Where is the East African Rift Valley located?
Eastern Africa
The Rift Valley, located in Eastern Africa, covers just over 2% of the continent and spreads over seven countries (Map 5 and Table 29). min. max. 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.
What is the East African Rift Valley known for?
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 volcanoes, hot springs, geysers, and frequent earthquakes.
Is the East African Rift the same as the Great Rift valley?
Continental Rift Valleys The East African Rift is part of the “Great Rift Valley” system discussed below. The Baikal Rift Valley (sometimes called the Baikal Rift Zone) cuts through 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles) of Siberia, in eastern Russia.
What is an example of a rift valley in Africa?
In Kenya, Uganda, and the fringes of South Sudan, the Great Rift runs along two separate branches that are joined to each other only at their southern end, in Southern Tanzania along its border with Zambia. The two branches are called the Western Rift Valley and the Eastern Rift Valley.
How deep is the rift valley?
The Great Rift Valley runs north to south for 5000 km, varies in width from 30-100 km, and is between several hundred to several thousand metres deep at any given point.
What does a rift valley look like?
A rift valley is a linear shaped lowland between several highlands or mountain ranges created by the action of a geologic rift. Rifts are formed as a result of the pulling apart of the lithosphere due to extensional tectonics. The linear depression may subsequently be further deepened by the forces of erosion.
Which is the longest rift valley in the world?
The longest rift on Earth’s surface, the Great Rift Valley is a long, deep depression with steep, wall-like cliffs, extending from Jordan in southwestern Asia southward through Africa to Mozambique.
What does East Africa look like?
The physical geography of East Africa is dominated by the Great Rift Valley, which extends through the middle of the region from north to south. Associated with the rift valleys are vast savannas such as the Serengeti Plain, large lakes, high mountains, and the highlands of Ethiopia.
What animals live in the Great Rift valley?
The Great Rift Valley’s inhabitants include lions, leopards, elephants, rhinos, buffaloes, cheetahs, giraffes, antelopes, zebras and primates.
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.
What caused the East African Rift Valley?
The East African Rift is one of the great tectonic features of Africa, caused by fracturing of the Earth’s crust. This astronaut photograph of the Eastern Branch of the Rift (near Kenya’s southern border) highlights the classical geologic structures associated with a tectonic rift valley.
Is there volcanic activity in the East African Rift System?
The East African rift system is marked by substantial volcanic activity, including lavas erupted from fissures along the rift in the region. Much of the faulting observed in this image cuts through such lavas.
Where is the Rift Valley located in Africa?
Together with the associated Ethiopian Rift, the tectonic boundary stretches from the southern Red Sea to central Mozambique. 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 is the eastern branch of the rift rift?
This astronaut photograph of the Eastern Branch of the Rift (near Kenya’s southern border) highlights the classical geologic structures associated with a tectonic rift valley. On one side of the rift lies the Nubian (or African) tectonic plate, which includes the older continental crust of Africa.