The 7.8-strength quake - which has been followed by a rash of aftershocks - struck shortly after midnight, and caused billions of dollars worth of damage in the Waipara and Marlborough regions, with the coastal tourist town of Kaikoura cut off by landslides and devastated by structural damage. Two people died in the quake that also caused major damage in the capital, Wellington. 

Wineries in the northern half of New Zealand's South Island are counting the cost of the devastating earthquake that struck in the early hours of Monday morning.

Waipara and Marlborough are both well-known wine-producing areas and growers and wineries are assessing the damage, as almost 900 aftershocks rumbled through the region in the subsequent 24 hours.

In Marlborough, a wine storage facility had damage to some of its 240,000 liter storage tanks which results to wine spilling out on a nearby road.

The Yealands Estate had also had a damage with tanks shaken up and a lot of quantity of wine had lost.

After the said incident, there ere no reports yet of casualties around Marlborough but storage on the said region had been reported damaged and loss of inventory.

Other neighboring wine region appears to have escaped relatively with the only reported as damaged so far but with just some bottles falling.

In Kaikoura, the earthquake had blocked the main road of south to Christ church which means that deliveries have to take more circuitous route to market. Meanwhile, the road north to the ferry terminal at Picton remains undamaged so far.

The said earthquake was centered on the settlement of Culverden in North Canterbury, near the spa town of Hanmer Springs.

The country is no stranger to seismic activity, with a 7.1-magnitude temblor causing massive structural damage in September 2010, followed by a 6.3-magnitude in February 2011 that killed 185 people in Christchurch. Frequent smaller quakes have been recorded since then, including the 2013 Seddon and Lake Grassmere quakes, both of which caused substantial property damage.