The Strait of Messina is part of the regional tectonic feature known as the Calabrian Arc, an area of differential uplift deriving from the dynamics of the Ionian and South Tyrrhenian tectonic units, two of the lithosphere blocks of microplates recognized in the highly fragmented Italian portion of the Africa-Eurasia contact. Some of the strongest earthquakes of the last centuries occurred in the Calabrian Arc such as the 1783 and 1905 Calabrian earthquakes as well as the more catastrophic 1908 Messina earthquake.
