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Large Crack in East African Rift is Evidence of Continent Splitting in Two (pbs.org)

A large crack, stretching several miles, made a sudden appearance recently in south-western Kenya. The tear emerged after heavy rains caused havoc in the nation last month, which also saw neighborhood get flooded and major highways closing off. The downpour also exposed a fault line that geologists now say is evidence that the African continent will split into two over the next tens of millions of years. From a report: The Earth is an ever-changing planet, even though in some respects change might be almost unnoticeable to us. Plate tectonics is a good example of this. But every now and again something dramatic happens and leads to renewed questions about the African continent splitting in two. The Earth's lithosphere (formed by the crust and the upper part of the mantle) is broken up into a number of tectonic plates. These plates are not static, but move relative to each other at varying speeds, "gliding" over a viscous asthenosphere.

[...] The East African Rift Valley stretches over 3,000km from the Gulf of Aden in the north towards Zimbabwe in the south, splitting the African plate into two unequal parts: the Somali and Nubian plates. Activity along the eastern branch of the rift valley, running along Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanzania, became evident when the large crack suddenly appeared in south-western Kenya. When the lithosphere is subject to a horizontal extensional force it will stretch, becoming thinner. 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.

81 comments

  1. Trump by argee · · Score: 0, Troll

    In other news, Nancy Pelosi blamed the African Rift on Donald Trump

    1. Re: Trump by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But it's huuuuuge, it's the greatest rift ever! And Mexico is going to pay for it...

    2. Re:Trump by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      yes, that's what we need more of her on Slashdot, ridiculous partisan trolling.

    3. Re:Trump by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is a nice crevice coming along to build that wall in there, you know. Or to provide a moat for the wall. Who wouldn't like a free moat?

    4. Re: Trump by Tablizer · · Score: 2

      In other news, Nancy Pelosi blamed the African Rift on Donald Trump

      But it's huuuuuge, it's the greatest rift ever! And Mexico is going to pay for it...

      East or West Mexico? It may spit also.

      Seriously, though, politicians on all sides routinely blame each other for every bad thing that happens and take credit for the good things. Advice: don't get your "news" from politicians, period.

    5. Re:Trump by cdsparrow · · Score: 1

      Sounds like Trump has figured out how to stop the sea level rise then. Explosives to open the rift to the sea and all that extra water from the glaciers makes a nice new sea.

    6. Re: Trump by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      She is female?

    7. Re:Trump by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 1

      Shut up and enjoy your crumbs...

      --
      Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
    8. Re: Trump by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Piss off moron.

    9. Re: Trump by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Itâ(TM)s not a rift, itâ(TM)s a shithole!

    10. Re: Trump by eric_harris_76 · · Score: 1

      Don't trust it? Don't pay attention to it. Warn others of it.

      Sounds like you're on the right track.

      --
      There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
  2. Might be a good thing by Spy+Handler · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Smaller landmasses surrounded by water tend to be nicer places to live than huge continents. For example, much of Pangaea's interior was a desert wasteland.

    1. Re:Might be a good thing by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      Doesn't seem that the landmass sizes will be even here. But still, good to know that we'll have a place to go to when we retire! Assuming the immortality research goes well, of course.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    2. Re:Might be a good thing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just wait for another 250 million years and you got another super-continent with the storms and deserts. Maybe we should get out of here before the seaside property values go through the roof!

  3. Really Slow News Day! by foxalopex · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's funny how these are slow geologic process taking millions of years yet there's an article reporting on it like it was "suddenly" new news or unexpected. A few more cracks might open in our lifetime but don't expect to see the "parting or the red sea" type movement in our lifetime. Most geological processes are super slow.

    1. Re:Really Slow News Day! by froggyjojodaddy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      In the submitters (and many news outlets) defence, I would think for the majority of people, this was indeed 'sudden news'. Most people understand plate tectonics but that doesn't take away the newsworthiness of a huge crack opening up.

      Think of volcanoes (volcano's?). Most folks understand they exist and, on occasion, they erupt - maybe even that eruptions are inevitable, but it's still news when it does blow.

      I think even if the crack was a few mm wide, if it's any significant length or depth, it'd still be counted as interesting news.

    2. Re:Really Slow News Day! by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 2
      But... when it does happen ... when the rift reaches the mediterranean ... what a sight it will be! Man!!! So sad I won't live to see it.

      The Gibraltar isthmus becoming Gibraltar straits happened just 12,000 years ago, missed it by a whisker. This flooding of the rift valley into a sea will take at least 1 million years they say...

