A resultant enormous tsunami wreaked havoc on Cretes coast, laying waste to various Minoan settlements. In the north of Santorini, the undulating seafloor bedforms were formed by pyroclastic flows and on the other flanks the scientists see proof that these sediment structures are associated to instabilities of the volcanic flanks, believed to be formed or reactivated during the Minoan Eruption. Our findings indicate that they contributed to the generation of the damaging Minoan tsunami”, says the geophysicist.
This triggered large water masses to be displaced, generating a huge tsunami wave. In comparison, just one-tenth of the comparable total volume was displaced during a recent collapse-generated tsunami at Anak Krakatau in 2018, which ravaged the surrounding coasts of the Sunda Strait in Indonesia.
Plainly striking in the high-resolution seismic profiles are wavy sediment structures, so-called undulating seafloor bedforms that can be found radially around the caldera and extend up to 25 kilometers from the volcano. In their research study, now released in the scientific journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters, the researchers reveal that these structures are extremely important to interpret the genesis of volcanic tsunamis.
Volcanic tsunamis have so far been improperly understood due to the complicated cascade of events that are associated with activating them. “Reconstructing the seafloor morphology is one action forward to a much better understanding of the generation of tsunamis during large eruptions”, describes Jens Karstens.
Seafloor bedforms are comparable to ripples or dunes that a person can observe in river beds or at the beach. Since of sediment being transferred by streaming water, they establish at the user interface of water and the ocean flooring. In the case at Santorini, the sediments were formed when currents of dense hot gas and volcanic rocks, so-called pyroclastic flows, went into the ocean after they flowed at high speeds down the volcanic flanks. Another procedure that can produce such undulating bedforms is the destabilization of sediments on the volcanic flanks.
In the north of Santorini, the undulating seafloor bedforms were formed by pyroclastic flows and on the other flanks the scientists see proof that these sediment structures are related to instabilities of the volcanic flanks, thought to be formed or reactivated during the Minoan Eruption. Our findings show that they contributed to the generation of the damaging Minoan tsunami”, states the geophysicist.
This caused big water masses to be displaced, generating a huge tsunami wave. In comparison, only one-tenth of the comparable overall volume was displaced during a recent collapse-generated tsunami at Anak Krakatau in 2018, which ravaged the surrounding coasts of the Sunda Strait in Indonesia.
Contortions of the subsurface extending 200 meters deep listed below the seafloor show that slope instabilities can likewise be reactivated by regional tectonic earthquakes which have actually happened with Magnitudes more than 7 (M7+) in the Santorini area in the past, causing devastating tsunamis.
” This study highlights the value of the understanding of flank instabilities for the tsunami danger assessment at active volcanoes,” says teacher for marine geomechanics at GEOMAR, Dr. Morelia Urlaub, leader of the task PRE COLLAPSE and co-author of the publication. The Minoan eruption is one of the best-studied volcanic eruptions worldwide and Santorini offers the unique opportunity to relate the development of the undulating seafloor deposits with the volcanic procedures.
In August 2023, members of the PRE COLLAPSE research group will check out Anak Krakatau with the research study vessel recreational vehicle Sonne to make similar seismic and bathymetric surveys to study the 1883 and 2018 eruptions. They will have the ability to utilize the recently acquired understanding about the undulating seafloor bedforms to better analyze and compare the subsurface structures at Krakatau and Santorini and assess how their findings can be requested danger evaluation likewise at other active marine volcanoes.
Recommendation: “Formation of undulating seafloor bedforms during the Minoan eruption and their ramifications for eruption dynamics and slope stability at Santorini” by Jens Karstens, Jonas Preine, Steven Carey, Katherine L.C. Bell, Paraskevi Nomikou, Christian Hübscher, Danai Lampridou and Morelia Urlaub, 7 June 2023, Earth and Planetary Science Letters.DOI: 10.1016/ j.epsl.2023.118215.
Scientists from the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel and numerous other institutions have actually evaluated the after-effects of the Minoan eruption of Santorini, discovering that the damaging tsunami 3,600 years back was triggered by a mix of pyroclastic circulations and the destabilization of the volcanos flanks. The study, utilizing seismic data and bathymetry of the sea floor, stresses the significance of understanding flank instabilities in evaluating tsunami threats at active volcanoes.
The imprints left on the seafloor of the Aegean act as important indicators for enhanced examination of threats of volcanic tsunamis.
The gigantic Minoan eruption of Santorini in the Aegean Sea ranks among the most considerable explosive volcanic occasions during the Holocene period. This disastrous natural catastrophe occurred in the Late Bronze Age, causing Santorini to violently rupture, predicting enormous amounts of hot volcanic rock and gas throughout the eastern Mediterranean. A resultant massive tsunami wreaked havoc on Cretes coast, laying waste to various Minoan settlements. Presently, the only evidence of Santorinis previous magnitude is the island with its big caldera rims jutting out from the sea.
A team of scientists from the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, in partnership with coworkers from the University of Rhode Island, the University of Hamburg, the Ocean Discovery League, Saunderstown, and the University of Athens, looked for to decode the cause of the enormous tsunami that occurred 3,600 years ago. They embarked on a comprehensive research study of the effect this huge waterfall of occasions left on the ocean floor.
In October 2019 a team led by marine geophysicist Dr. Jens Karstens gathered brand-new geophysical information with research vessel R/V Poseidon from around the Santorini Caldera. With acoustic wave, they developed a structural picture of the subsurface. The researchers combined the new seismic profiles with swath bathymetry data gathered throughout a number of previous global expeditions. These supply info on the water depth and the comprehensive morphology of the sea floor.
