Stop One, Subduction!

I haven't actually gone anywhere new yet. That's because I grew up near a major fault line here in Seattle! The plate of Juan de Fuca is slowly subducting under the major North American plate off the coast of the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State. This means that the Juan de Fuca plate and the North American plate have collided, and the Juan de Fuca plate is more dense so it is forced underneath. We are quite overdue for a major earthquake, in fact. There hasn't been one big enough to cause any serious damage since 1965, although there was a magnitude 6.8 earthquake in 2001 but it didn't cause a ton of damage. The most recent big volcanic eruption was in 1980, when Mt. St. Helens exploded. Explosions aren't common around here, but they are devastating when they do happen. There are a lot of volcanoes around the Seattle area, almost every mountain in the Cascade Range is a volcano. Mt. Rainier, Mt. St. Helens, and Mt. Baker to name a few. The actual fault line isn't visible, since it is underwater, but it is still amazing to look out over the waves and think about what could happen at just about any time.

http://www.allaboutgemstones.com/images/rock_cycle_subduction.jpg