When do rift valleys occur

The earthquakes and volcanoes are the result of small and large tectonic plates separating and being subducted around the Pacific Ocean. The global mid-ocean ridges are found in all the oceans on Earth. The center of these mid-ocean ridges are rift valleys that separate lie between the two separating plates. As the plates move apart magma from the upper mantle flows out onto the ocean floor in the valleys creating the newest crust on the planet.

The valleys are at the summit of a bulge in the floor of the ocean that gradually drops down as it moves away from the ridges when two plates are separating. Kids Fun Science Bookstore.

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Home About Us Contact Us. Enjoy this page? Please pay it forward. Here's how Like many underwater rift valleys, the East Pacific Rise is dotted with hydrothermal vents. Geologic activity beneath the underwater rift valley creates these vents, which spew super-heated water and vent fluid s into the ocean. Continental Rift Valleys. Very few active rift valleys are found on continental lithosphere.

The Baikal Rift Valley is formed by a divergent plate boundary, where the Amur plate is slowly tearing itself away from the Eurasian plate, and has been doing so for about 25 million years. The Amur plate is moving eastward at a rate of about 4 to 5 millimeters. The West Antarctic Rift is one of the most difficult rift valleys to study, because it lies beneath the massive Antarctic Ice Sheet , which can be more than 2 kilometers 1. The Rio Grande Rift separates the Colorado Plateau , which is generally moving in a clockwise direction, from the older part craton of the North American plate.

The most well-known rift valley on Earth is probably the so-called " Great Rift Valley System " which stretches from the Middle East in the north to Mozambique in the south.

The area is geologically active, and features volcano es, hot spring s, geyser s, and frequent earthquake s. Today, however, the Great Rift Valley exists as a cultural concept, not a scientific one. The northern part of the system is the Jordan Rift Valley.

Millions of years ago, the Arabian Peninsula was connected to Africa. Seafloor spreading caused the Arabian and African plates to rift apart. The Indian Ocean flooded the rift valley between the continents, creating the Red Sea. Today, Africa and Asia are connected by the triangle of the Sinai Peninsula. East African Rift. Throughout the East African Rift, the continent of Africa is splitting in two. The African plate, sometimes called the Nubian plate, carries most of the continent, while the smaller Somali plate carries Horn of Africa.

River valleys are produced by erosional forces. A new ocean begins when hot mantle material begins to move upward beneath a continent. Geoscientists are still not certain about why that happens. The lithosphere of the continent bulges upward and is stretched sideways. Eventually its breaks along a long crack, called a rift.