Afar Plume in the context of "Red Sea Rift"

The Aden Ridge is a part of an active oblique rift system located in the Gulf of Aden, between Somalia and the Arabian Peninsula to the north. The rift system marks the divergent boundary between the Somali and Arabian tectonic plates, extending from the Owen transform fault in the Arabian Sea to the Afar triple junction or Afar Plume beneath the Gulf of Tadjoura in Djibouti.

The Gulf of Aden is divided east to west into three distinct regions by large-scale discontinuities, the Socotra, Alula Fartak, and Shukra-El Sheik transform faults. Located in the central region, bounded by the Alula Fartak fault and Shukra-El Sheik fault, is the Aden spreading ridge. The Aden Ridge connects to the Sheba Ridge in the eastern region and to the Tadjoura Ridge in the western region. Due to oblique nature of the Aden Ridge, it is highly segmented. Along the ridge there are seven transform faults that offset it to the north.

The Ethiopia-Yemen Continental Flood Basalts were erupted during the Oligocene. They cover an area of about 600,000 km in Yemen and Ethiopia, with an estimated volume of greater than 350,000 km. They are associated with the Afar Plume and the initiation of rifting in the southern Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.

In Ethiopia flood basalts cover an old erosion surface with occasional flat areas or peneplains. Burial of old surfaces by lava has preserved laterite soils in both Yemen and Ethiopia.