ශ්‍රී ලංකාව (Sri Lanka)

Coastal paradises, high mountains, rolling beaches, tropical and subtropical climates.

http://www.utmthotel.com/files/hollmann/content/
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http://www.teatrails.com/wp-content/themes/teatrails/img/slides/
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Birthed from the remnants of Gondwana, a precambrian dominant island came to form what we call Sri Lanka. Over the next 120 million years, the land mass caught a ride with the Indian plate, up past the equator, and landed as our present day Sri Lanka, located at 7° N, 81° E. with a size of 25,332 sq. miles. 


 The earth is an extremely variable, ever changing place. If not due to anthropogenic reasons like changing landscapes, biology, and chemistry, the natural rhythms of Earth will indeed change the geography of Sri Lanka drastically. Manipulations in the environment ranging from mining, damming rivers, to tectonic plate movements and local weather patterns could alter Sri Lanka indefinitely. This island is vulnerable to changing weather patterns, but it's important to think about the geologic timescale of Earth, and how the creation of this island is temporary in the form it's in now.

10,000 years from now...

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/09/rising-seas/if-ice-melted-map

As much as I'd like to be optimistic, let's go the disaster route the future of Sri Lanka most likely is bleak and depressing. The models forecasting a rise in sea levels could have dire impacts on the coastal and lowland regions. An increase in greenhouse gasses either naturally or anthropogenicaly could increase the insolation of electromagnetic radiation, increasing the temperature of Earth, melting the ice.

http://clasfaculty.ucdenver.edu/callen/1202/Battle/Build/PlateTectonics
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The tsunami on December 24th, 2004 could be a prediction of things to come with a global climatic disturbance.

Could see increase of:
-Tsunami
-Earthquake
-Flooding and drought

Or possibly just a change in the
-Local temperature and precipitation patterns
-Monsoons
-Chemical and mechanical weathering

1,000,000 years from now...

http://www.sundaytimes.lk/100627/Plus/plus_18.html

Instead of following the coarse of the Indian plate North-East into the Eurasian plate, immense pressure building up in the fault East of Sri Lanka. The Tsunami in 2004 is evidence of this massive shift in this plate boundary that could impact life on Sri Lanka.

Only recently has there been a distinction in the Indian plate and the Australian plate, which were thought to be connected. New evidence is showing a possible new plate boundary in the Indian plate could be forming just 400-500km to the South of Sri Lanka.
This could mean the islands tectonic plate could begin an Eastern movement toward the Java-Sumantra subduction zone, or have major geologic events occurring in this region.




The Indian plate is moving South-East, and within several million years, could collide with the Burma plate, subducting Sri Lanka beneath it.

The island could experience a subduction process under the land mass in the Bay of Bangel, following the same Indian plate movement which formed the Himalayas.

100,000,000 years in the future...

Sri Lanka was only created 140-180 million years ago, and is only a blip in geologic materials surfacing on Earth's crust. In another 100 million years, it is highly likely that some geologic disturbance will recycle the island in some tectonic process. I would predict that a subduction zone would gobble this island, ending this island form Sri Lanka has now.

Formerly known Sri Lanka could possibly be crushed within the Eurasian plate, eaten up by another carbon and silicon based land mass, and recycled under Earth's crust into the mantel containing a stew of molten rock.

Works Cited

Dissanayake, C. B. "A New Plate Boundary near Sri Lanka: Implications for Future Geohazards." Journal of the National Science Foundation of Sri Lanka 33.1 (2010): n. pag. Web.

"Examine an Animation of Plate Movement Predicted for the Future." Examine an Animation of Plate Movement Predicted for the Future. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Nov. 2014.

Kleinschrodt, R. "Large-scale Thrusting in the Lower Crustal Basement of Sri Lanka." Precambrian Research 66.1-4 (1994): 39-57. Web. 26 Nov. 2014.

Samarasinghe, „G B. Long-range Forecast of Climate Change: Sri Lanka Future Scenario (n.d.): n. pag. Web. 26 Nov. 2014. <http://www.ips.lk/events/workshops/19_8_09_climate_change/3_samarasinghe.pdf>.

Vitanage, P. W., 1985: Tectonics And Mineralization In Sri Lanka. TECTONICS AND MINERALIZATION IN SRI LANKA (n.d.): n. pag. Web. 26 Nov. 2014. <http://www.geologinenseura.fi/bulletin/Volume57/sgs_bt_057_pages_157_168.pdf>.