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Mediterranean Sea in Ibiza, Spain
The Mediterranean Sea may not last forever. The slow but inevitable movement of Earth’s tectonic plates suggests that this sea may eventually disappear, just as it has in the past.
A collision of the African plate with the Eurasian plate is one of the main factors behind this potential transformation.
Earth’s continents are not static, they drift and move over millions of years, driven by the movement of tectonic plates. This process constantly reshapes the planet’s surface, creating and destroying landscapes. Although the current arrangement of the continents may appear permanent, it is only temporary.
The Mediterranean’s vulnerability results from its location between two converging tectonic plates. About 100 million years ago, the African plate began moving toward the Eurasian plate, a slow-motion collision that continues today.
This convergence has already given rise to demarcated geological features, such as the formation of the Alps, and is gradually narrowing the gap between the plates, explains . Over millions of years, this process could end up sealing the Mediterranean, compressing it into a dry and lifeless basinas Europe subducts under Africa.
This is not the first time the Mediterranean has faced such a threat. Around 5.97 million years ago, during the Messinian salinity crisis, the sea was isolated from the Atlantic Ocean due to sea level change.
This turned the Mediterranean into a vast salt desert for about half a million years. Its isolated waters quickly evaporated in the region’s arid climate, leaving behind thick layers of salt that still lie beneath the sea floor. Only the reestablishment of the connection with the Atlantic, through the Strait of Gibraltar, allowed the sea to fill again and return to its current state.
Although the disappearance of the Mediterranean may seem alarming, it is a process that would unfold over tens of millions of years. The current rate of tectonic movement is measured in millimeters per year, a pace too slow to have a predictable impact on human civilization.
