One of the divergent plates will eventually crash into another plate, creating a convergent boundary. The current rate of spreading is about 2.5 cm/year, showing general consistency with the overall distance and measured time. .wherever divergent boundaries go, convergent boundaries follow. This gives an average velocity of separation of about 3.1 cm/yr with relative rates scaled from 2.8 to 4.4 cm/yr. Mid-ocean ridges are also called spreading centers because of the way the plates spread apart.
This is where new oceanic lithosphere forms. When a divergent boundary occurs between two oceanic plates a mid-ocean ridge. A divergent boundary is where two adjacent tectonic plates are moving away from each other. At zones of continent-to-continent rifting, divergent boundaries may cause new ocean basin to form as the continent splits, spreads, the central rift. A divergent boundary is a type of plate boundary where two plates move apart or diverge relative to one another. The extent of separation associated with the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is about 5600 km and the extreme separation exhibits an age of about 180 million years. Divergent By Earthquake Hazards December 31, 2014. Convergent boundaries: where two plates are colliding. Most active divergent plate boundaries occur between. You can actually see New Zealands plate boundary fault at Gaunt Creek: 1. Well known ocean ridges include the Mid Atlantic Ridge, the East Pacific Rise, the Juan de Fuca. Divergent boundaries within continents initially produce rifts, which eventually become rift valleys. In the oceans, this has produced the mid ocean ridge system, which can also be described as a global range of underwater mountains. It is a portion of an image from the USGS site and a part of their discussion of plate motions. At divergent plate margins, plates are moving apart and new lithosphere is being created.
It is available in higher resolution from This is another depiction of the Mid-Atlantic-Ridge. This illustration is from Wikipedia and may be freely used. Earthquakes are visualized on a 3D globe. Movement of Plate Boundaries Divergent BoundariesĪt divergent boundaries where tectonic plates move apart, there will be upwelling material from the mantle to create new seafloor.Ī major example of a divergent boundary is the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. In this activity students visualize the distribution and magnitude of earthquakes at divergent plate boundaries.