Stratigraphy and depositional environment
Volcanic ash (tephra)
Layers of fine-grained volcanic ashes (tephra) are dispersed throughout the Pleistocene sediments on Rusinga Island, Mfangano Island, and Karungu. These ashes are from volcanic eruptions in the Rift Valley of Kenya, and in some cases the same tephra layer is found in multiple sites (as on Rusinga Island), providing a time-line for comparison. The image to the left is a back-scattered electron image of some of these tephra deposits.