Arabian and Nubian Tectonic Plates Separating

[Dover]

Xan Rice in Afar, Ethiopia
Thursday November 2, 2006
The Guardian


Fissures have opened in the Earth’s surface in Afar as the Arabian and Nubian tectonic plates pull apart. Scientists say the process is the same as that which created the Atlantic. Photograph: Xan Rice

The nomads were terrified. For a week the ground had shuddered violently. Cracks opened up in the soil swallowing goats and camels. Sulphur-laced smoke rose out of the dark slits. After retreating to the hills, the nomads saw chunks of obsidian rock burst through the Earth's crust "like huge black birds" and fly 30 metres into the air.
A mushroom cloud of ash dimmed the sun for three days. At night the new crater breathed flashes of fire.

"They had experienced earthquakes before but never anything like this," said Atalay Ayele, a seismologist at Addis Ababa University, who interviewed the Afar tribespeople soon after the volcanic eruption 13 months ago in this remote corner of north-eastern Ethiopia. "They said that Allah must have been angry with them."

But Dr Ayele, 37, and his colleagues wanted a scientific explanation. They knew the area was geologically unstable, but the number of earthquakes - 162 measuring more than four on the Richter scale in just two weeks - made them suspect that something extraordinary had happened deep underground.

They asked a team of British-based scientists with access to satellite technology for help. When the results came back it seemed as unlikely as birds flying out of the ground. Here in the Afar desert, one of the hottest and driest places on earth, the tribe had witnessed the birth of a new ocean. Images from the European Space Agency's Envisat satellite showed that a huge rift, 37 miles long and up to eight metres (26ft) wide, had opened deep in the Earth's crust. The tear, the largest observed since the advent of satellite monitoring, was created by a violent lateral rush of molten rock, or magma, along the fault line separating the Nubian and Arabian tectonic plates.
Tim Wright, a geologist at the University of Leeds who interpreted the satellite results, was astonished by the images and what they pointed to.

"The process happening here is identical to that which created the Atlantic Ocean," said Dr Wright during a recent research expedition in Afar. "If this continues we believe parts of Eritrea, Ethiopia and Djibouti will sink low enough to allow water to flow in from the Red Sea."..cont'd

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,,1936881,00.html

[Redneck Socialist]

1. That's pretty amazing

thanks for posting it.

[msongs]

2. we can use this to STOP the ocean rising due to global warming ->

the extended report at the link says the rift is as much as 100 meters below sea level (350 feet?) and is only seperated from the red sea by some highlands. we could pipe the red sea to the rift and relieve the rise in sea levels, plus create some new ocean and some new resorts and fishing grounds.

why not?

Msongs
www.msongs.com/political-shirts.htm

[TheMadMonk]

4. Won't do much for sea levels, But...

the idea does have other merits. The areas open for inundation (ie below sea level) around the world are minuscule compared to the ocean's total coverage.

However the idea has been floating about for a while to do something similar for the Dead Sea. It would ameliorate the sea's ever increasing salinity as it shrinks, and the movement of the water to the lower elevation could be used to generate a considerable amount of power.

Still there might be other considerations in the region mentioned in the article, such as the current agricultural utility of the land. With the Dead Sea, the results would me mostly restorative.

[Buck Laser]

3. Damn! And I thought they were happy... nt

[Ediacara]

5. Uh... this isn't news, exactly

The Nubian Subplate (the western part of the African Plate) has already seperated from the Arabian Plate. You all know this seperation as the Red Sea. I suspect this is actually rifting within Africa, seperating the Somali and Nubian subplates even further.