Hamada
Desert landscape with mostly rock instead of sand
A hamada (Arabic: حمادة, ḥammāda) is a type of desert landscape consisting of high, largely barren, hard rocky (basalt) plateaus, where most of the sand has been removed by deflation. The majority of the Sahara is hamada. Other examples are Negev desert in Israel and the Tinrhert plateau in Algeria.
01Formation
Hamadas are produced by the wind, which removes the fine products of weathering, an aeolian process known as deflation. The finer-grained products are taken away in suspension. At the same time, the sand is removed through saltation and surface creep, leaving behind a landscape of gravel, boulders and bare rock.
02Related landforms
Hamada is related to desert pavement (known variously as reg, serir, gibber, or saï), which occurs as stony plains or depressions covered with gravels or boulders rather than as highland plateaus.
Hamadas contrast with ergs, which are large areas of shifting sand dunes.
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Hamada”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
Images, from Wikimedia Commons:
- La hamada noire du Tademayt 1890.jpg by LPLT, Public domain
- 260 Boa Vista.jpg by Ingo Wölbern, Public domain
- Hoggar-Hammada.jpg by Albert Backer, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Erg chebbi cyclists.jpg by JanSuchy, Public domain
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