DEFINITION OF DEAD SEA

The lowest point on the Earth is the surface of the

Dead Sea, with an elevation of 1,400 feet (420 m) below sea

level. The sea has an area of about 390 square miles (1,010

km2) and extends about 45 miles (70 km) north-south through

the Jordan Valley along the Israel-Jordan border, between

Ghor in the north and Wadi Arabah in the south. Steep rock

cliffs bound the sea on the east and west sides, rising

2,500–4,000 feet (762–1,220 m) and creating dramatic topographic

relief. Fed only by the Jordan River and a number of

small intermittent streams, which are used extensively for

domestic drinking and irrigation, the surface of the Dead Sea is

currently dropping by 1.5–2.0 inches per year (3.8–5 cm/yr).

Combined effects of tectonic subsidence and surface water

overuse have led to more than 20 feet (6 m) of subsidence over

15 years. However, the Israeli and Jordanian governments

have plans to cooperate on building a pipeline to bring water

from the Gulf of Aqaba into the Dead Sea to replenish its

dwindling water supply. The water in the Dead Sea is among

the saltiest on Earth, and mineral salts such as potash and

bromine are commercially extracted from its shorelines.

The Dead Sea is a salt lake formed in a tectonic depression

known as a pull-apart basin, formed by extension

between mismatched strands of the Dead Sea transform fault.

One fault strand extends from the Gulf of Aqaba to the eastern

side of the Dead Sea and steps to the west across the sea,

extending to the north along the west side. Sinistral (left-lateral)

motion along a left-step in a strike-slip fault produces

extension in the region of the fault step, creating the topographic

low that the Dead Sea is located within.

See also TRANSFORM PLATE MARGIN PROCESSES.

debris avalanche See MASS WASTING.

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