Nicaragua is a country in Central America bordering with Honduras and Costa Rica. It’s capital Managua sits in between the interaction of two tectonic plates being the Caribbean plate and Coco’s plate.

Coco’s plate is a oceanic tectonic plate which was formed around 23 million years ago by sea floor spreading along the Coco’s ridge. This interaction between plates is primarily the subduction of the Coco’s plate with an eastern direction movement. This is the one being subducted because it is more dense than the Caribbean Plate. The Caribbean plate is mostly oceanic tectonic plate as well with around 3.2 square kilometers that borders with North and South american plates.

This setting of an older, denser plate formed of basalt being subducted results in the formation of trenches and magma chambers that makes natural hazards like Volcanic activity and Earthquakes to be fairly common in the region not just in Nicaragua.

In the following picture we can see the plate location and way of interaction. We can also see volcanoes forming along the pacific coast of each Central American country (Central American volcanic arc) given the plate submerging in this middle america trench.