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Paleotsunami Deposits Along the Coast of Egypt Correlate with Historical Earthquake Records of Eastern Mediterranean

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Paleotsunami Deposits Along the Coast of Egypt Correlate with Historical Earthquake Records of Eastern Mediterranean Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 18, 2203–2219, 2018 https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-18-2203-2018 © Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. Paleotsunami deposits along the coast of Egypt correlate with historical earthquake records of eastern Mediterranean Asem Salama1,2,5, Mustapha Meghraoui1,5, Mohamed El Gabry2,5, Said Maouche3,5, Moussa Hesham Hussein2,5, and Ibrahim Korrat4 1EOST-Institut de Physique du Globe – CNRS – UMR 7516, Strasbourg, France 2National Research Institute of Astronomy and Geophysics, 11421 Helwan, Egypt 3Centre Recherche Astronomie Astrophysique et Géophysique, Bouzareah, Algeria 4Mansoura University, Mansoura, Egypt 5North Africa Group for Earthquake and Tsunami Studies (NAGET), Ne t40/OEA ICTP, Italy Correspondence: Mustapha Meghraoui ([email protected]) Received: 7 March 2018 – Discussion started: 12 March 2018 Revised: 5 July 2018 – Accepted: 14 July 2018 – Published: 17 August 2018 Abstract. We study the sedimentary record of past tsunamis hazards on the Egyptian coastline and the eastern Mediter- along the coastal area west of Alexandria (NW Egypt) tak- ranean regions. ing into account the occurrence of major historical earth- quakes in the eastern Mediterranean. The two selected sites at Kefr Saber ( ∼ 32 km west of Marsa-Matrouh city) and ∼ 10 km northwest of El Alamein village are coastal la- 1 Introduction goons protected by 2–20 m-high dunes parallel to the shore- line. Field data were collected by (1) coastal geomorphol- Egypt has a well-documented historical catalogue of ogy along estuaries, wedge-protected and dune-protected la- earthquakes and tsunamis recorded in ancient texts and goons; and (2) identification and spatial distribution of pale- manuscripts. Original documents and archives from past civ- otsunamis deposits using five trenches (1.5 m-depth) at Kefr ilizations are considered the principal sources of macro- Saber and twelve cores (1 to 2.5 m-depth) at El Alamein. De- seismic data for major historical earthquakes and tsunamis tailed logging of sedimentary sections was conducted using (Poirier and Taher, 1980; Maamoun et al., 1984; Ambraseys X-rays, grain size and sorting, total organic and inorganic et al., 1994, 2009; Guidoboni et al., 1994, 2005; Soloviev et matter, bulk mineralogy, magnetic susceptibility, and radio- al., 2000; Tinti et al., 2001). The catalogue of Ambraseys et carbon dating to identify past tsunamis records. Generally of al. (2009) reports that coastal cities of northern Egypt have low energy, the stratigraphic succession made of coastal la- experienced repeated tsunami inundation with severe dam- goon and alluvial deposits includes intercalated high-energy age in the past. While historical earthquakes and tsunamis deposits made of mixed fine and coarse sand with bro- are well documented, it appears that there is a lack of holis- ken shells, interpreted as catastrophic layers correlated with tic investigations for tsunami deposits along the Mediter- tsunami deposits. Radiocarbon dating of 46 samples consist ranean coastlines. The geomorphology along the Mediter- in mixed old (>13000 BP) and young (<5500 BP), dated ranean coastline of northern Egypt, with low-level topog- charcoal and shells in sedimentary units correlate with the raphy (Hassouba, 1995), dunes and lagoons, constitutes an 24 June AD 1870 (Mw 7.5), 8 August AD 1303 (Mw ∼ 8) and ideal natural environment for the geological record of past 21 July AD 365 (Mw 8–8.5) large tsunamigenic earthquakes tsunamis. that caused inundation along the Alexandria and northern The eastern Mediterranean region has experienced major Egyptian shoreline. Our results point out the size and recur- earthquakes (with Mw > 7.5), mainly along the Hellenic sub- rence of past tsunamis and the potential for future tsunami duction zone, due to the convergence between the Eurasian and African plates (Fig. 1; Ambraseys et al., 1994; Taymaz et Published by Copernicus Publications on behalf of the European Geosciences Union. 2204 A. Salama et al.: Paleotsunami deposits along the coast of Egypt 20˚ 24˚ 28˚ 32˚ Turkey E U R A S I A 36˚ 36˚ Crete Cyprus MediterraneanSea 062887 012888 120955 32˚ 32˚ Marmaric Plateau Marsa Matrouh escarpament Sinai 052898 Qattara Nile AFRICA 101292 Libya 28˚ Egypt 28˚ 20˚ 24˚ 28˚ 32˚ Legend Earthquakes magnitudes Earthquake tsunami (M>7.5) Paleotsunami sites >6 8 August 1303 El Alamein 5–6 4–5 24 June 1870 Kefr Saber 3–4 <3 21 July 365 Figure 1. Seismicity (instrumental with M > 5.5) and main tectonic faulting (black lines) in northern Egypt. Boxes indicate the paleoseis- mic sites of Kefr Saber and El Alamein east of the Nile delta. The major historical earthquakes (star) of AD 365 (Mw 8–8.5), AD 1303 (Mw ∼ 8) and AD 1870 (Mw>7–7.5) are located along the Hellenic subduction zone according to Guidoboni et al. (1994), Stiros (2001), Ambraseys (2009), Papadopoulos