One of the greatest stories in the Bible tells how Moses rescued the Israelites from their miserable existence as slaves in Egypt, and led them on an epic trek to a new country where they could be free. It’s a tale made for Hollywood, and film critics frequently name their favourite scene as the moment in The Ten Commandments where Charlton Heston, as Moses, parts the Red Sea.

But could the miracle be rooted in historical fact? Russian oceanographers Naum Voltsinger and Alexei Androsov have discovered the remains of a reef at the northern end of the Suez straits. They report that when the wind blows at the right speed and from the right direction across the reef, the water level drops along a narrow strip. Incredibly, the waves remain banked up on either side of the reef, creating a corridor through the waters, wide enough for three men to walk abreast.

Earthquakes have damaged the reef over thousands of years, so the effect is no longer as dramatic as Hollywood would wish. The water level now drops 25 centimentres. But in ancient times, the appearance of a deep, dry trench between two walls of water would have seemed an awesome miracle.

Voltsinger and Androsov say the corridor could have lasted for up to four hours – long enough for the fleeing Israelites to cross to safety – before the seas plunged back, sweeping away the pursuing Egyptian soldiers.

It’s a strange world we live in, I feel, when scripture is dismissed as fairy-tale... until science backs it up!