During the last Ice Age, the Wurm Ice Age, the Rhine was forced into a wide bow to the South and reached its present bed above the falls, on hard chalk called malmstone. The Rhine Falls were created about 15,000 years ago at the junction of the hard malmstone and the soft moraines. The rocks visible today are part of the original steep, hard limestone.

This picture shows the old and new course of the Rhine.

(From Franz Hofmann, Geologie und Entstehungsgeschichte des Rheinfalls, in: Neujahrsblatt der Naturforschenden Gesellschaft Schaffhausen Nr. 39/1987). Illustrationen: Typografik SH

Taken from the zeppelin.

On the left, the Rhine Falls can be seen from a great height.

The Falls in Schaffhausen today.

Aerial view.