Much of Africa is a high plateau surrounded by narrow strips of coastal lowlands. Glaciers on Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania sit simply kilometers from the tropical jungles under. Even though Kilimanjaro isn’t far from the Equator,snowcovers its summit all year long. From the freezing Arctic to thetropicaljungles of Central America, North America enjoys moreclimatevariation than any other continent. Almost every kind ofecosystemis represented someplace on the continent, fromcoral reefs in the Caribbean to Greenland’s ice sheet to theGreat Plainsin the U.S. and Canada. The impact creates wrinkles in the crust, just as a rug wrinkles when you push in opposition to one finish of it.
