MOSES parted the Red Sea nice and smoothly, according to biblical accounts. The rupture of the Earth鈥檚 crust in the Afar depression, at the southern end of the Red Sea, however, is not proceeding so calmly. Magma is pushing the ground apart as the African tectonic plate moves away from the Arabian plate.
Tim Wright, of the University of Oxford, and his colleagues used the European Space Agency鈥檚 Envisat radar satellite to monitor the uneven rift. In September 2005 they observed a sudden 8-metre widening in the Afar region of Ethiopia, accompanied by small earthquakes and a volcanic eruption.
The pressure created by magma funnelling along underground cracks can account for 92 per cent of the movement, says Wright (Nature, vol 442, p 291). 鈥淚n this case we think the magma has taken over,鈥� he says.
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