The most dangerous volcanoes in the world that are active and threaten life on Earth

There are around of 1,350 “potentially active volcanoes around the worldAccording to the United States Department of the Interior and it is known that just over a third of them broke out at some point in history.

But where are most of the volcanoes found? where are there more chances to find active ones?

“Most of the planet’s volcanoes are located underwater along the 65,000km mid-ocean ridge system.“explains Ed Llewellin, professor of volcanology at Durham University, in a specialist publication responsible for this UK house of studies.

Where are the most active volcanoes in the world?

“About 80% of Earth’s magma production comes from volcanoes along these ocean ridges.which are usually found between 3 and 4 km below the surface of the ocean and are basically underwater mountain ranges or ranges of volcanic origin, where seeing both images, the ocean ridges, are found in the separation areas of the tectonic plates Llewellin added. .

“A part of the backbone system, about 9,000 km– it crosses the eastern Pacific, but it also crosses all major oceans, including 16,000 km along the center of the Atlantic, “said the researcher.

“It can be easy to forget these volcanoes,” Llewellin said, “because they are hidden deep beneath the ocean’s surface and, as a result, their eruptions rarely affect us. But what about the volcanoes that are located above the ocean’s surface?

Of the volcanoes found on the mainland, many of them are found around the Pacific Ocean. “This is because the Pacific Ocean is bounded by “subduction zones”, which are places around the edges of the tectonic plates where one plate slides under the other.“Llewellin assured.

As a result of this tectonic activity, the Pacific is home to the Ring of Fire, a 40,000 km long seismic beltin the shape of a horseshoe, the epicenter of about 90% of the world and earthquakes 75% of the world’s active terrestrial volcanoes.

The dangerous volcanoes of the Pacific Ring of Fire

Around the Pacific, old, cold, dense oceanic plates “slip under adjacent continental plates”Llewellin pointed out. As these plates descend into the mantle, they release water from the minerals formed on the ocean floor, and this water causes the mantle above to melt, producing magma.

Magma rises from the mantle over the descending plate and makes its way through the overlying continental plate. That is why there are mountain ranges of volcanoes throughout the Pacific, such as the Andes in South America, the Waterfalls in North America, the Aleutians between Alaska and Siberia, etc.

In the western Pacific, subduction zones “are mainly characterized by the sliding of one oceanic plate under another oceanic plate,” Llewellin explained. This can form volcanic island chains, such as the Japanese archipelago and much of Melanesia, a sub-region of Oceania in the South Pacific that contains Fiji, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, and Papua New Guinea.

There are some of the most dangerous active volcanoes on the planet.

Volcanoes: a latent danger to life on earth

Due to the nature of tectonic movements, the Pacific has not always been a hot spot for volcanoes. In fact, 252 million years ago, when the Permian period became the Triassic, the Earth would have been far less hospitable due to the scale of volcanic activity occurring across the planet.

At that time, what is considered the largest mass extinction event in history occurred, with an estimated extinction of 96% of marine life and 70% of land life, largely due to powerful volcanic eruptions, according to a 2017 article in the journal Nature.

Fortunately for humans and other current inhabitants of the Earth, volcanic eruptions are not as numerous today as they were in the planet’s past.

“If we include underwater volcanoes along ocean ridges, most of the Earth’s volcanic activity has been located outside the Pacific area.Llewellin said.

“Throughout the history of the Earth, the frequency of volcanic activity has slowly decreased. The early Earth was much warmer than it is today, so much so that we believe there have been periods when the entire earth’s surface It was covered in an ocean of magma.

“If anyone wants to see a real eruption, it is best to go to Stromboli, a small island off the tip of ItalyLlewellin explained.It has erupted, almost non-stop, for the last 1,500 years or so“.