Evidence of sea level drawdown at the end of the Messinian salinity crisis and seismic investigation of the Nahr Menashe unit in the northern Levant Basin, offshore Lebanon

2019 ◽  
Vol 31 (5) ◽  
pp. 827-840 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kyrre Heldal Kartveit ◽  
Heidrun Breiset Ulsund ◽  
Ståle Emil Johansen
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level ◽  
Messinian Salinity Crisis ◽  
Seismic Investigation ◽  
Levant Basin

Intense salt deformation in the Levant Basin in the middle of the Messinian Salinity Crisis

2013 ◽  
Vol 379 ◽  
pp. 108-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zohar Gvirtzman ◽  
Moshe Reshef ◽  
Orna Buch-Leviatan ◽  
Zvi Ben-Avraham
Keyword(s):  
Messinian Salinity Crisis ◽  
Levant Basin

The Ardèche endokarstic responses to the eustatic variations resulting from the Messinian salinity crisis

2006 ◽  
Vol 177 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ludovic Mocochain ◽  
Georges Clauzon ◽  
Jean-Yves Bigot
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Mediterranean Sea ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Carbonate Platform ◽  
Messinian Salinity Crisis ◽  
Base Level ◽  
Accommodation Space ◽  
Fan Delta ◽  
Delta Progradation ◽  
The Mediterranean

Abstract The Messinian salinity crisis is typically recorded by evaporites in the abyssal plains of the Mediterranean Sea and by canyons incised into the Mediterranean margins and their hinterlands. However, the impacts of crisis on geomorphology and surface dynamics lasted, until canyons were filled by sediments in the Pliocene (fig. 2). In the mid-Rhône valley, the Ardeche Cretaceous carbonate platform is incised over 600 m by the Rhône Messinian canyon. The canyon thalweg is located – 236 m bsl (below sea level) in the borehole of Pierrelatte [Demarcq, 1960; fig. 1]. During the Pliocene, this canyon was flooded as a ria and infilled by a Gilbert type fan delta [Clauzon and Rubino, 1992; Clauzon et al., 1995]. The whole Messinian-Pliocene third order cycle [Haq et al., 1987] generated four benchmark levels. The first two are [Clauzon, 1996]: (i) The pre-evaporitic abandonment surface which is mapped around the belvedere of Saint-Restitut (fig. 1). This surface is synchronous [Clauzon, 1996] of the crisis onset (5.95 Ma) [Gautier et al., 1994; Krigjsman et al., 1999] and, consequently, is an isochronous benchmark. (ii) The Messinian erosional surface is also an isochronous benchmark due to the fast flooding [Blanc, 2002] of the Rhône canyon, becoming a ria at 5.32 Ma [Hilgen and Langereis, 1988]. These surfaces are the result of endoreic Mediterranean sea level fall more than a thousand meters below the Atlantic Ocean. A huge accommodation space (up to more than 1000 m) was created as sea-level rose up to 80 m above its present-day level (asl) during the Pliocene highstand of cycle TB 3.4 (from 5.32 to 3.8 Ma). During the Lower Pliocene this accommodation space was filled by a Gilbert fan delta. This history yields two other benchmark levels: (i) the marine/non marine Pliocene transition which is an heterochronous surface produced by the Gilbert delta progradation. This surface recorded the Pliocene highstand sea level; (ii) the Pliocene abandonment surface at the top of the Gilbert delta continental wedge. Close to the Rhône-Ardeche confluence, the present day elevations of the four reference levels are (evolution of base-level synthesized in fig. 4): (1) 312 m asl, (2) 236 m bsl, (3) 130 m asl, (4) 190 m asl. The Ardèche carbonate platform underwent karstification both surficial and at depth. The endokarst is characterized by numerous cavities organised in networks. Saint-Marcel Cave is one of those networks providing the most complete record (fig. 5). It opens out on the northern side of the Ardeche canyon at an altitude of 100 m. It is made up by three superposed levels extending over 45 km in length. The lower level (1) is flooded and functionnal. It extends beneath the Ardeche thalweg down to the depth of 10 m bsl reached by divers. The observations collected in the galleries lead us to the conclusion that the karst originated in the vadose area [Brunet, 2000]. The coeval base-level was necessarily below those galleries. The two other levels (middle (2) and upper (3)) are today abandoned and perched. The middle level is about 115 m asl and the upper one is about 185 m asl. They are horizontal and have morphologies specific to the phreatic and temporary phreatic zone of the karst (fig. 6). In literature, the terracing of the Saint-Marcel Cave had been systematically interpreted as the result of the lowering by steps of the Ardeche base-level [Guérin, 1973; Blanc, 1995; Gombert, 1988; Debard, 1997]. In this interpretation, each deepening phase of the base level induces the genesis of the gravitary shaft and the abandonment of the previous horizontal level. The next stillstand of base level leads to the elaboration of a new horizontal level (fig. 7). This explanation is valid for most of Quaternary karsts, that are related to glacioeustatic falls of sea-level. However our study on the Saint-Marcel Cave contests this interpretation because all the shafts show an upward digging dynamism and no hint of vadose sections. The same “per ascensum” hydrodynamism was prevailing during the development of the whole network (figs. 8 and 9). We interpret the development of the Ardeche endokarst as related to the eustatic Messinian-Pliocene cycle TB 3.4/3.5 recorded by the Rhône river. The diving investigations in the flooded part of the Saint-Marcel Cave and also in the vauclusian springs of Bourg-Saint-Andeol reached - 154 m bsl. Those depths are compatible only with the incision of the Messinian Rhône canyon at the same altitude (−236 m bsl). The Saint-Marcel lower level would have develop at that time. The ascending shaping of levels 2 and 3 is thus likely to have formed during the ensuing sea-level rise and highstand during the Pliocene, in mainly two steps: (i) the ria stage controlled by the Mediterranean sea level rise and stillstand; (ii) the rhodanian Gilbert delta progradation, that controlled the genesis of the upper level (fig. 10).

