In a groundbreaking study, researchers unveiled compelling evidence of the Zanclean Megaflood, a colossal event that refilled the Mediterranean Sea in mere years, reshaping its landscape with unprecedented water flow and velocities.
This event, which ended the Messinian Salinity Crisis, altered the geological and environmental makeup of the region, leaving lasting imprints that challenge previous theories about gradual changes.
Zanclean Megaflood
A recent study presents strong evidence that a massive ‘megaflood’ refilled the Mediterranean Sea, bringing an end to a period when the region was largely covered by salt flats.
Researchers believe this event, known as the Zanclean Megaflood, marked the conclusion of the Messinian Salinity Crisis, which lasted between 5.97 and 5.33 million years ago.
An international team of scientists, including researchers from the University of Southampton, has identified geological formations in southeastern Sicily that suggest a sudden, large-scale flooding event swept across the area.
Unveiling the Scale of the Megaflood
“The Zanclean megaflood was an awe-inspiring natural phenomenon, with discharge rates and flow velocities dwarfing any other known floods in Earth’s history,” said Dr. Aaron Micallef, lead author of the study and researcher at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California. “Our research provides the most compelling evidence yet of this extraordinary event.”
During the Messinian Salinity Crisis, the Mediterranean Sea became isolated from the Atlantic Ocean and evaporated, leading to vast salt deposits that reshaped the region’s landscape.
For years, scientists had thought that this dry period ended gradually, with the Mediterranean refilling over a period of 10,000 years. However, this idea was challenged by the discovery of an erosion channel stretching from the Gulf of Cadiz to the Alboran Sea in 2009. The finding pointed to a single, massive flooding event, lasting between two and 16 years, which became known as the Zanclean megaflood.
Geological Insights and Evidence
Estimates suggest the megaflood had a discharge from 68 to 100 Sverdrups (Sv), with one Sv equal to one million cubic meters per second.
The new research published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment combines newly discovered geological features with geophysical data and numerical modeling to provide the most comprehensive picture yet of the megaflood.
The researchers investigated over 300 asymmetric, streamlined ridges in a corridor across the Sicily Sill – a submerged land bridge that once separated the western and eastern Mediterranean basins.
Implications and Future Research
“The morphology of these ridges is compatible with erosion by large-scale, turbulent water flow with a predominantly north-easterly direction,” says Professor Paul Carling, an Emeritus professor in the School of Geography and Environmental Science at the University of Southampton and a coauthor of the study.
“They reveal the immense power of the Zanclean Megaflood and how it reshaped the landscape, leaving lasting imprints on the geological record.”
By sampling the ridges, the team found they were topped with a layer of rocky debris containing material eroded from the ridge flanks and the surrounding region, indicating it was deposited there quickly and with immense force.
This layer is right at the boundary between the Messinian and Zanclean periods when the megaflood is believed to have occurred.
Using seismic reflection data – a kind of geological ultrasound allowing scientists to see layers of rock and sediment beneath the surface, the researchers discovered a ‘W-shaped channel’ on the continental shelf east of the Sicily Sill.
This channel, carved into the seabed, connects the ridges to the Noto Canyon – a deep underwater valley located in the eastern Mediterranean.
The shape and location of the channel suggest that it acted like a massive funnel. When the megaflood waters poured over the Sicily Sill, this channel likely carried the water toward the Noto Canyon and into the eastern Mediterranean.
The researchers used computer models to simulate how the megaflood might have behaved. Their findings suggest that the floodwaters shifted direction and gained strength over time, reaching speeds of up to 32 meters per second (72 miles per hour). As the flood intensified, it carved deeper channels, eroded large amounts of material, and carried sediment across greater distances.
“These findings not only shed light on a critical moment in Earth’s geological history but also demonstrate the persistence of landforms over five million years,” Dr. Micallef added. “It opens the door to further research along the Mediterranean margins.”
Reference: “Land-to-sea indicators of the Zanclean megaflood” by Aaron Micallef, Giovanni Barreca, Christian Hübscher, Angelo Camerlenghi, Paul Carling, Jose Maria Abril Hernandez, Raúl Periáñez, Daniel Garcia-Castellanos, Jonathan Ford, Benedikt Haimerl, Matthias Hartge, Jonas Preine and Antonio Caruso, 28 December 2024, Communications Earth & Environment.
DOI: 10.1038/s43247-024-01972-w
The research was supported by the National Geographic Society, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation.
