East African Rift - Earth Discover

Fishermen setting out for their daily work along the shores of Lake Victoria in Uganda

c. 400,000 BCE: Lake Victoria – The Making of Africa’s Largest Freshwater Lake

Lake Victoria, formed in an East African rift valley, is the largest tropical and the second-largest freshwater lake globally. Created by rifting processes, it has experienced cycles of drying and refilling, now hosting a diverse [...]

An illustrative depiction showing the Earth's crust being split by plate tectonics in the East African Rift Zone, with the Horn of Africa and Somalia on the right, and the Nile River on the left, predicting the formation of a new ocean basin that will divide Africa into two plates in about 10 million years

c. 30 Million BCE: The East African Rift Zone – Earth’s Dynamic Crust

The East African Rift Zone, a result of continental rifting and mantle plume activity, is actively splitting the African continent, with predictions of forming two new plates and a new ocean basin in about 10 [...]