Nature's fireworks
Avatar

Nature's fireworks

by Derya Gürer, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands

This picture was taken during a stay on the island of Tanna (lat/long 19.52 S, 169.43 E) Vanuatu in April 2011. Tanna means Earth in Tannese. Mount Yasur (361 m), the world's most accessible active volcano, shows Strombolian to Vulcanian activity. It owes its existence to the eastward-moving Indo-Australian Plate being subducted under the westward-moving Pacific Plate. The red glow of the volcano was apparently what attracted Captain James Cook to land on the island in 1774.

Featured on GeoLog, the official blog of the European Geosciences Union