Late Holocene shorelines deduced from tidal notches on both sides of the Ionian Thrust (Greece): Fiscardo Peninsula (Cephalonia) and Ithaca Island.

Abstract

Fossil shorelines produced by recent co-seismic movements were identified throughasubmarine survey along the coasts of Ithaca and Fiscardo (Greece).In both areas a tidal notch-slightly submerged below present Mean Sea Level (MSL) was observed at various sites. This “modern” notch is known to have been submerged by the global sea-level rise during the 19^th and 20^th centuries. The depth after tide and air-pressure correction of the vertex of the “modern” notch (that owes its submergence to the current rapid sea level rise) was measured between -20 and -30±5cm at Fiscardo and between -36 and -45±6cm at Ithaca. This “modern” notch at the same depth on east and west sides of the Ionian Thrust suggests that both areas were not affected by the co-seismic vertical movements that occurred in 1953 (in the wider area). On the other hand, a greater depth in Ithaca could be an effect of co-seismic subsidence. Over the long term, the tectonic behavior of Ithaca differs from Fiscardo. At Ithaca no evidence of emergence was found and Holocene vertical movements have been only of subsidence: submerged fossil tidal notches were distinguished below MSL at about -40 (modern), -60, -75, -95, -106, -126, -150 and -220±6cm. On the East coast of Fiscardo peninsula impacts of ancient earthquakes have left some marks of emergence at about +18 and +44±5cm, and of submergence at about -25 (modern), -45, -60, -75, -82, -100 and -230cm, with even some evidence of past uplift and subsidence at the same sites.