Bathymetry of the northeast corner of the Caribbean Plate showing the major faults and plate boundaries

The Lesser Antilles Volcanic Arc is a

volcanic arc A volcanic arc (also known as a magmatic arc) is a belt of volcanoes formed above a subducting oceanic tectonic plate, with the belt arranged in an arc shape as seen from above. Volcanic arcs typically parallel an oceanic trench, with the arc lo ...

that forms the eastern boundary of the

Caribbean Plate The Caribbean Plate is a mostly oceanic tectonic plate underlying Central America and the Caribbean Sea off the north coast of South America. Roughly 3.2 million square kilometers (1.2 million square miles) in area, the Caribbean Plate borders ...

. It is part of a subduction zone, also known as the

Lesser Antilles subduction zone The Lesser Antilles subduction zone is a convergent plate boundary on the seafloor along the eastern margin of the Lesser Antilles Volcanic Arc. In this subduction zone, oceanic crust of the South American Plate is being subducted under the Cari ...

, where the

oceanic crust Oceanic crust is the uppermost layer of the oceanic portion of the tectonic plates. It is composed of the upper oceanic crust, with pillow lavas and a dike complex, and the lower oceanic crust, composed of troctolite, gabbro and ultramafic ...

of the North American Plate is being subducted under the Caribbean Plate.The University of the West Indies Seismic Research Centre
Caribbean Volcanoes
Accessed: November 18, 2022. This subduction process formed a number of volcanic islands, from the Virgin Islands in the north to the islands off the coast of

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

in the south. The Lesser Antilles Volcanic Arc includes 21 'active' volcanoes, notably Soufriere Hills on Montserrat;

Mount Pelée Mount Pelée or Mont Pelée ( ; french: Montagne Pelée, ; gcf, label=Antillean Creole, Montann Pèlé, meaning "bald mountain" or "peeled mountain") is an active volcano at the northern end of Martinique, an island and French overseas departmen ...

Martinique Martinique ( , ; gcf, label=Martinican Creole, Matinik or ; Kalinago: or ) is an island and an overseas department/region and single territorial collectivity of France. An integral part of the French Republic, Martinique is located in ...

;

La Grande Soufrière La Grande Soufrière ( en, "big sulfur outlet"), is an active stratovolcano on the French island of Basse-Terre, in Guadeloupe. It is the highest mountain peak in the Lesser Antilles, rising 1,467 m high. The last magmatic eruption was in 1 ...

on Guadeloupe; Soufrière Saint Vincent on Saint Vincent;

Mount Scenery Mount Scenery is an active volcano in the Caribbean Netherlands. Its lava dome forms the summit of the Saba island stratovolcano. At an elevation of , it is the highest point in both the Kingdom of the Netherlands, and, since the dissolution o ...

Saba Saba may refer to: Places * Saba (island), an island of the Netherlands located in the Caribbean Sea * Şaba (Romanian for Shabo), a town of the Odesa Oblast, Ukraine * Sabá, a municipality in the department of Colón, Honduras * Saba (river), ...

; and the submarine volcano

Kick 'em Jenny Kick 'em Jenny (also: Kick-'em-Jenny or Mt. Kick-'Em-Jenny) is an active submarine volcano or seamount on the Caribbean Sea floor, located north of the island of Grenada and about west of Ronde Island in the Grenadines. Kick-'em-Jenny rises a ...

which lies about north of Grenada.

References

* Macdonald, R., C.J. Hawkesworth, and E. Heath. (2000). The Lesser Antilles volcanic chain: a study in arc magmatism. Earth-Science Reviews, Volume 49, Issues 1-4, March 2000, Pages 1–76. . * Christeson et al. (2003
''Deep structure of an island arc backstop, Lesser Antilles subduction zone''
Journal of Geophysical Research, V.108, p. 2327]

References

Further reading