Vegetation, sea-level, and climate changes during the Messinian salinity crisis

2012 ◽  
Vol 125 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 432-444 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Jimenez-Moreno ◽  
J. N. Perez-Asensio ◽  
J. C. Larrasoana ◽  
J. Aguirre ◽  
J. Civis ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level ◽  
Climate Changes ◽  
Messinian Salinity Crisis

Sediment transportation systems to the Levant basin and the role of the Nile River since the Pliocene

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yael Sagy ◽  
Oz Dror ◽  
Michael Gardosh ◽  
Moshe Reshef
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level ◽  
Late Pleistocene ◽  
Nile Delta ◽  
Set Covering ◽  
Transport Systems ◽  
Gradual Transition ◽  
Nile River ◽  
Deep Basin ◽  
Early Pliocene ◽  
Levant Basin

<p>The progradation of the Nile River Delta and the thick (~1500m) Sinai-Israel shelf since the Pliocene provide a world class source to sink system feeding a deep (>1.5 km) siliciclastic basin.  The general agreement that the Pliocene-to-Recent succession originates from the Nile Delta dispersing sediments via a system of counterclockwise currents does not reveal how the sediments were transported to the deep basin. Particularly, how sediments originating from the Nile Delta could have bypassed the ~50 km wide Sinai-Israeli shelf. Here, we examine the various sources that contributed to the accumulation of the Pliocene-to-Recent succession in the deep Levant basin, and the temporal and spatial contribution of each source. The analysis of a unique seismic data set covering the shelf, slope and deep basin enable us to track submarine sediment transport systems.</p><p>Following attribute analysis of the seismic volumes we map channel sets, analyze their morphological features and interpret their erosional and depositional patterns. Direction flow maps indicate that sediments sources vary from eastward remnant Arabian drainage network at the onset of the Pliocene, to direct Nilotic origin during the Pliocene. Since the Late Pleistocene reworked sediments, deriving from the Israeli shelf and northern Sinai provide a major source to the deep basin. Furthermore, our results demonstrate an increase in channel’s complexity since the Early Pliocene to Recent suggesting a gradual transition from sporadic submarine flow events, carrying fewer sediments to the deep basin at the Early Pliocene, to more frequent events during the Late Pleistocene-to-Recent characterized by an increase in sediment load. The gradual increase of channel complexity from Pliocene-to-Recent is discordant to the general trend of sea-level fluctuation, suggesting that sea-level has a minor effect on sediment accumulation in the deep basin. We propose that the balance between the northward prograding Nile Cone and the longshore currents building the Sinai-Israeli shelf dictate siliciclastic accumulation in the southeastern Mediterranean basin as well as the paleogeography of its margin.</p>

Drainage systems and their relations to the Messinian Salinity Crisis in the Levant Basin

