"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....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."
See: http://www.livescience.com/environment/091102-africa-rift-ocean.html
Details on the 2005 eruption of Dabbahu and its location...
See: http://www.networkmirror.com/wXts44xaAl_lxwZz/www.volcano.si.edu/world/volcano.cfm%3Fvnum%3D0201-113&volpage%3Dvar.html
Lastly, some great aerial shots of the area...
See: http://homepages.see.leeds.ac.uk/~eartjw/dabbahu/photos.html
Frank Neumann | 
