It is important to understand plate boundaries in order to understand where there may be occurrences of natural hazards such as earthquakes and volcanoes.
Iceland is situated on the Eurasian and North American Tectonic Plates, two divergent plates. Divergent plates move away from one another. Due to this, Iceland has many earthquakes. (see map of most recent earthquake activity below)
Along boundaries such as this, earthquakes are very common and magma rises from the earth’s core forming more land. In fact the Eurasian and North American Plates pull this country apart by a few centimeters every year.
Iceland is pretty special in the world of plate tectonics, as it is one of the only places on Earth that you can see these two tectonic plates and the Mid-Atlantic Ridge above ground. (see photo below)
It is even possible to swim between two continents as is pictured below.
Earthquakes are not the only natural hazards caused by these two plates. Volcanic eruptions such as the Eldfell eruption in 1973, the 1783 eruption of Laki, and the 2010 eruption of Eyjafjallajokull (see photo below) were all a result of the North American and Eurasian Plates moving apart.
References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasian_Plate
https://www.britannica.com/place/Eyjafjallajokull-volcano
Very interesting research. I LOVE this island!- amazing the tectonic boundary is right there to walk on or dive across...I am curious what you'll find out next week when we discuss earthquakes in detail!
ReplyDeleteHey there, nice post and beautiful photos. Iceland is the most intriguing country. I plan to travel there eventually, and now when I do, I know to add swimming between the tectonic plates to my itinerary.
ReplyDeleteHi! I like that you added a lot of images to go along with your research. It's really cool that you can physically see the two tectonic plates, and even swim in between them.
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