First direct proof of mega-flood in Mediterranean Sea region six million years ago.
Geologists from Utrecht, London and Granada have found the first direct
proof of the largest known mega-flood that ever occurred on earth. This
mega-flood ended what is known as the ‘Messinian Salinity Crisis’,
a period around six million years ago when the water level in the
Mediterranean Sea sank by around 1.5 km, causing an extreme
environmental crisis in the region. The authors studied sandstone that
was exposed along the southern coast of Sicily and concluded that it was
formed by a powerful flow from the western Mediterranean Sea towards
the east. The water flowed over a barrier that separated what were then
isolated basins in the western and eastern Mediterranean region. Their
research was recently published in the journal Sedimentology.