The illustration above shows the sea floor (oceanic crust) spreading, or growing. Where does this excess crust go when this occurs? Sometimes it forms undersea mountains, is pushed up, and other times it interacts with lower density continental crusts, where the seafloor crust is subducted beneath the continental crust. This force of a spreading oceanic crust pushing against the continental crust can cause many things to occur, most notably, earthquakes.

Plate Interactions Return To Geology Page