New Evidence to Support the Theory of a Megaflood that Filled the Mediterranean Millions of Years Ago

Millions of years ago, the Mediterranean Sea evaporated. It may have been filled again by the greatest flood ever to occur on earth.

An international team of researchers has found new evidence to support the Zanclean megaflood, an event that flooded the Mediterranean Sea after the Messinian Salinity Crisis turned it into a dry, salty environment. As reported in December 28 learning published in the magazine Communications Earth & Environmentthe researchers combined new geological data in Sicily with geophysical and computer data to provide the most comprehensive picture of the ancient megaflood known to date.

“The Zanclean megaflood was a terrifying natural event, with an outflow and a faster flow of water than any flood known in the history of the Earth,” Aaron Micallef of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California, who led the study, said in the University of. Southampton words. “Our research provides the strongest evidence for this amazing phenomenon.”

Between 5.97 and 5.33 million years ago, the Messinian Salinity Crisis caused the Mediterranean Sea to be cut off from the Atlantic Ocean and evaporate into a saline environment. Scientists previously estimated that over the course of 10,000 years, the Mediterranean Sea slowly filled up again. However, in 2009 availability of the erosion process which stretches from the Gulf of Cadiz on Spain’s Atlantic coast to the Alboran Sea east of the Strait of Gibraltar refuted this theory, and instead led scientists to describe a single flood event.

“This ridge is thought to have been caused by the passage of Atlantic waters through the Late Messinian isthmus near the present-day Strait of Gibraltar, which first filled the western Mediterranean Sea, and then poured into the Sicily Sill, which filled the eastern Mediterranean Sea, ” researchers wrote. a new lesson. Scientists estimate that the megaflood lasted between two and 16 years, and released between 2.4 and 3.5 billion cubic feet (68 and 100 million cubic meters) per second, according to the study.

The team identified more than 300 continuous ridges near the Sicily Sill, an underwater bridge that divided the western Mediterranean from the eastern Mediterranean. The mounds were layered with debris washed from the sides of the mounds and surrounding areas, indicating a rapid and extensive depositional process. These layers come from between the Messinian (7.2 million to 5.3 million years ago) and Zanclean (5.3 to 3.60 million years ago) periods, matching well with the expected time of the Zanclean megaflood, about 5.3 million years ago.

“The formation of these hills is consistent with the erosion of a large, turbulent stream moving in a northeasterly direction,” Paul Carling of the University of Southampton, who participated in the study, said in a statement. “They reveal the great power of the Zanclean Megaflood and how it changed the landscape, leaving lasting marks on history.”

Carling and his colleagues also discovered a “W-shaped channel” along the eastern coast of the Sicily Sill, connecting the ridges to an underwater valley in the eastern Mediterranean called Noto Canyon. The researchers think that when the Zanclean River filled the western Mediterranean Sea and eventually spilled over the Sicily Sill, the river fed water into the eastern part of the lake.

The team also created computer models to recreate this. The tests show that the water changed its direction and grew faster over time, reaching 72 miles per hour (116 kilometers per hour).

“These findings shed light on a critical period in Earth’s geological history and show the tenacity of the soil over five million years,” added Micallef. “It opens the door to further research in the Mediterranean.”

Although the Zanclean megaflood is still a myth, one thing is certain – 5.3 million years ago, the Mediterranean Sea may not have been the best place to visit today.