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Message: <blockquote data-quote="methsri" data-source="post: 7650498" data-attributes="member: 65662"> <a href="http://ritemail-places.blogspot.com/2009/11/new-ocean-to-form-inside-africa.html" target="_blank"></a><a href="http://ritemail-places.blogspot.com/2009/11/new-ocean-to-form-inside-africa.html" target="_blank"></a>    <a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3uVHTH5I/AAAAAAAAUaw/8o_xo4Tg0gM/s1600/New-Ocean-001.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3uVHTH5I/AAAAAAAAUaw/8o_xo4Tg0gM/s640/New-Ocean-001.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></a> A 35-mile rift in the desert of Ethiopia will  eventually become a new ocean or sea, researchers now confirm. The  crack, 20 feet wide in spots, opened in 2005. Some geologists believed  then that it would spawn a new ocean. But that view was controversial, and the rift had not been well  studied. A new study involving an international team of scientists and  reported in the journal <a href="http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2009GL039605.shtml" target="_blank">Geophysical Research Letters</a> finds the processes  creating the rift are nearly identical to what goes on at the bottom of  oceans, further indication a new sea is in the region's future. The same  rift activity is slowly <a href="http://www.livescience.com/forcesofnature/060719_red_sea.html" target="_blank">parting the Red Sea</a>, too. Using newly gathered  seismic data from 2005, researchers reconstructed the event to show the  rift tore open along its entire 35-mile length in just days. Dabbahu, a  volcano at the northern end of the rift, erupted first, then magma  pushed up through the middle of the rift area and began "unzipping" the  rift in both directions, the researchers explained in a statement today.  "We know that seafloor ridges are created by a similar intrusion of  magma into a rift, but we never knew that a huge length of the ridge  could break open at once like this," said Cindy Ebinger, professor of  earth and environmental sciences at the University of Rochester and  co-author of the study. The result shows that highly active volcanic  boundaries along the edges of tectonic ocean plates may suddenly break  apart in large sections, instead of in bits, as the leading theory held.  And such sudden large-scale events on land pose a much more <a href="http://www.livescience.com/environment/top10_naturaldisasterthreats_us.html" target="_blank">serious hazard</a> to populations living near the rift  than would several smaller events, Ebinger said. "The whole point of  this study is to learn whether what is happening in Ethiopia is like  what is happening at the bottom of the ocean where it's almost  impossible for us to go," says Ebinger. "We knew that if we could  establish that, then Ethiopia would essentially be a unique and superb  ocean-ridge laboratory for us. Because of the unprecedented cross-border  collaboration behind this research, we now know that the answer is yes,  it is analogous." The African and Arabian plates meet in the remote  Afar desert of Northern Ethiopia and have been <a href="http://www.livescience.com/environment/070130_africa_torn.html" target="_blank">spreading apart</a> in a rifting process — at a speed of  less than 1 inch per year — for the past 30 million years. This rifting  formed the 186-mile Afar depression and the <a href="http://www.livescience.com/forcesofnature/060719_red_sea.html" target="_blank">Red Sea</a>. The thinking is that the Red Sea will  eventually pour into the new sea in a million years or so. The new body  of water would connect to the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, an arm of  the Arabian Sea between Yemen on the Arabian Peninsula and Somalia in  eastern Africa. Atalay Ayele, professor at the Addis Ababa University in  Ethiopia, led the investigation, gathering seismic data with help from  neighboring Eritrea and Ghebrebrhan Ogubazghi, professor at the Eritrea  Institute of Technology, and from Yemen with the help of Jamal Sholan of  the National Yemen Seismological Observatory Center. <a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3pqCNcpI/AAAAAAAAUaI/cShqoly0H9E/s1600/New-Ocean-002.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3pqCNcpI/AAAAAAAAUaI/cShqoly0H9E/s640/New-Ocean-002.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></a> Tim Wright/University of OxfordA crevice in  the Afar Triangle signals the birth of an ocean. In ten million years  this ocean will split the African continent. <a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3p-MDmLI/AAAAAAAAUaQ/HtaxbZKFjGA/s1600/New-Ocean-003.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3p-MDmLI/AAAAAAAAUaQ/HtaxbZKFjGA/s640/New-Ocean-003.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></a> Dereje Ayalew/Universität Addis  AbbabaScientists examine crevices in the Afar Triangle. <a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3p5SQIHI/AAAAAAAAUaY/0Eu_CxGRkjs/s1600/New-Ocean-004.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3p5SQIHI/AAAAAAAAUaY/0Eu_CxGRkjs/s640/New-Ocean-004.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></a> SeaWiFS Project/NASA/Goddard Space Flight  Center/ORBIMAGEAn aerial view of north-eastern Africa. The Afar Triangle  is the sandy-colored triangle bordering on the sea. <a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3qbBF3QI/AAAAAAAAUag/s9EtMPQl1ZA/s1600/New-Ocean-005.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3qbBF3QI/AAAAAAAAUag/s9EtMPQl1ZA/s640/New-Ocean-005.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></a> Anthony PhilpottsA view of the East African Rift System, which is  already largely below sea level. <a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3qufkmaI/AAAAAAAAUao/OK4OJ9R91yY/s1600/New-Ocean-006.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_iTGXYFIkfkA/SwP3qufkmaI/AAAAAAAAUao/OK4OJ9R91yY/s640/New-Ocean-006.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></a> Asfawossen AsratThis crevice was photographed  in the fall of 2005. It is 500 meters (1,640 feet) long and 100 meters  (328 feet) deep. </blockquote>

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