Papa New Guinea's Erupting Trio

Tuesday was an exciting day for inhabitants of Papua New Guinea's West New Britain as three volcanoes erupted simultaneously.

The three volcanoes - Langila, Ulawun, and Rabaul - all spewed ash at the same time, but each acted a little differently.

Langila, the westernmost volcano, and Rabaul, the easternmost volcano, each emitted faint plumes of ash into the air, both of which drifted to the northwest. Strangely though, the thick stream of ash from the most active volcano, Ulawun, blew straight to the south.

Because these volcanoes are so close to each other and tend flare up at the same time, scientists suggest they could be affected by the same underground tectonic activity.

This image was captured Aug. 9. 2005 by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer on NASA's Terra satellite.

--Bjorn Carey

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Credit: NASA Earth Observatory