The Pacific “Ring of Fire” is living up to its name.
The 450 or so volcanoes that make up the ring outline have been unusually active this year, sparking evacuations on the Indonesian island of Bali and on the tiny island nation of Vanuatu. Parts of southwestern Japan, meanwhile, have been shaken by a series of earthquakes, unsettling the local population, in an area where the massive Pacific Plate grinds against other plates that form the Earth’s crust, creating a 25,000-mile zone where earthquakes and volcanic eruptions are unusually common.