TOPIC 4

THE MEDITERRANEAN:
ESTUARY OR SMALL OCEAN?
 MEDITERRANEAN
NORTH
ATLANTIC

SOUTH
ATLANTIC

The Mediterranean is marginal sea of the North Atlantic..

«Whole world - land and oceans 12000» de NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center - Disponible bajo la licencia Public domain vía Wikimedia Commons -
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Whole_world_-_land_and_oceans_12000.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Whole_world_-
_land_and_oceans_12000.jpg
 Black Sea
Ocean

Strait of Sicily St. Bosphorus

Strait of Gibraltar
Atlantic

St. Dardanelles

Western Mediterranean
Eastern Mediterranean

A sea surrounded by mountains, big enough to offer the complexity of an ocean,

yet small enough to be studied with a reasonable affordable effort.
 POSITIVE ESTUARY
E < R+P
E < R+P

E = Evaporation
R = Runoff
P = Precipitation
The exchange of water between the Mediterranean and the neighbor ocean is related
to the balance o mass (which means de balance of water and salt...)
In a positive estuarine circulation, the input of river runoff and precipitation exceeds
evaporation (p-e- the case of the Baltic sea) so that the ocean receives more water
from the marginal sea than it gives to it.
 NEGATIVE ESTUARY
E > R+P
E > R+P

E = Evaporation
R = Runoff
P = Precipitation

The exchange of water between the Mediterranean and the neighbor ocean is related to the
balance o mass (which means de balance of water and salt...)
In a negative estuarine circulation, the excess of evaporation within the marginal sea, makes
the ocean to give more water to the marginal sea than it receives from it.
 Black Sea

Strait of Sicily
Strait of Gibraltar

Western Mediterranean
Eastern Mediterranean

The Mediterranean has two main basins united by the strait of Sicily. The Black Sea is a
Mediterranean’s marginal sea (positive estuary). We will not talk about it here.
We will see that the Eastern Basin is a negative estuary for the western basin, as the
Mediterranean as a whole, is a negative estuary for the Atlantic Ocean. In the next slide we will
see a vertical section approximately following the dashed red line on the map.
 MEDITERRANEAN VERTICAL SECTION
0
NAW 37.0
100
36.2 Vi 38.6
14.2
200 13.0 38.8 15.5
300
Vo 38.4
LIW 39.1

SICILY
400
GIBRALTAR

500

WMDW 12.7 13.6 EMDW

4.0 38.4 38.7
1000
35.0 29.10 29.15
2000 27.80

3000

4000 WESTERN BASSIN EASTERN BASSIN

10ºW 0º 10ºE 20ºE 30ºE

Vi –Vo = P + R - E Water balance

roVo So = riVi Si Salt balance
Mediterranean water masses
formation and circulation
MAW : Modified Atlantic water (surface)
Formation of WMDW
LIW: Levantine Intermediate Water
Formation of EMDW
WMDW: Western Med. Deep Water
Formation of LIW
EMDW: Eastern Med. Deep Water
Formation of AdW
AdW: Adriatic Water
NACW

MW

NADW

Schlitzer, R., Ocean Data View http://odv.awi.de, 2014

 January 1995

East
surface
Strait of Sicily

LIW
West
350 m

Schlitzer, R., Ocean Data View

http://odv.awi.de, 2014
MedatlasII_ctd data
EMDW
WMDW
>2500 m

MEDAR Group, 2002 - MEDATLAS/2002 database. Mediterranean and Black Sea database of temperature
salinity and bio-chemical parameters. Climatological Atlas. IFREMER Edition (4 Cdroms).
 STRAIT OF GIBRALTAR

Schlitzer, R., Ocean Data View http://odv.awi.de, 2014 MedatlasII_ctd data

MEDAR Group, 2002 - MEDATLAS/2002 database. Mediterranean and Black Sea database of temperature
salinity and bio-chemical parameters. Climatological Atlas. IFREMER Edition (4 Cdroms).
 STRAIT OF GIBRALTAR

Schlitzer, R., Ocean Data View http://odv.awi.de, 2014 MedatlasII_ctd data

MEDAR Group, 2002 - MEDATLAS/2002 database. Mediterranean and Black Sea database of temperature
salinity and bio-chemical parameters. Climatological Atlas. IFREMER Edition (4 Cdroms).
 AMW
AMW (Atlantic
Modified
Water)

MIW MIW WMDW

(Mediterranean
Intermediate
Water)

STRAIT OF GIBRALTAR

Schlitzer, R., Ocean Data View http://odv.awi.de, 2014 MedatlasII_ctd data

MEDAR Group, 2002 - MEDATLAS/2002 database. Mediterranean and Black Sea database of temperature
salinity and bio-chemical parameters. Climatological Atlas. IFREMER Edition (4 Cdroms).