[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Giant crack in Africa (Page 1 of 2)

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:52:41 AM EDT

And everybody is worried about California sliding into the ocean.

Giant Crack in Africa Will Create a New Ocean

A 35-mile rift in the desert of Ethiopia will likely become a new ocean eventually, researchers now confirm.

The crack, 20 feet wide in spots, opened in 2005 and 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 Geophysical Research Letters finds the
processes creating the rift are nearly identical to what goes on at the
bottom of oceans, further indication a sea is in the region's future.

The same rift activity is slowly parting the Red Sea, 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 serious hazard 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 spreading apart 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 Red Sea.
The thinking is that the Red Sea will eventually pour into the new sea
in a million years or so. The new ocean 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.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:53:17 AM EDT

[#1]

Thread title is misleading.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:53:52 AM EDT

[#2]

I can make money off of this, somehow...I need to pin the details........

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:54:05 AM EDT

[#3]

Oh, this is a serious thread. I thought maybe Oprah went home.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:54:30 AM EDT

[#4]

Even better if Africa falls into the ocean. Bonus points if Cali and Africa go at the same time.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:54:35 AM EDT

[#5]

coc

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:54:38 AM EDT

[#6]

Quoted:
Thread title is misleading.

Just what in the hell were you hoping to see?

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:55:05 AM EDT

[#7]

Yes, there is a spreading center there.

Buncha separatists.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:55:36 AM EDT

[#8]

It's man-made global cracking.

I'm super serial.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:56:38 AM EDT

[#9]

Quoted:

There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

How long have you been waiting to use that pic?

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:56:39 AM EDT

[#10]

Quoted:

Oh, this is a serious thread. I thought maybe Oprah went home.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:56:52 AM EDT

[#11]

Quoted:
There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

I'd like to see the crack in Antarctica.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:58:05 AM EDT

[#12]

Count me in, also.

Quoted:

Quoted:

There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

I'd like to see the crack in Antarctica.

Posted: 11/3/2009 11:58:10 AM EDT

[#13]

Quoted:

Quoted:
There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

I'd like to see the crack in Antarctica.

I would like to accompany on your trek to the south pole.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:00:42 PM EDT

[#14]

Quoted:

Quoted:

There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

I'd like to see the crack in Antarctica.

I would like to strike it with my rod from god.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:02:19 PM EDT

[#15]

Quoted:

There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

This proves it - Africa is the asshole of the Earth.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:04:58 PM EDT

[#16]

Good lord! One of the digital designers came up to me this morning and out of the blue started spewing a bunch of doomsday stuff about 2012, California and this very crack. He's got poor English skills and a heavy Ukranian accent––couldn't tell if he'd gone off the reservation of if he was just f'ing with me.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:05:28 PM EDT

[#17]

That area is loaded with volcanoes, lots of earthquakes there.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:05:41 PM EDT

[#18]

Bush's fault and only Obama can make it right again.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:06:34 PM EDT

[#19]

Quoted:

Quoted:
There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

I'd like to see the crack in Antarctica.

I would like to accompany on your trek to the south pole.

Don't forget to post pictures of yourselves in Cameroon.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:07:49 PM EDT

[#20]

Quoted:
There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

Why did I just save that pic?

Rob

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:08:33 PM EDT

[#21]

cool

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:10:04 PM EDT

[#22]

You can kiss Djibouti goodbye.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:10:22 PM EDT

[#23]

By the title, I thought Oprah was traveling in Africa.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:11:56 PM EDT

[#24]

Did somebody say CRACK?!

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:21:10 PM EDT

[#25]

At what point do we throw the chosen one (Obama) in to the volcano as a sacrifice so he saves the world.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:28:24 PM EDT

[#26]

Quoted:
It's man-made global cracking.

I'm super serial.

And it's Bush's fault, cuz he hates black people.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:32:07 PM EDT

[#27]

I've also heard that there's a fissure on Uranus.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:32:26 PM EDT

[#28]

Quoted:

At what point do we throw the chosen one (Obama) in to the volcano as a sacrifice so he saves the world.

It will have to Biden to fulfill the prophesy. They'll convince him he has a brain cloud.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:33:17 PM EDT

[#29]

Quoted:
http://dailybail.com/storage/_Tyrone20Biggums.jpg

Did somebody say CRACK?!

LOL...

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:41:37 PM EDT

[#30]

Always knew that continent was broken, this proves it.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:42:56 PM EDT

[#31]

Africa.....the Continent that just keeps on giving.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:47:42 PM EDT

[#32]

What bad luck, it's not the kinda crack you can sell....

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:48:32 PM EDT

[#33]

Quoted:
Africa.....the Continent that just keeps on giving back crack.

There fixed it for ya'

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:49:04 PM EDT

[#34]

Without reading the article, is there anything new that we didn't already know?

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:52:33 PM EDT

[#35]

Quoted:
Even better if Africa falls into the ocean. Bonus points if Cali and Africa go at the same time.

Posted: 11/3/2009 12:54:12 PM EDT

[#36]

Dabbahu

They named it after our last president.

Quoted:

Quoted:
There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

How long have you been waiting to use that pic?

PBIR I HATE YOUR AVATAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted: 11/3/2009 1:57:04 PM EDT

[#37]

Quoted:

Quoted:

There's a crack in Africa allright:

http://www.funnycoolstuff.com/images/world-map.jpg

How long have you been waiting to use that pic?

Not meant as a hi-jack, but where is the original posting by bulldog?

I have seen this phenomena several times, but never followed up.

Did a Mod just delete it, or what?

Anybody?