The coast of Egypt and Saudi Arabia are at risk because the Red Sea has been hiding powerful geological forces.
Sam Purkis looked out the window of a submarine in Tiran Strait and thought like a wave.
The chasm was three meters wide and eight meters tall, and it was lit by the vehicle's flashlight.
Purkis, a marine scientist from the University of Miami, realized that what we were looking at was the result of a geological force.
The work of an underwater landslide is believed to have triggered 10-meter-high waves that hit the Egyptian coastline 500 years ago.
If that land slips, it could cause a second wave twice the size of the first one, according to models. When earthquakes occur in the region, they rarely produce a wave of this size.
Purkis explains that a little shake in the wrong place could cause the wall to fail and cause a much larger tsunami than occurred 500 years ago.
The area of Egypt and Saudi Arabia, which are urbanizing so rapidly, have certain dangers that need to be avoided.
There is a map of where the ancient landslide happened. The University of Miami is a part of the OceanXplorer.
The Red Sea is a maritime rift because it is spreading apart as the two plates that border it shift.
This makes the region highly susceptible to earthquakes, but the discovery of a submarine landslide suggests there are other tsunami-triggering forces at play.
Slope failures along parts of the Red Sea coastline could be very dangerous in straits or other narrow passages, where a wave can quickly make landfall with very little warning.
In Tiran Strait, the authors say a 20-meter-high wave could threaten the rapidly urbanizing coastline of Egypt and Saudi Arabia. An Egyptian resort town lies directly in the wave's path according to models.
A company that is developing the Saudi Arabian coastline funded the research voyage that discovered the submarine landslide.
The risk assessment was a good idea. Powerful waves hit the shore in just minutes despite the slide that occurred half a millennium ago.
The first impacts will be felt by the Egyptian resort city of Sharm El Sheikh if the land slips 50 meters more. The waves crashing on the shore here could reach as high as 21 meters within a minute and thirty seconds.
The waves that hit Sharm could reach the coast in less than three minutes if the land slips by a further 100 meters.
The Saudi coastline on the other side of the strait would be impacted a few minutes after that. Researchers think the waves could reach 15 meters tall.
The bathymetry of the Straits confines and directs the tsunami is depicted in all simulations.
The wide and deep water to the north allows the wavefront to progress unimpeded up the Gulf of Aqaba. The Straits restrict wave entry into the Red Sea.
Historical records missed the undersea landslide that triggered a tsunami 500 years ago. The event was not marked by an earthquake and the coastline where Sharm now sits was only an occasional base for fishermen at the time.
The reality is very different today and submarine studies can reveal vulnerabilities in coastline infrastructure that could put communities at risk.
The slopes offshore Sharm are very steep. Waves could easily make their way to the Saudi coast if the walls were to slide further into the deep.
Predicting when the waves will hit could save lives. The Red Sea should be monitored like earthquakes.
The study was published in a journal.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
