SUMMARY

Sinkholes are large open holes (the largest is as much as 30 m in diameter and 15 m in deep) that result from the earth simply collapsing. In the last decade hundreds of sinkholes have formed along the Dead Sea coastlines in Israel and Jordan causing severe damage to the regional infrastructure. Sinkholes occur along the sea shore within a narrow strip of 60 km long and about 1 km wide. The formation of sinkholes accelerated in the past few years to a growth rate of about 150-200 per year. They spread parallel to the general direction of the Dead Sea fault system. The formation of these sinkholes is connected to the dramatic drop of the Dead Sea water level and associated groundwater levels. The most alarming cases are sinkholes that have occurred in resort areas, in and around Highway 90, and at the Israeli and Jordanian potash plants. Understanding and predicting natural phenomena such as sinkhole collapse around the Dead Sea is very important because of the environmental hazards which it causes. In our work we discuss several geophysics methods that have been employed to investigate and predict these occurrences: seismic, geoelectric, microgravity. We have given special consideration to the magnetic method which was developed at the Survey of Israel togethe