For several years, social media pages and accounts have claimed that a new ocean is forming in Africa. The claim has been spread by YouTube (archived) videos (archived) with views in the millions, Facebook posts (archived) that refer to it as if it were a recent discovery and Reddit threads (archived) featuring dramatic images of the ground splitting open.
What exactly this alleged forming ocean looks like, how it is forming and how quickly it is forming look and sound different depending on the headline, image or thumbnail. One Facebook post (archived) depicted a long canyon filled with water. An Instagram post (archived) showed Africa splitting down the center, from the Mediterranean Sea down to the continent’s southern tip. A TikTok video (archived), which similarly began with a graphic of Africa splitting down the middle, claimed “this all started in 2005” and showed what appeared to be a massive crack filled with water down the center of Ethiopia.
While it is true that Africa is splitting apart and scientists currently believe a new ocean will eventually form as a result, this is a process that is taking place slowly over millions of years. People in Africa wouldn’t be able to see the earth actively pulling apart with the naked eye, nor would they see water visibly filling any rifts or depressions like an ocean bubbling up from beneath the land.
The part of Africa where this splitting is taking place is called the Great Rift Valley or East African Rift, according to Eos, a science magazine published by the American Geophysical Union and the United States Geological Survey. This rift is visible on a map; it begins in a volcanic area in Ethiopia to the north and is marked by several large, narrow lakes as it winds its way to the south through the continent. For 30 million years, the eastern part of the African plate has been slowly tearing itself away from the rest of the continent at a rate of millimeters or centimeters per year, according to an Eos article from 2020. The Great Rift Valley has formed over these 30 million years.
As the spreading continues, the rift valley will sink lower, eventually to the point that ocean waters will be able to flood the basin, a page by The Geological Society of London says. New oceanic crust may fill the space where the continental crust is separating, but as of this writing there was no evidence of oceanic crust filling the space quite yet.
Scientists believe the region is likely in the process of forming a new ocean basin; they don’t know how long it will be until then. Some scientists have estimated it will take as little as a few million years, while others have suggested it could take up to 50 million years.
In Ethiopia, where the northern end of the East African Rift starts, three separate rifts meet in what’s called the Afar Triple Junction. The highly volcanic area is where many of the most dramatic effects of the continent’s splitting can be seen. The Danakil Depression, in Ethiopia’s Afar region, is already below sea level. And Dallol, a volcano in that depression, is the site of a dramatic landscape filled with acidic, brightly colored geothermal pools. The region is also home to one of the rare places the Earth has literally split open.
In 2005, a 35-mile long fissure formed in Ethiopia’s Afar region in just three weeks, according to the European Space Agency. The fissure’s opening coincided with volcanic activity and earthquakes in the area, reported the Global Volcanism Program. This “crack” in the surface, which has been the subject of dramatic photographs, was one of the most visible examples of Africa slowly breaking apart. The fissure, which can be seen on Google Maps today, is located in the desert with no water inside of it — so even this is a long way from the visible formation of a new ocean.
Scientists regularly publish studies about the East African Rift and its forming ocean basin, especially following the formation of the Ethiopian fissure in 2005. Social media posts and news headlines sometimes make it sound like the splitting of Africa and the new ocean basin expected to fill it in are newly discovered or have only been researched since 2005. But research on the East African Rift, and even the idea that the continent is separating, has existed for decades. One research paper on the East African Rift system is dated to 1967. A paper from 1972 referenced the theory that Africa is separating and allowing for sea-floor spreading, albeit to claim there was no evidence at the time to support it.
Recent research has investigated why the African plate is separating, the history of the rift and how the East African Rift can be used to enhance scientists’ understanding of continental rifts elsewhere.
