Which type of fault is found in the Great Rift Valley of East Africa? In a normal dip-slip fault, which of the following statements describes the movement of the hanging wall relative to the footwall? The hanging wall moves down relative to the footwall.
What type of fault is the East African Rift Valley?
The East African Rift Valley (EAR) is a developing divergent plate boundary in East Africa. Here the eastern portion of Africa, the Somalian plate, is pulling away from the rest of the continent, that comprises the Nubian plate.
What type of fault is the Great Rift Valley?
The San Andreas is a transform fault that marks the roughly northward movement of the Pacific plate and the roughly southern movement of the North American plate. Many of Earth’s deepest rift valleys are found underwater, dividing long mountain ranges called mid-ocean ridges.
Which type of fault would be most common at the East African Rift?
Landscapes in the rift valley can appear confusing. The most striking features in this view are the numerous, nearly parallel, linear fault lines that occupy the floor of the valley.
What caused the Great Rift Valley in Africa?
Geologists know that the Rift Valley was formed by violent subterranean forces that tore apart the earth’s crust. … These forces caused huge chunks of the crust to sink between parallel fault lines and force up molten rock in volcanic eruptions.
What is the East African Rift an example of?
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 year.
What will happen if a Rift Valley continues to pull apart?
If these two rift zones continue they will break apart the crustal plates they are located on and will create new plates. Sea water will flood the rift valleys and they will eventually become seas like the Red Sea.
What is the Great Rift Valley and why is it important?
The system of rift valleys that characterizes the African continent represents a perfect environment to understand the evolution of mankind; for the important paleoanthropological discoveries in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Zaire, the African rift valleys are indeed considered the “cradle of mankind”, that is …
What countries does the Great Rift Valley go through?
The Rift Valley consists of a group of independent interior basins, extending from Djibouti in the north to Tanzania in the south, nearly half being located in Ethiopia.
…
| Name of basin | Total area of basin | Area in the country |
|---|---|---|
| Uganda | 4 514 | |
| Kenya | 102 452 | |
| Southern lakes: | 178 800 | |
| Kenya | 25 000 |
Why Rift Valley has steep sides?
c) Rift valleys have steep sides because they are formed when the earth crust is divided, they are not like those valley which are formed by soil erosion.
How is Rift Valley formed?
A rift valley is a lowland region that forms where Earth’s tectonic plates move apart, or rift. Rift valleys are found both on land and at the bottom of the ocean, where they are created by the process of seafloor spreading. … Tectonic plates are huge, rocky slabs of Earth’s lithosphere—its crust and upper mantle.
How fast is Africa splitting apart?
The three plates are separating at different speeds. The Arabian plate is moving away from Africa at a rate of about 1 inch per year, while the two African plates are separating even slower, between half an inch to 0.2 inches per year, according to Macdonald.
What are some distinctive features of the East African Rift Valley?
Rift valleys are usually narrow and long, some measuring hundreds of kilometres in length. Their floors are relatively flat, owing in large part to volcanic deposition and marine or lacustrine sedimentation. The sides of rift valleys drop steeply away in the form of steps and terraces.
What will happen to the Great Rift Valley in Africa eventually?
Eventually, it will rupture, leading to the formation of a rift valley. This process is accompanied by surface manifestations along the rift valley in the form of volcanism and seismic activity. Rifts are the initial stage of a continental break-up and, if successful, can lead to the formation of a new ocean basin.
Who lives in the Great Rift Valley?
An estimated 1,000 to 1,500 Hadza live in the central Great Rift Valley and the surrounding plains in north-central Tanzania, where they subsist almost entirely off the land: hunting animals, foraging for roots and fruit, gathering honey.
Why the Great Rift Valley in Africa is a good example of divergent convergence?
Great Rift Valley (The Best Example of a Divergent Boundary) … In a southwest direction, the fault continues as the Great Rift Valley, which split the older Ethiopian highlands into two halves. In eastern Africa, the valley divides into the Eastern Rift and the Western Rift.