New data from satellite imagery offers valuable tools to study a tectonic rift in one of Africa's most geologically unique points on Earth. Along the stretch of East Africa's Afar region, scientists have found that the continent appears to be splitting apart.
Experts believe that atop the juncture of three tectonic plates, the cleave would eventually create a new ocean basin millions of years from today. Right now, the most apparent evidence is a 35-mile-long split in the Ethiopian desert.
According to Christopher Moore, a PhD doctoral student at the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom, it is the only location on Earth where researchers are able to study the mechanism of how continental rift turns into an ocean rift.
Scientists believe that Africa's new ocean will appear in at least five to ten million years. However, the Afar region's serendipitous location at the boundaries od the Arabian, Nubian, and Somali plates makes it an ideal laboratory to study intricate tectonic processes.
What are Tectonic Plates?
The United States Geological Survey (USGS) describes a tectonic plate as a massive, irregularly shaped piece of solid rock, generally composed of both continental and oceanic lithosphere
The Earth's crust is made up of many large tectonic plates that constantly climb over, slide under, mash against, or stretch apart from one another.
The heat from radioactive mechanisms within the planet's interior causes the plates to move. At times they shift toward and sometimes away from each other. This activity is called plate motion, or a tectonic shift.
For the past 30 million years, the Arabian plate has been moving away from Africa. As a result, the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden between the two linked landmasses came into existence.
There are still a lot of things unknown about the tectonic plate shifting, including what is causing the continent to rift apart. Some think that an enormous plume of superheated rocks rising from the mantle underneath East Africa could be behind it.
Africa to Take on a New Form
Some comprehensive satellite observations, along with field research could aid scientists in piecing together the events taking place in the Afar region's underground base. However, if the area serves as a living laboratory dedicated to the study of the continental rift, the environment would not make it easy for them.
Cynthia Ebinger, a geophysicist at Tulane University in New Orleans, says the region has been described as "Dante's inferno," as it is the hottest populated town on the research campaigns in the Afar area.
Furthermore, she explains that temperatures rise up to 130 degrees Fahrenheit during the daytime and then cool off to about 95 degrees at night.
Each plate boundary in the Afar region is extending at different speeds. However, the joined forces of these separating plates are creating what's known as a mid-ocean ridge system. From this system, experts believe that a new ocean will eventually form.
Ebinger theorizes that the built-up pressure from rising magma could be causing the explosive events seen in the Afar region. She believes that over time, such rifting events will eventually reshape the African continent.
