The Sun: After the earthquake in Albania, fears of a massive tsunami in the Mediterranean

“ Says Mediterranean cities, or even Mediterranean islands, may be involved and destroyed by some large tsunami, because dangerous levels of seismic accumulate in this area are being built risking underwater mega-tremes. “The Sun” has asked some seismologists who believe the devastating earthquakes are imminent, following recent quakes in Albania and Bosnia, as well as including urban centres like Athens and the Greek islands. We remember that the day before there was a severe earthquake in Crete. Greece in particular is prone to earthquakes.

Professor Akis Tselentis, who heads the Geodinetics Institute at the Athens National Observatory, told Sun Online.

There are areas such as the mouth of East Corinth, which have accumulated a lot of seismic energy, which must be released. We expect an earthquake there with certainty at 6.5. My biggest concern is an earthquake near a city, because that could happen in years to come. Athens will be affected, and certainly even several of the” buildings, Tselentis has indicated, stressing that neither the tsunami threat is excluded.

With tourism in record numbers, some 33 million foreigners visited Greece last year and with Britons leading the lists, Prof Tselentis says the tsunami risk poses an even greater threat.

Even a three-foot-high tsunami can pose a danger when the islands are so full. Although rare, there is a real danger that even a tsunami can happen in the Aegean area when it is full of tourists”, says Tselentis.

The Sun” has spoken to another prominent Greek seismologist. Professor Ethymios Lekas also predicted that even the most powerful earthquakes will likely destroy the region.

“We will surely have a back kick in the 5.9 (Richter) scale in the coming hours or days,” said Greece-based expert, before adding that “everything could happen”, Lekas said.

The seismologist added that the damage is likely to be “large”, as many buildings in the poor “regions are in poor condition”.

The threat is being taken so seriously that in August ten major marines conducted a surprise exercise aimed at rescue of the wounded, if an earthquake were to trigger a deadly tide involving coastal communities”, writes the Sun.

The paper has also learned that scientists are planning to monitor major sections of the Mediterranean Sea to help tsunami warning centres, as well as to discover signs of earthquakes off the coast.

Warnings follow the 6.4-sized tragic quake that rocked Albania in recent days, the earthquake that caused dozens of deaths and hundreds of injuries.

Scientists said another earthquake also rocked Bosnia with an epicenter about 50 miles south of the capital Sarajevo, following that one in Albania.

The Bosnia earthquake also shocker was praised far beyond the shock it caused in Albania, but may have been caused by it, experts said.

Jadranka Mihaljevic, director of seismology at the Institute for Hydrometeorology in Montenegro, said countries in the Balkans and in southern Europe have a long history of deadly earthquakes.

The “what we are now seeing is a very strong, very powerful sequence of earthquakes,”, she said.

Buildings up and down the Albanian coast have been greatly damaged by the shocks.

In 1999, an earthquake measuring 7.6 killed 17,000 people in Turkey; and in 2016, more than 241 people died in a 6.2 - magnitude earthquake in central Italy.

A series of deadly earthquakes also destroyed the region in the late 1970s, killing more than 1,500 people in Romania in 1977, dozens in Greece in 1978 and hundreds in 1979 in the former Yugoslavia.

The deadly 1977-1979 series was followed by a quiet period where new seismic energy was being collected, ” added Dr. Mihaljevic.

But after 40 years of relatively calm seismicism, strong earthquakes appear to have been restored. ”

Strong tremors in Albania came just two months after a 5.6 earthquake injured dozens and damaged hundreds of homes in the same area.

Officials and seismologists said the quake, September 21st in Albania, was the most powerful to hit the country in 30 years.

The European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre reported that the quake that shook behind it 6.4, even Bosnia and Greece, just hours later, when it shocked Turkey earlier, showed the reactivation of energy in the high seismology area of the Mediterranean coast.