Up to 12 massive volcanic blasts occurred between 8 million and 12 million years ago in Idaho's Snake River Plain, leading up to today's Yellowstone supervolcano, new research reveals. A dozen of these ancient supereruptions took place along the Yellowstone hotspot track, researchers reported Feb. 10 in the journal Geological Society of America Bulletin. The trail of eruptions marks where the North American tectonic plate sailed over a superhot blob of mantle rock called a hotspot. (The mantle is the rocky layer between Earth's crust and core.) Though learning of more supereruptions in the West may seem unsettling, the findings...