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Great Rift Valley. The Great Rift Valley ( Swahili: Bonde la ufa) is a series of contiguous geographic trenches, approximately 7,000 kilometres (4,300 mi) in total length, that runs from Lebanon in Asia to Mozambique in Southeast Africa. [1] While the name continues in some usages, it is rarely used in geology as it is considered an imprecise ...
It was formerly considered to be part of a larger Great Rift Valley that extended north to Asia Minor. A narrow zone, the rift is a developing divergent tectonic plate boundary where the African Plate is in the process of splitting into two tectonic plates, called the Somali Plate and the Nubian Plate, at a rate of 6–7 mm (0.24–0.28 in) per ...
This rift zone separates the African Plate to the west from the Somali Plate to the east. One hypothesis proposes a mantle plume rising beneath the Afar region pushing the crust outward, whereas an opposing hypothesis explains the rifting by dynamics in the crust, as a break in the African Plate along a line of maximum weakness as plates to its ...
A rift valley is a linear shaped lowland between several highlands or mountain ranges produced by the action of a geologic rift. Rifts are formed as a result of the pulling apart of the lithosphere due to extensional tectonics. The linear depression may subsequently be further deepened by the forces of erosion.
Plate tectonics map. The East African Rift (Great Rift Valley) in eastern Africa; The Mid-Atlantic Ridge system separates the North American Plate and the South American Plate in the west from the African Plate and the Eurasian Plate in the east; The Gakkel Ridge is a slow spreading ridge located in the Arctic Ocean
Red Sea Rift. The Red Sea Rift is a mid-ocean ridge between two tectonic plates, the African Plate and the Arabian Plate. It extends from the Dead Sea Transform fault system, and ends at an intersection with the Aden Ridge and the East African Rift, forming the Afar Triple Junction in the Afar Depression of the Horn of Africa .
The Jordan Rift Valley was formed many millions of years ago in the Miocene epoch (23.8 – 5.3 Myr ago) when the Arabian Plate moved northward and then eastward away from Africa. One million years later, the land between the Mediterranean and the Jordan Rift Valley rose so that the sea water stopped flooding the area. Alternatively, it was a ...
Scientists estimate that the rift could one day even split Africa in two and form an entirely new ocean (though that might take awhile, as the two plates are currently moving a part and the ...