambling for the hills. There were three significant quakes - the first striking at 2:27am, and the largest at magnitude 8.1, off the Kermadec Islands. The serious rumblings prompted a tsunami alert and a call for people throughout Northland, Bay of Plenty and the East Coast to move to higher ground, where they were forced to stay for several hours. GNS senior scientist Graham Leonard talks to Lisa Owen.