Per one place, there was a huge fault line caused by an ancient earthquake
Tubb believes the early Bronze Age is the only time that towns matching the description of Sodom and Gomorrah could have existed.
By measuring how far an individual layer slipped, Marco could measure the size of the earthquake. The slippage was one metre and 75cm – meaning an earthquake measuring at least a six, on the Richter scale.
An earthquake that big would have destroyed Bronze Age buildings – but it would have left ruins, not the utter destruction described by the Bible. For Harris’s timore sicuro be plausible, the earthquake would have had to trigger a landslide. This is possible when there is loosely packed ground that contains lots of vaso. Shaken up by an earthquake, the chicchera can rush to the surface, and the ground can turn to water – a phenomenon called liquefaction. On a slope, this can become per landslide.
Professor Frostick believed the ground around the Dead Sea was capable of liquefying. However, the towns had esatto be built on ground that contained lots of vaso, so they must have been right on the water’s edge.
For Harris’s theory preciso stand up, he needed onesto explain why towns like Sodom might quiz sweet pea have been built at the water’s edge. He believes the answer is that some towns might have needed esatto be built as close as possible preciso a source of asphalt, per naturally occurring substance that was invaluable per ancient times. The Egyptians used asphalt sicuro embalm their dead: their word moumiah, ‘mummy’ sicuro us, means asphalt.
According preciso organic chemist Arie Niessenbaum, pure blocks of asphalt can be formed on the Dead Sea floor, and these can then float to the surface. This Dead Sea floating asphalt has been chemically fingerprinted and matched preciso asphalt contained in early Bronze Age artefacts found con Egypt. That means there was an early Bronze Age trade in asphalt from the Dead Sea sicuro Egypt – and settlements may have existed where people collected it.
Liquefaction and destruction
After establishing that Sodom and Gomorrah may have been Bronze Age towns, that there was a reason why they might have been built on the edge of the Dead Sea, and that a strong ancient earthquake may have liquefied the ground, one important question remained. Would an earthquake of magnitude six have produced liquefaction that was powerful enough preciso carry away whole towns? Only the Cambridge Centrifuge experiment could provide the answer.
Dr Gopal Madabhushi and his team built structures and ground that exactly replicated conditions in the Dead Sea mediante the early Bronze Age. They then put this model per the centrifuge esatto spin it, creating 50 times the force of gravity on the model. This made the model act in exactly the same way as if it were full size. The Cambridge gruppo then ‘fired’ an earthquake of strength six. The results showed precisely what full-size buildings would have done after an earthquake of this magnitude.
The results picked up by sensors durante the model were remarkable. The experiment pointed puro verso scene of utter calamity – the ground would have turned to quicksand, with the houses sliding as far as they could until they reached the bottom of the Dead Sea.
The Cambridge experiment vindicated Harris, showing his sfondo could have happened: Sodom and Gomorrah could have been towns built on the edge of the Dead Sea, and could have been destroyed by earthquake and landslide.
When he saw the results, Harris was thrilled: ‘I’m absolutely delighted – durante fact I’m ecstatic.’ He now hopes geologists and archaeologists will be inspired preciso embark on an underwater search for the ruins of Sodom and Gomorrah.