The 8.2 ka event in the Dead Sea: tracking a high-latitude disturbance in the Mediterranean

The last deglaciation is an ideal time interval to investigate the effect of climatic and oceanic disturbances occurring at high latitude on the hydrological regimes of the Mediterranean Sea. In particular, a series of disruptions of the Atlantic Meridional Oceanic Circulation (AMOC) has punctuated the transition from glacial to interglacial conditions, with the so-called 8.2 ka event being the youngest one. After the publication of recent results showing the existence of instable climatic conditions in the Dead Sea during the Younger Dryas (Müller et al., 2022), we examine here the environmental record during the 8.2 ka event to illuminate the effects of the background climate (colder to warmer) on hydrological distrubances linked to AMOC disruptions. We performed a coupled limnological and geochemical analysis of sediments deposited in the deeper part of the Dead Sea (ICDP site 5017A), which showed the occurrence of repeated mass wasting deposits related to intense erosive activity in the watershed of the Dead Sea. Newly-acquired neodymium and strontium isotopes also show a rapid change in sediment provenance and a hiatus in outcrop sequences from western lake shores suggests a drop in lake level at that time (Migowski et al., 2006). Ongoing classification of mass wasting events and the integration of other well-dated regional records and paleoclimatic simulations will provide additional insights on the erosional processes operating at that time, as well as the climatic regimes associated.