Assessments of the extension directions and their variations are critical for understanding rifting processes. This study provides an overview of the extension directions along the axes of the Main Ethiopian Rift and the Red Sea Rift (or propagator) of Afar, two of the three rifts meeting at the Afar triple junction. This overview is based on new and published field data on the opening direction of significant (width >0.2 m) Holocene extension fractures along the rift axis. The data show that the Red Sea propagator axis opens orthogonally, both in northern and central Afar, even though a significant strike-slip component is recognized at the rift margins in central Afar. The Main Ethiopian Rift axis also opens orthogonal to the trend of the rift, which varies between the different rift segments. Therefore, the axes of two of the three rifts meeting in Afar are characterized by orthogonal extension. However, given the variable orientations of the rift segments, the obtained opening directions are usually not uniform along the rift. Current plate-motion models suggest slightly different divergence directions, especially along the Main Ethiopian Rift, which shows a significant oblique component. The discrepancy between the data along the rift axis and those from plate-motion models suggests an across-rift strain partitioning. The observed orthogonal extension along the rift axis may be magma-induced, provided that a depth-dependent variation in the kinematics exists, at least below the Main Ethiopian Rift axis.

Deposits in the Gona Paleoanthropological Research Project (GPRP) area in east-central Ethiopia span most of the last ~6.4 m.y. and are among the longest and most complete paleoenvironmental and human fossil archives in East Africa. The 40 Ar/ 39 Ar and paleomagnetic dates and tephrostratigraphic correlations establish the time spans for the four formations present at Gona: the Adu-Asa (>6.4–5.2 Ma), Sagantole (>4.6–3.9 Ma), Hadar (3.8–2.9 Ma), and Busidima Formations (2.7 to <0.16 Ma). The volcano-sedimentary succession at Gona displays many classic tectono-sedimentary features of an evolving rift basin. The mixed volcanic and fluviolacustrine Adu-Asa Formation is the earliest expression of rifting at Gona, probably deposited in a small half-graben. The Sagantole and Hadar Formations were deposited in a much larger half-graben bounded to the E-NE by an as-yet-unidentified normal fault. The Sagantole and Hadar Formations are both fluvial and lacustrine, reflecting periodic shallow impoundment of a low-gradient paleo–Awash River, perhaps by an accommodation zone north of the Ledi-Geraru project area. Starting at 2.9–2.7 Ma, the character of sedimentation changed dramatically throughout the Awash Valley as bed load coarsened and the meandering paleo–Awash River cyclically cut and filled. Unlike the Hadar Formation, the Busidima Formation thickens westward, suggesting deposition in a half-graben of the opposite polarity compared to Sagantole/Hadar time. Sedimentation rates decreased 5-fold, from 0.25 mm/yr in the Hadar Formation to 0.05 mm/yr in the Busidima Formation, perhaps in response to slowing extension rates and/or opening of the half-graben north of Gona.

Sediments exposed in the Dikika Research Project area form a nearly continuous sequence spanning the period from older than 3.8 Ma to younger than 0.15 Ma. By developing a stratigraphic framework of sedimentary basins, we are able to reconstruct a regional geological history that illuminates environmental changes resulting from tectonic events in the Afar triple junction region. The sequence begins with the Basal Member of the Hadar Formation, which was deposited on a dissected and deeply weathered surface of the uppermost flow of Dahla Series Basalt (8–4 Ma). This contact signals an increase in sediment accumulation rate due to active extension along faults parallel to the Red Sea Rift system. Sediments of the Hadar Formation indicate the progressive infilling of the Hadar Basin and migration of the shoreline northward or northeastward toward the axial depocenter, with several brief transgressions southward. After 2.9 Ma, the Dikika Research Project area was uplifted, and the Hadar Formation was faulted and eroded on an angular unconformity. Subsequent to 2.7 Ma, sedimentation returned, although the character and position of the newly developed Busidima half-graben had changed. This basin was formed by the rotation of an asymmetric marginal half-graben around a border fault that paralleled the western escarpment of the Ethiopian Rift. The Busidima Formation deposited in this basin records the migration of the paleo–Awash River across its floodplain in response to a changing tectonic setting. These local paleoenvironmental changes are primarily the response to regional tectonics and are superimposed on the global and regional records of climate change.