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A map of East Africa showing some of the historically active volcanoes (as red triangles) and the Afar Triangle (shaded at the center), which is a so-called triple junction (or triple point) where three plates are pulling away from one another: the Arabian plate and two parts of the African plate—the Nubian and Somali—splitting along the East African Rift Zone Main rift faults, plates ...
The linear depression may subsequently be further deepened by the forces of erosion. More generally the valley is likely to be filled with sedimentary deposits derived from the rift flanks and the surrounding areas. In many cases rift lakes are formed. One of the best known examples of this process is the East African Rift. [1]
The East African Rift is an active rift between the Nubian and Somali protoplates. This rift is caused by elevated heat flow from the mantle under Kenya and the Afar region. Trending NNE to SSW, the East African Rift is composed of a western and an eastern branch.
The infill of magmas in the form of dykes helps to define the shape of a volcano. A higher frequency of intrusive events along rift zones leads to elongated topographies of the affected edifices. [6] Mathematical models show how the presence of rift zones contributes to a central horizontal bulge or ridge parallel to the orientation of the ...
Geologists predict that in about 10 million years the whole 6,000 km (3,700 mi) length of the East African Rift will be submerged, forming a new ocean basin as large as today's Red Sea, and separating the Somali plate and the Horn of Africa from the rest of the continent. [9] The floor of the Afar Depression is composed of lava, mostly basalt.
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; The East Pacific Rise, extending from the South Pacific to the Gulf of California; The Baikal Rift Zone in ...
The junction of the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden and the East African Rift centered in the Afar Triangle (the Afar triple junction) is the only R-R-R triple junction above sea level. The Rodrigues triple junction is a R-R-R triple junction in the southern Indian Ocean, where the African, the Indo-Australian and the Antarctic Plates meet. [8]
Zones of thickened crust, such as those formed during continent-continent collision tend to spread laterally; this spreading occurs even when the collisional event is still in progress. [7] After the collision has finished the zone of thickened crust generally undergoes gravitational collapse , often with the formation of very large extensional ...