A drying climate is making East Africa pull apart faster

Aerial view of the Nabuyatom Volcano at the edge of Lake Turkana in northern Kenya showing its almost uneroded caldera, more than a kilometer wide. Black lava covers the land to the horizon.

Over the past 5,000 years, East Africa has dried out. Now, new research finds that this change may be making the continent pull apart faster.

Faults in the East African Rift Zone have sped up since the levels of large lakes have dropped, according to research published in November in the journal Scientific Reports.