      --
      sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
    3. Re:Really Slow News Day! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Yes, the world we know today was 'created' 12.000 years ago by some very dramatic events by the looks of it, recommend Randall Carlson on the Joe Rogan show. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0Cp7DrvNLQ
      In Northern Europe there has also been the world largest landslide with accompanying tsunamis:
      https://www.britannica.com/topic/Storegga-slides
      "scientists contend that one or more tsunamis associated with the Storegga slides washed away the land bridge connecting the island of Great Britain with continental Europe"

    4. Re:Really Slow News Day! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ummm ... didja read the article? This crack (which could be something else - in the photos, the road got split, but how about that power line next to it that seems to be intact?) is in East Africa, in the well-known East African Rift Zone, which terminates northward into the Red Sea not the Mediterranean.

      That said, things could be interesting in the Gibraltar area over the next few tens of millions of years, too. There's some evidence of a subduction zone forming in the Atlantic not too far offshore. But that has little or nothing to do with this year's 'crack in the earth.'

    5. Re:Really Slow News Day! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Most geological processes are super slow.

      Most, yes. But not all... e.g. Missoula Floods (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missoula_Floods)

    6. Re:Really Slow News Day! by radarskiy · · Score: 3, Informative

      It's a crack several miles long that wasn't there a couple of weeks ago. That is, in fact, pretty damn sudden.

    7. Re:Really Slow News Day! by Hadlock · · Score: 1

      San Francisco Bay by many accounts is only 10,000 years old; previously it was meadows and fields before it sunk and became flooded as a tidal estuary when sea levels rose.

      --
      moox. for a new generation.
    8. Re:Really Slow News Day! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Time to invest in that future beachfront property!

    9. Re:Really Slow News Day! by tonique · · Score: 1

      If you're referring to the Zanclean flood, that is supposed to have happened more than 5,000,000 years ago. Also, Wikipedia says it may have taken 10,000 years for the Mediterranean to fill up.

    10. Re:Really Slow News Day! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wow, the new science. I learned about this at school in the 1960s. News. Only to the new generation of "scientists."

    11. Re:Really Slow News Day! by RockDoctor · · Score: 1

      This flooding of the rift valley into a sea will take at least 1 million years they say...

      It'll take a lot longer than that, since most of the East African Rift System is actually above sea level. Some of the lake bottoms go below sea level, but they're already full of water.

      when the rift reaches the mediterranean

      Very unlikely to happen - the rift is already veering towards the Arabian Sea at the Afar Triangle. While there is probably some geotectonic control over the direction of the lower 2500km of the Nile's course, the fact that the river flows rather indicates that there is a general slope upwards along it's course. Any deep bedrock pits are already filled with sediment.

      I'd have loved to see the end-Messinian flooding of the Mediterranean basin. Or, for that matter, the Zechstein Basin (for which we have sedimentological evidence of the rapidity of flooding, with air-expulsion structures in dune sandstones being well-known.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
    12. Re:Really Slow News Day! by RockDoctor · · Score: 1

      It is unclear from the reporting if the fissure was present for some time but has only recently broken through to the surface. As a caver, I spend an appreciable part of my spare time in underground voids which have been forming for thousands of years (one study I've been involved with hints at a multi-million year history for a UK cave), and are slowly ascending by roof stoping. Eventually they'll break through to the surface, seemingly suddenly but really the result of a millennia-long process.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
  4. This is news? by charliemerritt03 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Seems I've heard of the East African Rift Valley for, like, decades. Only 'news' here is rain washed sediment away and people could see a fault. The entire rift is a fault zone.

    1. Re:This is news? by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 4, Informative

      The first link in the submission leads to a March 26th photo showing a rather dramatic crack that’s opened up across some fields and a highway.

      I think the story is a reminder that the rift is geologically active - the rift itself has existed for millions of years.

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    2. Re:This is news? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Hotspot in the mantle, according to "Rise of the Continents". Pretty good, it was on BBC a while back.

      Nova probably has something similar but with more pictures and fewer long words.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    3. Re:This is news? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm not a geologist, but I suspect that crack is superficial. If the actual fault line had shifted there'd have been no need to announce it on the news - we'd have felt the bugger.

    4. Re:This is news? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      I think there was a minor tremor. But it's where the plates push together and/or move laterally that you get the sudden release of built up energy when it finally overcomes friction.

      Not a geologist either. Sometimes wish I was.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    5. Re:This is news? by SWPadnos · · Score: 0
      "Nova might has something close but with more pictures and less big words."

      .

      FTFY.

