With over 20,000 earthquakes recorded over several years (and counting), the full animation now takes quite some time to run through. In order to make it quicker and easier to see the latest information, the home page now shows a non-animated (but still interactive) map of the latest 25 quakes. All of the animated maps (including those previously featured on the home page) are still available via the "Big Quakes" and "Other Maps" tabs.
GeoNet are only posting the larger or more strongly felt quakes on their "recent quakes" page, as with the large number of aftershocks, they are unable to publish all of them on their website. This map uses a full data feed from GeoNet, not their "recent quakes" page, so will display many quakes that don't appear on the GeoNet "recent quakes" page.
GeoNet publish their initial estimate on their website, but often (especially with larger quakes) revisit the data and revise their estimates. The Christchurch Quake Map looks out for these updates and processes them as they become available, but the reports on the GeoNet website don't always get updated. This means that the details shown on the Christchurch Quake Map are the most accurate available at the time.
Sometimes, quakes are retroactively added to the data feed that the map uses. When this happens, they slot into place in the sequence - so you won't see them at the end of the sequence. GeoNet appear to be analysing the data from shortly after the main quake in more detail, publishing many more quakes as a result; there may be occasional jumps in the number of quakes reported on the map as new data for the early period is brought in.
Yes - you can view a single day by selecting it from the "Show day" dropdown box near the top of the right-hand column.
Yes, you can now view an individual quake. Pause the animation once the quake has appeared (alternatively, wait for it to finish by itself, or press the "go to end" button so that it lists all the quakes in the selected period). Then, when you hover over a quake in the list on the right-hand side, you'll see just that one quake (plus any visible "sticky dots"). Once you move your mouse off the list of quakes, the map will return to how it was, and you can click the play button to resume (or restart) the animation.
If you're looking for somewhere in particular (Bexley or Rolleston, for example), and can't see it on the map, try zooming in and panning around the map, using the controls on the left-hand side of the map. You can also zoom with your scroll wheel, and pan by dragging the map with your left mouse button.
The Christchurch Quake Map now uses a custom map, which is designed to make the quake data stand out better. A satellite view using Sentinel-2 imagery provided by LINZ is also available using the buttons in the top left corner. The zoom level has been restricted as the Christchuch Quake Map is a data visualisation, not a navigational aide.