As part of my project, I challenged myself to spot natural areas beyond the mainland United States, and even beyond Hawai'i and focused on various overseas territories of the country. One of those I spotted were the Northern Mariana Islands, and spotted the Northern and Southern Pagan Volcanoes.
These are two stratovolcanoes connected by a narrow isthmus. Both volcanoes are exposed calderas due to previous eruptions, which are caused by the subduction of the Pacific plate under the Mariana and Philippine plates.
Much like Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, this would-be national park would protect active lava flows (evident by North Pagan's basalt fields) and various endemic life like the Mariana fruit bat, the Myzomela rubratra ssp. asuncionis, and so on. Further, today, the island is semi-inhabited by a non-permanent population of Carolinian and Chamorro people.
One of the main environmental issues facing this remote area include invasive species such as cattle, Sambar deer, goats, pigs, Antigonon leptopus (love vines), Spathodea campanulata (African Tulip trees), and plans by the United States Navy to transform the island into a Range and Testing area under the belief it's permanently uninhabited.
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