Taking the rocky road

Rice Earth science students take grand tour of Morocco’s dramatic terrain

BY MIKE WILLIAMS
Rice News staff

There sure are a lot of interesting rocks along the road from Marrakech to Casablanca, a more than 2,000-mile-long journey passing through Ouahzazate, Erfoud, Midelt, Meknes, Chefchaouen, Tetouan and Rabat, and a coterie of Rice University students and their teachers had a good look at them last month.

	A group of Rice students and a professor return from a sunrise experience in a sand dune field.

Led by Earth science professors André Droxler and Gerald Dickens, a group of undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral researchers and professors about 25 strong embarked in May upon a two-week journey through Morocco, one of the planet’s unique geological sites.

There they were able to study at close range geological formations from the northwest Sahara desert to the Anti-, High-, Middle-Atlas and Rif mountains. “The Moroccan field trip gave students the opportunity to see a wide range of geology but also rocks that cover a great time span,” Droxler said. “The beauty of Morocco is that we observed rocks from Precambrian times, about 700 million year old, up to half a million years old. The age, diversity and types of outcropping rocks were all really astonishing.”

The lack of vegetation in much of the country made it particularly easy to peer back through the ages as the students traveled though the mountains of Morocco in a bus and two four-wheel-drive SUVs. “You get to observe the completely uncovered outcrops, and the overall landscapes are absolutely stunning,” Droxler said. “Morocco gives you this great palette of not only different types of rocks but also different formations and structures.”

Those deep structures are at the heart of a project in which Earth Science chair Alan Levander is currently involved. Levander, Rice’s Carey Croneis Professor of Earth Science, is taking part in Project PICASSO, an international collaboration studying the deep roots of the Atlas-Rif Mountains and surrounding terrains to determine what happens when continents collide. The mountain ranges in Morocco are part of the line of demarcation where the Africa and Eurasia plates meet.

Graduate student Michael Keller and Jeremy Caves '09 relax on the crest of a huge sand dune in southeast Morocco.

“Alan was very positive about our plans to head for Morocco in May because of his research involvement in that area, though the trip was not directly linked to his project,” Droxler said.

Among the things students observed were rocks in the Rif Mountains along the Mediterranean coast that formed in the Earth’s upper mantel and had to be pushed at least 60 miles up to the surface by tectonic activity.

Droxler said Albert Bally, Rice’s Harry Carothers Wiess Professor Emeritus of Geology, was an immense help in preparing students by teaching a spring seminar on Moroccan geology, which he became very familiar with while working for Shell Oil and doing research with his graduate students while at Rice.

Droxler got further help in planning from his own former teacher and adviser from the University of Neuchâtel in Switzerland, who’d spent a lot of time in Morocco from the early ’60s. “I’d kept in contact with Professor Emeritus Jean Paul Schaer, who, in spite of being 80, helped me start organizing the trip. He knew somebody who knew somebody who knew somebody and so on. That’s how we got the trip together.” In addition to Schaer, three other of Droxler’s colleagues currently doing field research in Morocco — Francois Negro, Romain Bousquet and Lahssen Baidder of Switzerland, Germany and Morocco, respectively — led the Rice students through their discovery of Moroccan geology.

Students brought their sleeping bags, but they never used them. “Youssef Bakabou, one of our drivers, got us from hotel to hotel, and though one of them was a bit modest, they were all wonderful,” Droxler said. He said all 25 in the party had dinner and stayed one night in a private home as the guests of Ahmed Ouazzan, a former guide and lifelong friend of Schaer.

“Most of the people helping us were Berbers,” he said. “Morocco is mostly inhabited by Berbers; Arabs moved in Morocco a long time ago, but never really established themselves into the mountains, where the Berbers have lived forever. We could sense a disconnect between Berbers and Arabs, and understanding the social organization and observing the different living conditions in Morocco became part of a wider learning experience for the students than only immersing themselves in the geology of Morocco.

“That’s the reason the Earth Science Department at Rice organizes these long field trips every other year — so students can learn to make their way in the world, no matter where they go, not only as Earth scientists but also as Earth citizens.”