Submarine landslides of the Mediterranean Sea: Trigger mechanisms, dynamics, and frequency-magnitude distribution

Abstract

[1] Submarine landslides are ubiquitous along Mediterranean continental margins. With the aim of understanding mass-wasting processes and related hazard at the scale of a large marine basin encompassing multiple geological settings, we have compiled data on their geometry, age, and trigger mechanism with a geographic information system. The distribution of submarine landslides in the Mediterranean reveals that major deltaic wedges have a higher density of large submarine landslides, while tectonically active margins are characterized by relatively small failures. In all areas, landslide size distributions display power law scaling for landslides > 1 km 3 . We find consistent differences on the exponent of the power law (θ) depending on the tectonic setting. Available age information suggests that failures exceeding 1000 km 3 are infrequent and may recur every~40 kyr. Smaller failures that can still cause significant damage might be relatively frequent (failures > 1 km 3 may recur every 40 years). The database highlights that our knowledge of submarine landslide activity with time is limited to a few tens of thousands of years. Available data suggest that submarine landslides may preferentially occur during lowstand periods, but no firm conclusion can be made on this respect, as only 70 landslides (out of 696 in the database) have relatively accurate age determinations. The temporal pattern and changes in frequency-magnitude distribution suggest that sedimentation patterns and pore pressure development have had a major role in triggering slope failures and control the sediment flux from mass wasting to the deep basin.Citation: Urgeles, R., and A. Camerlenghi (2013), Submarine landslides of the Mediterranean Sea: Trigger mechanisms, dynamics, and frequency-magnitude distribution,

The Tsunami Vulnerability Assessment of Urban Environments through Freely Available Datasets: The Case Study of Napoli City (Southern Italy)

“…The mass failures may be responsible for the generation of tsunami waves [60]; the largest events may have an effect at the scale of the whole Mediterranean basin and bear a high tsunamigenic potential regardless of the water depth at which they occur. Landslides exceeding 10 km 3 in volume can still bear significant tsunamigenic potential at regional scale, and therefore their probability of occurrence should be carefully considered.…”

Earthquake-triggered landslides along the Hyblean-Malta Escarpment (off Augusta, eastern Sicily, Italy) – assessment of the related tsunamigenic potential

“…In Fig. 1, historical earthquake data are from Grünthal and Wahlström (2012) (http://www.gfz-potsdam.de/en/section/ seismic-hazard-and-stress-field/data-products-services/ emec-earthquake-catalogue/) and Stucchi et al (2012) (http://www.emidius.eu/SHEEC/sheec_1000_1899.html); landslide deposits are taken from Urgeles and Camerlenghi (2013); seismogenic sources are taken from the SHARE-EDSF database (Basili et al, 2013 -http://diss.rm.ingv.it/share-edsf/)…”

“…In this work, insisting Figure 1. Map of the Sicily and southern Calabria with seismotectonic faults (shaded areas, Basili et al, 2013), historical M w > 5 earthquakes (dots, Grünthal and Wahlström, 2012;Stucchi et al, 2012) and landslides (diamonds, Urgeles and Camerlenghi, 2013). The red rectangle outlines our study area.…”

An Exploratory Modelling Study on Late Pleistocene Mega-Tsunamis Triggered By Giant Submarine Landslides in the Mediterranean

“…Urgeles and Camerlenghi [8] published a review study on trigger mechanisms, dynamics and frequency-magnitude distribution It covers an area of approximately 40000 km 2 below the 3000 m isobath with an estimated total volume of 400 km 3 . Garziglia et al [20] identifi ed several mass-transport deposits (MTD) on the Rosetta province (NW Nile Delta, Egyptian margin).…”