Top: When sea levels were lower 10,000 years ago,
the Black Sea was a large freshwater Black “Lake.” It was dammed off
from the salty Mediterranean Sea by the then high-and-dry Bosphorus
Sill. Some say the water level in Black Lake was 80 meters lower than
it is today, but new research claims it was only 30 meters lower.
Bottom: Why is that important? Because as the ice age waned and sea
levels rose, water overtopped the Bosphorus Sill into Black Lake. A
controversial theory says this might be the source of the Noah’s flood
story, but a new study claims that the Black Sea rose only about 5 to
10 meters, not a more catastrophic 50 to 60 meters.
(Illustration by Jack Cook, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)[back]
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