<P> The Zanclean flood or Zanclean Deluge is a flood theorized to have refilled the Mediterranean Sea 5.33 million years ago . This flooding ended the Messinian salinity crisis and reconnected the Mediterranean Sea to the Atlantic Ocean, although it is possible that even before the flood there were partial connections to the Atlantic Ocean . The reconnection marks the beginning of the Zanclean age . </P> <P> According to this model, water from the Atlantic Ocean refilled the dried up basin through the modern - day Strait of Gibraltar . The Mediterranean Basin flooded mostly during a period estimated to have been between several months and two years . Sea level rise in the basin may have reached rates at times greater than ten metres per day (thirty feet per day). Based on the erosion features preserved until modern times under the Pliocene sediment, Garcia - Castellanos et al. estimate that water rushed down a drop of more than 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) with a discharge of up to 2 × 10 m / s (7.1 × 10 cu ft / s), about 1,000 times that of the present day Amazon River . Studies of the underground structures at the Gibraltar Strait show that the flooding channel descended in a rather gradual way toward the bottom of the basin rather than forming a steep waterfall . </P> <P> Not all scientific studies have agreed with the catastrophist interpretation of this event . Some researchers have estimated that the reinstallment of a "normal" Mediterranean Sea basin following the Messinian "Lago Mare" episode took place in a much more gradual way, taking as long as 10,000 years . </P>

How long did it take for the mediterranean sea to fill