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45 Comments
Hmm I know of another “mega flodd” event that did this.
Whats odd is everytime evidence of Biblical events is found they go out of their way to find an “alternate” explanation.
This is a web site for science, not religion. Go elsewhere and give the rest of us a break.
Dear So Aptly Named “Karen”,
Do you have some special authority as a scitech moderator to tell people to leave this site or are you a site owner? Does being nasty give you some pleasure. It certainly gives me no pleasure to read you. Why don’t you go away and give the rest of us a break?
adhere to your own advice
People, come on. Every European culture has a flooding description in it’s history so something happened. I doubt anything was known or understood 5.3mil years ago but something occurred. Could this be it? It’s probably too early for Biblical coverage. And the earth is certainly more than 6k years old.
I am happy to examine evidence from those of a Biblical bent, but note that opinion is not evidence
This was over 5 millions years ago. The Ark was only 6000 years old.
Are you an ark historian? I didn’t know that there were accreditations for ark history? After a while all this computer modeling comes across as just more myth making, varying not so very much differently than the mythmakers three and a half thousand years ago. Now like then all the fairy tale makers who call themselves scientists then and now are after one thing, money to fund their lives and research. I’m old enough to remember when Piltdown man was still taken seriously. Over my lifetime there has been no shortage of scientific discoveries which 10-15 or 20 years later are discarded for new scientific discoveries and so it goes on and on. Those who are wise would do well to take all such articles with a grain of salt. Most of these are just clickbait.
The difference between science and religion is that in science, mistakes and hoaxes are corrected and discarded when the truth comes to light. In religion, hoaxes are worshipped. I am still here and so is the shroud of Turin.
How silly to elevate science above religion when both are belief structures with massive practical flaws, and both rife with misrepresentation motivated by agenda. Science is not some magical mechanism immune to the intentional abuse by mankind. While theoretically it leads to the truth, and historically it has many successes, it is also the playground of charlatans that trade on its credibility for leverage against competing agendas. Science must always be viewed with a jaundiced eye – like news.
Really? How do you know? Carbon dating can’t go back more than a few thousand years and although I’m open for the billions of years theory which people tend to forget the meaning of this word, there’s just enough evidence for Noah’s flood which we could call a theory as well since it also requires faith just like Darwin’s evolution theory requires faith. Unfortunately, people confuses science with scientist’s opinions (belief). Let’s just respect other people’s beliefs and focus on observable science. Unfortunately, we can only infer things thar can’t be repeatable. I once only believed in Evolution but after going deep into a possible creator, I now see things in the theory that make no sense. Honest scientists would admit that because. If you like science, you have to have an open mind and that applies to religious people too.
” Carbon dating can’t go back more than a few thousand years…”
Who said carbon dating was used here? Are you unaware of all the other radioisotope dating methods?
“there’s just enough evidence for Noah’s flood…”
Nope, not a single shred… unless you claim that the bible is wrong (this was a localized flood, and not in the time frame mentioned in the bible – are you going to twist your sacred book to fit the evidence?)
“… it also requires faith just like Darwin’s evolution theory requires faith…”
Theory of evolution does not require faith – it has a rock solid foundation of empirical evidence and predictions that were observed. Your superstitious drivel has none. Your crap is not a theory. Not even a hypothesis. It’s just bronze age fairy tales.
Prove it.
H G Wells argued this in his history of the world. An interesting surmise, but evidently it was much before humans existed. The flood story probably had its origins in the regular flooding of the Tigris and Euphrates river experienced by the Babylonians from whom the Jews got the Genesis stories (which the modified according to their own values and purposes).
You know all of this for a fact?
Read what he wrote, dumbass.
All of the people talking about this from the perspective of millions of years ago and “before humans existed” or talking about the biblical account as if it’s simply “religion” are failing to take one thing into account. The secular timeline is based on assumptions and not actual evidence. There is no reason to assume the earth is billions of years old based on any tangible evidence. The one and only reason to use that line of reasoning is because you’re committed to the idea of Darwinian evolution BEFORE looking at the evidence. You see, it’s all based on preconceived ideas about the past. In that view, you can make the evidence say whatever you want it to say. In reality, the actual, tangible evidence far and away aligns more with what the Bible says about history. Darwinism and its associated billions of years is an unscientific fairy tale dreamed up by a man who knew next to nothing about science.
“Researchers believe this event, known as the Zanclean Megaflood, marked the conclusion of the Messinian Salinity Crisis, which lasted between 5.97 and 5.33 million years ago.”
