Distance Traveled (in meters)

Continent Speed
100 years 50,000 years 1 million years

Antarctica 2 cm. / year 2M  1,000M  20,000M

Africa 2.2 cm. / year  2.2M  1,100M  22,000M

South America 1.5 cm. / year  1.5M 750M  15,000M 

North America 1.2 cm. / year  1.2M  600M  12,000M

1. Compute, in meters, how far these continents will travel in (a) 100 years, (b) 50,000 years and
(c) 1 million years. Tabulate the answers.
2. Which continent moves the fastest? Where will it be in 50,000 years? Africa, it should be
1,100M away from where it is now.
3. Which continent moves the slowest? Where will it be in 1 million years? North America, it
should be 12,000M away from where it is now.
4. Is there a chance that the continents will collide with each other? Explain your answer by
giving an example.
Yes and no It is the tectonic plates beneath these land masses that move, not the continents
themselves. A moving tectonic plate has no effect on the land above it, but when it collides with
another tectonic plate, things can change quickly. If they collide, and rub against each other,
things get out of hand, and we get earthquakes, tsunamis, landslides, volcanoes, rising mountain,
and so on example of these is the Himalayan mountains