Subduction of the Pacific Plate beneath the North American Plate creating the Aleutian trench and volcanic island arc (Credit: Alaska Volcano Observatory). Click image for a larger view.

A fascinating new study reveals that a massive chunk of Earth’s crust, buried deep beneath the Midwest, is slowly pulling ...

Seismic mapping of North America has revealed that an ancient slab of crust buried beneath the Midwest is causing the crust ...

Off the coasts of southern British Columbia, Washington, Oregon and northern California lies a 600 mile-long strip where the Pacific Ocean ... the overriding North American plate.

Six of the majors are named for the continents embedded within them, such as the North American ... Juan de Fuca plate is largely responsible for the volcanoes that dot the Pacific Northwest ...

Geologists attribute the Laramide Orogeny to the subduction of an oceanic plate, specifically the Farallon Plate, beneath the North American Plate. This subduction began roughly 160 million years ...

The Cascadia subduction zone, where the oceanic Juan de Fuca plate descends beneath the overlying North American plate, extends 1100 km from northern California to northern Vancouver Island.

The Cascadia Subduction Zone is capable of generating powerful earthquakes. The study found compact sediments along the coast of Washington and northern Oregon, a result that suggests that the ...