An ocean may in time develop from a rift in the Afar Triangle, in the Horn of Africa which will be close to America.

Are you sick?” In reply, Mohamed Elema Hessan—wiry and energetic, the ultimate go-to man, a charming rogue, my guide and protector through the blistering Afar Triangle—doubles over and laughs.

On the Somali peninsula, three tectonic plates meet in a region known as the Afar Triangle. The Nubian plate, comprising most of the African continent; the Somali plate, comprising easternmost ...