      --
      - The Sigless Wonder
    6. Re:This is news? by jd · · Score: 1

      There's a difference between knowing in the abstract sense and KNOWING in the sense that there's a bloody great big rip in the fabric of the continent that is now highly visible. (Admittedly, if it was a rift in the fabric of spacetime and Jack Harkness and The Doctor were involved, it would be more interesting. For the few seconds before a Dalek fleet vaporized you. Nonetheless, interesting.)

      --
      It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
    7. Re:This is news? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Hmmm. And how there's a a secret Nazi UFO base there.

      Oh, wait. That's the History Channel.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    8. Re:This is news? by DarthVain · · Score: 1

      I was going to say, it looks more like erosion, or subsurface erosion and collapse, rather than some cataclysmic rift to the bowels of the earth.

      As you say, probably more likely a natural process when a rift creates an opportunity for water to wash away sediment.

      Less exciting I suppose.

    9. Re:This is news? by RockDoctor · · Score: 1
      At Afar, certainly something closely resembling a mantle plume. Further south in the Rift system ... a much trickier proposition. Is there a second plume under the Turkana region where Eastern and Western Rifts separate? Why the tectonic and sedimentary contrasts between Eastern and Western Rifts?

      I attended a 3-day conference largely devoted to such questions a bit over a year ago. No one knows "the" answer, if indeed there is a posable question. Very interesting ; very hard to condense into notes.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
  5. Awesome! by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 1

    My childhood dream of the earth opening up and swallowing bullies is actually possible!

    1. Re:Awesome! by Nkwe · · Score: 1

      My childhood dream of the earth opening up and swallowing bullies is actually possible!

      It is possible, you just have to get the bullies to stand still for a long time.

    2. Re:Awesome! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My childhood dream of the earth opening up and swallowing bullies is actually possible!

      I know, right? I got bullied by niggers in school too!

    3. Re:Awesome! by RockDoctor · · Score: 1
      ... or persuade them to jump up and down on a carefully chosen (by you) spot.

      Ground-penetrating radar is your friend.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
  6. It's just... by JustOK · · Score: 1

    It's just Gaia getting ready to fart.

    --
    rewriting history since 2109
  7. Re:or... the earth is expanding. by magarity · · Score: 1

    Google "expanding earth" for books, videos, animations, lectures and more info.

    Let me guess; the extra comes from the back ends of the turtles that go all the way down?

  8. Re:Really Bummer News Day! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Perhaps some perspective: humans seem to have originated in East Africa a few million years ago. Agriculture and related civilization started maybe 10Kish years ago. At the rate we're going, it seems unlikely that the species will last another thousand years, let alone 10 million. So ... interesting, but geology is slow and evolution is fast. Something else will be around to see what happens, but not us.

  9. No. Way. by DrXym · · Score: 2

    There was I thinking that Rift Valley was just a figurative name.

    1. Re:No. Way. by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 2

      A more accessible place where you can see the same process happening is Thingvellir in Iceland, which is on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. It happens to also be the location of the ancient parliament of the country, but researchers are unable to determine exactly where the original thousand-year-old meeting place ("Law Rock") was because of the continual movement of the rift valley.

    2. Re:No. Way. by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      There was I thinking that Rift Valley was just a figurative name.

      After it tears, it's "Raft Valley" for those caught in the middle.

    3. Re:No. Way. by RockDoctor · · Score: 1
      Ummm, why would you start to think that?

      Without even trying particularly hard, I can get the use of "the Rift Valley" (in various permutations) back to 1894 as a geological term. I don't know enough of East African history to really be interested in following it back into the murkiness of Dr Livingstone's expeditions (though I've scuba dived where he last set off into "the interior") to investigate the naming further, but Livingstone wasn't a geological innocent, and neither were Speke and Burton. I suspect it has always been a geologically inspired name.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
    4. Re:No. Way. by DrXym · · Score: 1

      That's the joke. I don't think it is a figurative name or a metaphor. In the context of the article it is me wondering why it's news that a rift valley is actually called that because it is an actual geological rift formation.

  10. Re: Racism and Global Warming by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Behold two retards, locked in the retard mating ritual.

  11. Human cradle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Jokes apart, that's the same rift that saw the rising of the Homo Sapiens. It is our ancestral cradle.

    1. Re:Human cradle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Jokes apart, that's the same rift that saw the rising of the Homo Sapiens. It is our ancestral cradle.

      A cradle that some parts of humanity never seemed to grow out of.

    2. Re:Human cradle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Shhh, that is too inconvenient.

  12. FIght it! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We are fighting global warming, we might just as well fight the African rift.

  13. Split! Now! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "The downpour also exposed a fault line that geologists now say is evidence that the African continent will split into two over the next tens of millions of years."

    OMG! Run for your lives!!!

    1. Re:Split! Now! by suman28 · · Score: 1

      or, you COULD walk very slowly!

