HR: 14:40h
AN: OS13B-05    [Abstracts]
TI: Results of Coring Survey Indicate Eastern Mediterranean Paleotsunami Events
AU: * Goodman-Tchernov, B N
EM: goodman@research.haifa.ac.il
AF: Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences, Coral Beach PO Box 469, Eilat, 88103, Israel
AU: * Goodman-Tchernov, B N
EM: goodman@research.haifa.ac.il
AF: University of Haifa, Recanati Institute for Maritime Studies Department of Maritime Civilization, Mt. Carmel, 31905, Israel
AU: Reinhardt, E
EM: ereinhar@mcmaster.ca
AF: McMaster University, School of Geography and Earth Sciences 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton, ON L8S4K1, Canada
AU: Mart, Y
EM: y.mart@research.haifa.ac.il
AF: University of Haifa, Recanati Institute for Maritime Studies Department of Maritime Civilization, Mt. Carmel, 31905, Israel
AB: The upper shelf of high-energy coastlines is a dynamic and changing environment, and therefore has not traditionally been viewed as a potential location for finding preserved in situ tsunami deposits. A unique shell-rich 2nd century AD deposit that was discovered a meter below the seabed outside the ancient harbor of Caesarea, Israel in 2002, has been interpreted as paleotsunami deposit. Prior to this discovery, there was no recorded physical evidence substantiating any of the 3 tsunami events mentioned in written texts. Our finding introduced the possibility that the demise of the ancient harbor may have included tsunami-related damage. It also raised the possibility that an in situ tsunamigenic layer might have been preserved along the shoreline and to deeper depths. With the goal of investigating this layer, 1 to 3 meter length cores were collected along shore-parallel (at the -15 m contour) and shore-perpendicular (from -10 to -30 meters depth) transects. The coarse-sand environment required the use of a novel submerged diver-operated pneumatic percussion coring device. The cores were analyzed using a variety of proxies (micropaleontology, sedimentology, geochemistry) to identify mixing indicators between terrestrial, beach zone, shelf, and deep sea. The results demonstrate that 1) the horizon is natural and not anthropogenic in origin, 2) fine resolution particle size distribution analysis proved useful for differentiating between normal storm cycles and tsunami events, 3) subtle micropaleontological indicators of rare-occuring, environmentally significant species were present in the tsunamigenic horizons, and 3) not one, but multiple tsunamigenic horizons are preserved offshore from Caesarea. This paper will discuss these findings and methods, and their potential for better finding, understanding and identifying paleotsunami deposits.
DE: 3002 Continental shelf and slope processes (4219)
DE: 4217 Coastal processes
DE: 4564 Tsunamis and storm surges
DE: 4944 Micropaleontology (0459, 3030)
SC: Ocean Sciences [OS]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting