Mediterranean Sea

Greek civilization

El Mediterranean Sea it is one of the seas that make up the Atlantic Ocean. It is located in the region that joins southern Europe, western Asia and northern Africa. It is considered a sea with enormous historical importance for the entire western civilization since it was an area where numerous cultures developed. It is considered the second largest inland sea on the planet, behind the Caribbean.

In this article we are going to tell you about all the characteristics, training and importance of the Mediterranean Sea.

Key features

Mediterranean Sea Basin

This sea contains a large amount of water and represents 1% of all the ocean water in the world. Its volume of water is of 3.735.000 cubic kilometers and the average depth is 1430 meters. Its length is 3860 kilometers and it has a total area of ​​2.5 million square kilometers. All this amount of water makes it possible to bathe the 3 peninsulas of southern Europe. These peninsulas are the Iberian, Italic and Balkan. It also bathes an Asian peninsula known by the name of Anatolia.

The name of the Mediterranean Sea comes from the ancient Romans. Back then I knew him as "Mare nostrum" or "our sea." The name of Mediterranean comes from Latin mediterraneum what the middle of the earth means. This name is due to an origin of societies that named it since they only knew the land around this sea. This made them consider the Mediterranean Sea as the center of the world. From ancient times, the Greeks gave the name to this sea until today.

Extremar is connected to the Atlantic Ocean through the Strait of Gibraltar. It is located between southern Europe, North Africa and the west coast of the Near East. The Atlantic Ocean is not only communication, but also connects to the Black Sea by the Bosphorus and Dardanelles Straits. Another of its connections is that of the Red Sea. It connects through the Suez Canal.

Subdivisions of the Mediterranean Sea

There is a long list of small seas into which the Mediterranean Sea is divided. Each one corresponds to specific geographic locations or some areas where the characteristics, whether due to flora, fauna or geology, change. We are going to list the list of subdivisions that the Mediterranean Sea has:

  • Alboran Sea, between Spain and Morocco.
  • Mar menor, southeast of Spain.
  • La Mar Chica in northern Morocco.
  • Adriatic Sea, between the Italian peninsula and the coasts of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Montenegro.
  • Ionian Sea, between the Italian peninsula, Greece and Albania.
  • Libyan Sea in Tunisia.
  • Sea of ​​Cilicia between Turkey and Cyprus.
  • Levantine Sea, off the coasts of Egypt, Lebanon, Cyprus, Israel, Syria and Turkey.
  • Ligurian Sea, between Corsica and Liguria.
  • Tyrrhenian Sea, between the east coast of Sardinia, the Italian peninsula and the northern Sicilian coast.
  • Balearic Sea between the east coast of the Iberian Peninsula and the island of Sardinia.
  • Aegean Sea, between Greece and Turkey.

Formation and origin

Mediterranean Sea

After the separation of the super continent known as Pangea, a space was opened between Europe, Africa and the Middle East. At that time the Mediterranean Sea was connected with the Atlantic Ocean until about 6 million years ago when the Messinian salinity crisis took place. At this time the sea was largely dry because it was disconnected from the great ocean. This caused the production of the rest of the water without there being any tributary that will contribute a new body of water to the sea.

It is possible that it would have continued to lose water, but the continuous erosion of the terrain created a channel about 250 kilometers long and the water from the ocean began to flow as if it were a flood. Scientists believe that the opening that was created by forming a waterfall almost 2 kilometers wide was able to fill the entire Mediterranean Sea within approximately two years. This waterfall and the flooding of this entire area modified the geography of the land. This is how the creation of the Mediterranean Sea took place as we know it today.

As for the climate, we see that it has generally warm, dry and calm summers. It is not usually a sea with too much turbulence for navigation and they tend to have summers with dry seasons. The whole region receives the fresh winds that come from the spaces between mountains of the areas of Europe. These winds contrast with the warm winds that come from the plains and is African and that increase the rate of evaporation of the water during the warmer months.

All this produces waters with a higher amount of salinity and a more humid atmosphere. We can consider winters as windier but with a moderate characteristic. We generally find warm, dry winds and autumns and springs are usually variable and associated with rain.

Flora and fauna of the Mediterranean Sea

As for the living beings that inhabit this planet, we have serious environmental problems. And is that the Mediterranean Sea is considered one of the most polluted seas in the world. After the Australian, Chinese and Japanese waters, the Mediterranean Sea is one of the seas, a greater biological diversity despite high levels of pollution.

Today 17.000 species have been described, of which 4% come from other seas, so they are considered invasive species. Most of the animal and plant species are concentrated in the deepest regions in the areas near the Strait of Gibraltar. Here we find the Alboran Sea, the entire African and Spanish coast and the northern Adriatic and Aegean Seas.

This sea is considered as one of the most polluted in the world as it contains a high presence of hydrocarbons and microplastics. These two elements are powerful threats to the ecological balance of plant and animal life. It can also be associated with risks derived from overfishing and excess cargo ships.

I hope that with this information you can learn more about the Mediterranean Sea.


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