The Instituto Geográfico Nacional has recorded a series of deep tremor beneath the Canary Islands since Saturday 7 October 2017, with the majority of the tremors beneath the southern part of the island of La Palma. None of these events was large enough to cause any problems in itself, however the islands are volcanic in origin and seismic activity beneath volcanoes can be significant, as they are often
caused by the arrival of fresh magma, which may indicate that a volcano
is about to undergo an eruptive episode.
Earthquakes in the Canary Islands since 7 October 2017. Instituto Geográfico Nacional.
The Canary Islands are a group of volcanic islands fuelled by a mantle
plume rising through the African Plate, on which they are situated. The
plume is rising from deep within the Earth, and is independent of the
movement of the tectonic plates at the Earth's surface. As the plate
moves relative to the hotspot new volcanic islands form on its surface,
each over the hotspot when it forms, with the oldest islands of the
chain in the east (the African Plate is being pushed east by the
expansion of the Atlantic Ocean, but the hotspot is relatively
motionless).
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