Plate Movement and Landforms

Plate Movement and Landforms

• Ocean plates and continental plates can collide, forcing the ocean plate beneath the continental one, causing mountain ranges like the Andes.
• Continental plate collisions also create mountains, such as the Himalayas, as plates push together.
• Plates separate, creating gaps that allow magma (liquid rock) to rise to the surface, forming mid-ocean ridges (underwater mountains), like the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.
• Iceland is an example of a volcanic island formed when the separation of plates creates volcanic activity.
• Plates slide past each other, causing earthquakes, like the San Andreas Fault in California.
• The Ring of Fire is a region with frequent earthquakes and volcanoes, caused by the movement of the Pacific plate.

Processes Shaping Landforms

• Weathering: The process of breaking down rocks into smaller pieces by physical and chemical forces.
  • Factors like temperature changes, water, ice, and plant roots can cause weathering.
  • The result of weathering are sediments.
• Erosion: The movement of sediments from one location to another by wind, water or ice.
  • Powerful winds carry sediment, creating sand dunes.
  • Water erodes rock and carries sediments downstream
  • Glaciers, large sheets of ice, also cause massive erosion.
• These processes are constantly shaping and changing Earth's landforms.