Yep. let’s ignore the inconvenient timeline and the fact that this was a localized event. Why let facts get in the way of an imaginary narrative, right? I mean, it does contain the word “flood”, right?
Right. Will call it everything but what YAHUAH said so long ago.
The biblical flood of Noah. God declared it and it was so. This is what He means when he said having eyes but can’t see and ears but can’t hear.
Also there’s nothing new under the sun. He said after the flood of Noah he didn’t flood again but that’s doesn’t mean the flood of Noah was the first major flood of biblical portions in all of the heavens and earth.
We can’t just decide things in our own reasoning. What He said. He said. The rest are mysterys to find when you dive into His word and actually want to know Him versus to proof your own self right when in a reality you had already decided to hate God before you every tested HIS scientific methods and ways.
Not everyone embraces the notion of Noah and his Ark. By and large these
” Biblical ” events were the fruits of creative minds, mythology, and exaggerations.
If one wants to defend these fables, they should in accordance with the deities they pray to. There still remain many people of other religions that do not share in the belief that these events actually happened.
Amen!!!
Go peddle yer fairy tales.
I thought Sv was Sievert, no?
There is evidence of a similar event in the Northwest United States. If that Catastrophic Flood event can be linked in Time to the Eastern European & Eurasian Event. It is simple logic. At the End of the last ice Age there has been evidence of Ice Barriers holding large pools of water. In Europe the Mountains of the Alps could forcused a melt thru East. In North America. The Rockies, and the other mountain Ranges could of also have focused water releases to create the explain the nature of an apparent ancient wide spread water disaster.
Except the evidence for the flood is overwhelming, seen all over the world and recorded by nearly every culture on earth.
The biblical flood, and the one mentioned in the Sumerian epic of Gilgamesh, probably was an ancient oral history and mythologization of the filling of the black Sea about 8,000 years ago (or was it 8,000 bce?) Nobody says that Noah’s flood story wasn’t based on something real but it wasn’t 5,000,000 years ago.
This one was at the end of the last ice age and was indeed recorded in the stories of Native Americans.
True science doesn’t just throw out, avoid or cancel other alternative explanations, it investigates. To ignore a traditional Biblical event is not science but cancellation plausibly based on intellectual or a deeper insecurity. This is not in good keeping with innate natures of efficacious and secure scientific research, it is merely avoidance.
Don’t let facts get in the way of your confirmation bias, religiotard.
What are you afraid of that your last comment boils down to petty name calling.
Truth
A global flood of a few thousand years ago would leave extensive and inarguable evidence in the geologic record, no such record exists. Stratigraphic studies by petroleum geologists can determine the rise and fall of sea level to an accuracy of a few feet in rocks hundreds of millions of years old, pretty sure such an event of a few thousand years would be blatantly obvious.
I was told once not to counfound science and scientism,that being said some suggest that the gréât american lakes have been made in the same time méditerran sea was refilled, has somebody got something on it ?
Truth indeed
When did this Zanclean megaflood occur? Was this at the end of the last ice-age?
My question would be, what was the effect on the over all sea level and what kind of effects might that have had globally considering the intensity of the flood.
People can argue about religion all they want. Perhaps that would be better done elsewhere and we could use this space for more science based discussion.
Scientists and researchers? Pretty sure they are geologists, why not call them such? Carbon dating is limited to about 58,000 years but there are many other methods of dating that over the decades have proven repeatable and correlative, generally within a percent or two. Radioactive decay is among the best, if you doubt it’s accuracy consider the official time clocks of the world keep time to ten thousandths or less of a second accuracy by measuring the decay rate of Cesium.
All the scientific timelines are messed up and based on “assumptions” about the past. Science and archeology eventually all come around to the Biblical Narrative which is 100% correct. This flood and other mega-floods are what the Book of Genesis describes as the Universal Megaflood which destroyed mankind for its Wickedness.
John Froelich Ph.D mathematics, NSF postdoc, IT consultant,……
In science, your argument/claims should stand on the evidence alone, not the letters of the alphabet placed after your name.
It’s fascinating that Civilisations separated geologically and by thousands of years.. All spoke of a massive flood.
Floods are typically rare catastrophic events that result in destruction of cities and crops. It shouldn’t be surprising that they are written on clay tablets, papyrus rolls, or passed on with oral traditions. However, when examined carefully, there is no evidence that they all occurred at the same time. They are rare enough to instill awe and fear in pre-science societies, much like eclipses.