Sumatra Trench Sumatra Trench The Sumatra Trench belongs to the Sunda Trench or Java Trench. The Sunda subduction zone (called also: the Sumatra-Andaman subduction zone) is located in the east part of Indian Ocean, and is about 300 km from the southwest coast of Sumatra and Java islands. It extends over 5000 km long, starting from Burma in the northwest and ending at Sumba Island in the southeast. The Java trench was generated by the oblique subduction of the Indo-Australian Plate into the Sunda plate at a rate of 61mm/y (in the south) and 51mm/y (in the north). The oceanic crust being
Tethys Ocean pushing the floor of the Paleo-Tethys Ocean under the eastern end of northern Pangaea (i.e.Laurasia). The Tethys Ocean formed between Cimmeria and Gondwana, directly over where the Paleo-Tethys used to be. During the Jurassic period about 150 Mya, Cimmeria finally collided with Laurasia and stalled, so the ocean floor behind it buckled under, forming the Tethyan Trench. Water levels rose, and the western Tethys shallowly covered significant portions of Europe, forming the first Tethys Sea. Around the same time, Laurasia and Gondwana began drifting apart, opening an extension of the Tethys Sea between them which today is the part of