  14. Re: Racism and Global Warming by KHKw2k · · Score: 2, Funny

    it truly is an elegant display, the retard mating ritual.

    nature is beautiful.

  15. Makes sense by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    All the additional weight of the C02 is causing the plates to divide. This would fit right in with his plans to divide up Africa. I am not sure what is worse his hatred of black people of his hatred of the planet Earth.

    The only thing that can possible save us from President Trump is if everyone starts listening to CNN and voting Democratic. One thing I know is the Democrats have all the answers.

    It's not like both parties are the same and trying to get rich off the tax payers and divide up the country. The parties are totally different. One party (Democratic) is for world peace, moms, and apple pies. The other party wants to cause mass extinction, deforestation, to clone Aldolf Hitler, and kill babies.

  16. Just Say No! by swirlingbrain · · Score: 1

    To crack!

  17. Don't waste this guys time! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Whenever foxalopex is near an imminent volcano eruption make sure not to bother him. After all the magma's been there millions of years and there is important work to do. I speak of course about voluntarily reading something online and taking the time to comment that that article was a waste of time.

  18. Literally BREAKING news by Ranger · · Score: 1

    Although pretty much anyone who's read much about the Rift Valley knows that Africa is splitting there.

    --
    "You'll get nothing, and you'll like it!"
  19. Predictable by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Cue the ass-hat blaming this on global warming in 3...2...1...

  20. Split Known for Decades by Roger+W+Moore · · Score: 3, Informative

    The only new thing is the crack. The fact that Africa is splitting up along the rift valley has been known for decades - I learnt about it in a first year geology lecture as an undergrad.

  21. Before this gets out of control ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We have to get a grip on the geopolitical implications.

  22. Pruitt by brunnegd · · Score: 1

    DOE SecretaryPruitt said science has nothing to do with the rift, claims plate tectonics is unproven science

  23. Quick, blame climate change! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That seems to be the go-to excuse anymore.

  24. Some food for thought..... by dbreeze · · Score: 1

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
    https://africa-arabia-plate.we...
    [Zec 14:4 KJV] 4 And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which [is] before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, [and there shall be] a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.
    https://discussions.godandscie...
    https://www.tomorrowsworld.org...
    https://www.blueletterbible.or...
    http://www.biblesearchers.com/...
    And, as a bonus, I'll leave this for the math nerds to dissect... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... http://www.telusplanet.net/pub...

    --
    When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law he tore his robes.2Kings22:11
  25. Re:or... the earth is expanding. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The extra mass comes from large amounts of electrical current feeding energy into Earth's magnetic poles. This converts into mass, causing expansion in a pattern that closely matches basic electrodynamics. Of course the geologists don't notice this as they often fail or forget their physics courses, as people going into the field are mostly interested in the field work or chemistry. So they go off what they know, and assume everything is driven by chemistry and thermodynamics, while ignoring mechanisms that basic physics explains. It was only a couple decades ago that geology universally recognized plate tectonics, such that there should be other posters around old enough to remember when that wasn't taught in geology and was laughed about if brought up. Further work is needed, and it may be decades yet before mainstream geologist realize how laughably wrong subduction is and that evidence clearly points to only expanding joints on the surface of the Earth.

  26. Re:Bull shit. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dude you missed April Fools day. Nice try though.

  27. Here is the solution by gerald.edward.butler · · Score: 0

    Everyone who injects anything about race, skin color, sex, gender, sexual orientation, etc. into any discussion should be removed from society permanently. We are either color/race/gender blind or we aren't. Stop with the SJW/identity bullshit and just live your fucking life. If someone comes after you, come back at them harder. Person to person. Mano e Mano y Hombre e Hombre.

  28. Just to clarify my earlier remark by gerald.edward.butler · · Score: 0

    I support what you are saying. Fuck the "Brown" bullshit. It smells like shit no matter when it is used. Fuck "white" doesn't even have any meaning. What used to be "not white" (Italian, Greek, Spain-Spanish, Mediteranean, Irish, etc) is now considered "White" in all but the most egregious instances of SJW/identity politics bullshit games. "Latino", which to me means, those of Spanish/Portuguese descent (likely mixed with Native American and/or African) primarily from the Carribean, South America, and Central America is on the precipice of folding from "Not White" to "White" in most discussions (depending, of course, on the exact SEEMINGLY EVIDENT heritage involved). In other words, "Whiteness" is defined as whatever is mainstream in N. America/U.S. for all practical purposes. The whole term is fucking meaningless and those who insist on it having any meaning are completely self-absorbed full-of-shit fuckwads. Simples as that.