Week 5 The Himalayas

Fig.1. The Himalaya mountain: Έλληνες στο Έβερεστ ή αλλιώς Hellas Everest 2004. (n.d.).

So the post this time guys, it is not a trip that I went to, but my grandparents. As they were going to Asia for their 50th anniversary, they got to fly over the Himalayas.  My grandma wanted me to look more into this mountain and here is what I have found.

The Himalaya was formed because of a collision between two continental crust, the Indian Plate and the Eurasian Plate 50 million years ago. Continental collision results in forming mountains with features like laterally shortened and vertically thickened crust, caused by deformation like folding and large-scale thrust faulting. These two plates caused compressive stress and the stress raised the Himalayas and the Tibet Mountains. Asia’s margin created an Andean-type plate margin that had well-developed continental volcanic arc while India’s northern margin was a passive continental margin that consist of thick platform of shallow-water sediments and sedimentary rocks. The Himalayas also consist of metamorphic rocks like schist and gneiss. As the intervening ocean basin was closing up, more deformable materials on the continental margins started to become highly folded and faulted. Two major thrust fault and many small ones rose up through the Indian crust. Slices of the Indian crust started to stack on one another due to subsequent motion along the thrust faults. Those slices today makes up the bulk of the highest peaks in the Himalayas. Many of the slices are covered by tropical marine limestone that used to form on the continental shelf.

Fig 2: Indian Plates colliding into Asia plates

From what I have learned recently, India collision with Asia has slowed down,
but India is still continuing to migrate north which had severely deformed
much of China and Southeast Asia. The reason why India is staying intact
while Asia is getting deformed because of its diverse crustal blocks. India’s
continental barrier is made of Precambrian rocks which has stayed intact for
more than 2 billion years resulting in it being very strong and sturdy. On the
other hand Southeast Asia was put together recently by smaller crustal fragment
and as a result,it is still weak. Because the Indian plate is still moving toward the
Asian plate, this causes the region to be seismically active, creating earthquakes
from time to time. So you guys better watch out if you ever go visit the Himalayas.
Despite the earthquakes hopefully I get to go there and tell you guys about my
experience! See you guys next time on my next adventure!!!