Gippsland registers nine earthquakes in six days

Geoscience Australia has recorded nine earthquakes in Gippsland in the nine days to start October.

A magnitude-3.2 earthquake was felt in Leongatha on Wednesday evening, days after a magnitude-4.9 quake hit near Leongatha.

Emergency services are encouraging residents to be prepared in the event another quake hits the region.

An earthquake scientist says there is nothing unusual about the number of earthquakes recorded in Gippsland in the past nine days.

Gippsland has been hit by nine earthquakes in the nine days of October, starting with the magnitude-4.9 quake that rocked the region on Saturday .

That earthquake came one week after a magnitude-3.9 earthquake was recorded at Ensay , in eastern Victoria, which at the time was labelled the most powerful recorded in the area in more than a decade.

Eight aftershocks have been recorded since Saturday's quake, including two tremors overnight of magnitude-2.5 and 1.5.

Geoscience Australia said it received more than 2,000 reports of people feeling Wednesday's tremor, which hit at a depth of 10 kilometres.

Seismology Research Centre chief scientist Adam Pascale said the recent aftershock activity is expected, and there might be more to come.

"We do see this type of activity regularly, just sometimes they're clustered a little bit closer together and other times they're not," he said.

"Whether there's larger events is impossible to tell but again we need to be prepared."

Monash University seismologist and Australian Earthquake Engineering Society president, Dee Ninis, said Gippsland had a history of earthquakes.

"Korumburra is an area that gets quite a few earthquakes; they probably experience an earthquake large enough to be felt a couple of times a year," Dr Ninis said.

The region had two magnitude-4.6 quakes in 2009 only a few weeks apart, and also a magnitude-4.4 quake in 2011.