Aside from considerable drops in ocean levels, and also Mediterranean Sea levels, Weren’t there also periods when the whole Sea pretty much dried up as shown by salt layers in the bottome? What were dates on very low levels, and dried periods?
The last one was 5.3 million years ago.
The Nile carved a ‘grand canyon’ type watercourse during a (the most recent?) period of dessication of the Med, a fact discovered during prelim work on the Aswan High Dam.
When the former barrier at Gibraltar was breached, the Atlantic waters poured in and refilled the Med basin over a period of years or perhaps decades.
There may have been an earlier partial flooding (during the 650K years of the Med dessication) when a higher, larger version of the Black Sea spilled over into the Med.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-19446-3
entertaining simulations:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5uW7Qg6rXM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bw-qf_zQMWs