Gondwan The Controversy Of The Continental Drift Theory

There is quite a controversy of how the world is how it is nowadays. Over the years many scientists explored different theories to discover how, though one theory still stands, the continental drift theory. Discovered by Alfred Wegener, in 1912, he proposed that the continents were all once conjoined as one massive continent, to which is now referred to as Pangea meaning ‘all earth’. However, approximately 200 million years ago Pangea broke apart into two pieces, Laurasia and Gondwana.

Gondwana consisted of the continents we now recognise as Africa, South America, Australia, Antarctica, the Indian subcontinent and the Arabian Peninsula. Due to the size and the positioning of Gondwana, the climate varied from very hot to very cold. Theoretically, Gondwana would have looked similarly to Antarctica how it is today, nevertheless, during the hotter climate Gondwana would have been covered in lush rainforest much like a rainforest in Northern Queensland in Australia.

Such evidence as the jigsaw puzzle, glacial deposits, similar igneous rocks found on continents once connected and flora and fauna. But as technology evolved scientists were able to discover with seismometers and other technological devices that vibrations travelled through the tectonic plates causing Pangea to spilt and form Laurasia which drifted North and Gondwana which drifted to the South. Over the years these continents further spilt into even smaller continents slowly forming the continents we now recognise today which are still slowly drifting each year, hence ‘continental