et al. (2014) and Jusseret and Sintubin (2017). Focal mechanisms are from CMT-Harvard (referenced as CMT catalogue). al., 2004). Major historical tsunamis in the eastern Mediter- et al. (2014), studied the sedimentological records and re- ranean region which affected northern Egypt are triggered lated microtexture and heavy mineral assemblage for three by large earthquakes (Papadopoulos et al., 2014). However, events in Portugal in AD 1755, Scotland in 8200 BP and there is a possibility of landslide triggered tsunamis associ- in Indonesia associated with the 2004 Sumatra earthquake. ated with local earthquakes (El-Sayed et al., 2004; Tinti et al., Sawai (2001) and Nanayama et al. (2003) recognized major 2005). Yalciner et al. (2014) estimated from modelling that tsunamis due to extensive coastal inundation along the east- a landslide with a volume up to 500 km3 may have caused ern coast of Hokkaido (northern Japan); the repeated sand a tsunami with a wave height ranging from 0.4 to 4 m off- sheet layers several kilometres inland evidenced a 500 year shore of the Nile Delta. Coastal landslides may generate giant tsunami cycle in the period between 2000 and 7000 BP. Fol- tsunamis as the Storrega event that impacted Norway and the lowing the 2004 Sumatra earthquake (Mw 9.1) and in addi- North Atlantic Ocean in ∼ 6100 BC (Bondevik et al., 2012). tion to the coral reef uplift and subsidence (Meltzner et al., Tsunami research of the past 20 years has led to the dis- 2009), Malik et al. (2015) identified (in trenches) three his- covery of coastal tsunami sedimentary records dating back to torical tsunamis during the past 1000 years along the coast of thousands of years. Among the early studies was that of At- South Andaman Island (India). Lario et al. (2011) document water (1987) who found evidence of more than six soil lay- five tsunami events in the Gulf of Cadiz (Spain) generated by ers buried below tsunami deposits over the past 7000 years strong earthquakes in the last 7000 years, prior to AD 1755 along the Puget Sound coastline of Washington State. Costa Lisbon earthquake-generated tsunami. In the Mediterranean, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 18, 2203–2219, 2018 www.nat-hazards-earth-syst-sci.net/18/2203/2018/ A. Salama et al.: Paleotsunami deposits along the coast of Egypt 2205 De Martini et al. (2012) identified two tsunami deposits dur- damage distribution, combined with coastal uplift measure- ing the first millennium BC and another one in AD 650– ments and modelling (Fig. 1; Guidoboni et al., 1994; Stiros, 770 and estimated a 385 year average recurrence interval 2001; Shaw et al., 2008; Ambraseys, 2009). for strong tsunamis along the eastern coast of Sicily (Italy). On 8 August AD 1303 a major earthquake with magnitude Minoura et al. (2000) described tsunami deposits with vol- ∼ Mw 8 located between Crete and Rhodes islands (Fig. 1) canic ashes along the coast on Crete (Greece) that corre- generated a tsunami that greatly damaged the coastal cities late with the Thera (Santorini) eruption in the late Minoan of the eastern Mediterranean (Ambraseys, 2009; Papadopou- period (1600–1300 BC). Papadopoulos et al. (2012) docu- los et al., 2014). In 1329 Abu-El Fida (1907) reported that mented three paleotsunami layers attributed to the AD 1303, the Alexandria city and the Nile Delta were flooded and AD 1481 and AD 1741 historically documented tsunamis in many houses were damaged in Cairo and northern Egypt. Dalaman (southwestern Turkey). Using granulometry, XRD, In Alexandria, part of the city walls collapsed, the famous XRF, and FT-IR, Tyuleneva et al. (2018) identified two sedi- lighthouse was destroyed and some ships were torn apart and mentary events offshore of Casearea (Israel) that may corre- carried inland by the tsunami waves (Abu-El Fida, 1907). late with landslide tsunamis in AD 749 and 5700 BP (Chal- On 24 June 1870, a large earthquake affected many places colithic cultural period). in the eastern Mediterranean region and was felt in Alexan- In this paper, we investigate the high energy sedimentary dria at around 18:00 h local time (LT), with no damage in deposits along the northern coast of Egypt and their corre- the city but with slight damage in Cairo (Ambraseys, 2009). lation with the historical tsunami catalogue of the eastern Along the Alexandria coastline and the Nile Delta, the sea Mediterranean. Using coastal geomorphology with trenching waves flooded the docks of ports and inland fields (Coum- and coring, we examine the geological evidence of tsunami bary, 1870). The epicentre location of this earthquake at east- deposits using textural, geochemical analysis, magnetic sus- ern edge of Crete is inferred from damage in Heraklion and ceptibility and radiocarbon dating to identify the tsunamis related shaking felt around the eastern Mediterranean (Fig. 1; records. We have analysed 120 samples (25 g each) from Schmidt, 1875; Jusseret and Sintubin, 2017). core tubes every 15 cm for the geochemical analysis includ- The AD 365 and AD 1303 events were classified as very ing grain size, bulk mineralogy, and totally organic and in- large earthquakes (with Mw ≥ 8; Stiros et al., 2001; Shaw organic matter.
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