List of Tectonic Plate Interactions - Orogenic Belts

Orogenic Belts

• The most dramatic orogenic belt on the planet is the one between the Indo-Australian Plate and African Plate on one hand (to the South) and the Eurasian Plate on the other (to the North). This belt runs from New Zealand in the East-SouthEast, through Indonesia, along the Himalayas, through the Middle East up to the Mediterranean in the West-Northwest. It is also called the "Tethyan" Zone, as it constitutes the zone along which the ancient Tethys Ocean was deformed and disappeared. The following mountain belts can be distinguished:
  • The European Alps
  • The Carpathians
  • The Pyrenees
  • The Apennines
  • The Dinarides
  • The North African mountain belts such as the Atlas Mountains
  • The Karst Plateau of the Balkan Peninsula
  • The Caucasus
  • The Zagros
  • The Himalayas
  • The Indonesian Archipelago
  • The Southern Alps of New Zealand

• The Andes orogenic belt is the latest of a series of pre-Andean orogenies along the western margin of the South American Plate.