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jimmy Moneron ◽  
Zohar Gvirtzman
Keyword(s):  
Salt Tectonics ◽  
Messinian Salinity Crisis ◽  
Time Intervals ◽  
Drainage Systems ◽  
Resolution Imaging ◽  
Levant Basin ◽  
Channel Patterns ◽  
Seismic Reflection Profiles ◽  
Short Time ◽  
Channel Systems

<p>New high-resolution imaging of recently acquired data in the Levant basin shed light on very dense channel systems. The processes behind their origin, timing and direction - during the different stages of the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC) - is still unresolved and partly understood. Discoveries of such drainage systems raise questions on a past topography and mechanisms responsible for the channel morphologies, the understanding of these channel patterns is thus essential for a meaningful assessment of such mechanisms involved in the context of the MSC and its aftermath. Our results show that the drainage direction was undergoing extreme changes during short time intervals in the Levant Basin. Indeed, new maps presented here indicate different past drainage orientations, which is in contrast to the current-day turbidite channels - draining the Sinai-Levant continental margin northward towards the Cyprus Arc. We hypothesize from these results that drainage change, from southwest to north, expresses northward tilting of the basin towards the Cyprus subduction zone, however, when exactly did this tilting occur? Deciphering the timing of such events is important in order to get a better understanding of tectonostratigraphic settings, controlling depocenter locations in the Levant basin in the MSC. We also suggest that the unique pattern of channels over the Intra-Messinian Truncation Surface (IMTS), expresses a complex seafloor relief which was mainly controlled by salt tectonics induced thrusts faults.</p><p>Keywords: Messinian Salinity Crisis, Channel systems, Evaporites, Seismic Reflection Profiles</p>

Evidence for large-scale methane venting due to rapid drawdown of sea level during the Messinian Salinity Crisis

Geology ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
pp. 371-374 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Bertoni ◽  
Joseph Cartwright ◽  
Christian Hermanrud
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Messinian Salinity Crisis

A numerical study of the climate response to lowered Mediterranean Sea level during the Messinian Salinity Crisis

2009 ◽  
Vol 279 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 41-59 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa N. Murphy ◽  
Daniel B. Kirk-Davidoff ◽  
Natalie Mahowald ◽  
Bette L. Otto-Bliesner
Keyword(s):  
Mediterranean Sea ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Numerical Study ◽  
Messinian Salinity Crisis ◽  
Climate Response

scholarly journals Leaky salt: pipe trails record the history of cross-evaporite fluid escape in the northern Levant Basin, Eastern Mediterranean

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Davide Oppo ◽  
Sian Evans ◽  
Christopher A-L Jackson ◽  
David Iacopini ◽  
SM Mainul Kabir ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Fluid Flow ◽  
Tectonic Evolution ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Salt Tectonics ◽  
Messinian Salinity Crisis ◽  
Seal Failure ◽  
History Of ◽  
Levant Basin

<p>Hydrocarbon escape systems can be regionally active on multi-million-year timescales. However, reconstructing the timing and evolution of repeated escape events can be challenging because their expression may overlap in time and space. In the northern Levant Basin, eastern Mediterranean, distinct fluid escape episodes from common leakage points formed discrete, cross-evaporite fluid escape pipes, which are preserved in the stratigraphic record due to the coeval Messinian salt tectonics.</p><p>The pipes consistently originate at the crest of prominent sub-salt anticlines, where thinning and hydrofracturing of overlying salt permitted focused fluid flow. Sequential pipes are arranged in several kilometers-long trails that were progressively deformed due to basinward gravity-gliding of salt and its overburden. The correlation of the oldest pipes within 12 trails suggests that margin-wide fluid escape started in the Late Pliocene/Early Pleistocene, coincident with a major phase of uplift of the Levant margin. We interpret that the consequent transfer of overpressure from the deeper basin areas triggered seal failure and cross-evaporite fluid flow. We infer that other triggers, mainly associated with the Messinian Salinity Crisis and compressive tectonics, played a secondary role in the northern Levant Basin. Further phases of fluid escape are unique to each anticline and, despite a common initial cause, long-term fluid escape proceeded independently according to structure-specific characteristics, such as the local dynamics of fluid migration and anticline geometry.</p><p>Whereas cross-evaporite fluid escape in the southern Levant Basin is mainly attributed to the Messinian Salinity Crisis and compaction disequilibrium, we argue that these mechanisms do not apply to the northern Levant Basin; here, fluid escape was mainly driven by the tectonic evolution of the margin. Within this context, our study shows that the causes of cross-evaporite fluid escape can vary over time, act in synergy, and have different impacts in different areas of large salt basins.</p>

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