Didn't the flooding of the Med occur in pre-human times? I'm pretty sure the Black Sea flooded in a similar (but not quite as spectacular) event during Neolithic times. I seem to recall reading about log buildings being discovered in hundreds of feet of water, miles from the present shoreline. At depth, the Black Sea is anaerobic, biological materials do not rot.

People would have been able to escape the rising waters by simply walking away, but the displaced refugees would have set into motion a great domino effect of dislocations that would have affected most of Europe and Asia and would have provoked stories and a racial memory of the great event.

My best guess of the origin of the Noah myth were the frequent floods of the Tigris/Euphrates valley that have been shown to have periodically occurred for thousands of years. Sometimes the two rivers merged into a great shallow lake. Not quite as devastating as the Biblical event, but it certainly must have caused great destruction to the hydraulic civilizations of that area. Dikes, canals, dams, all water control structures required for agriculture in that area would have been severely damaged, not to mention crops. Even if the population was familiar enough with the phenomenon to escape drowning, the need to organize people and repair that damage may have been a factor in the development of civilization and the rise of cities. We do know most of the cultures of Mesopotamia had flood stories as part of their folklore.

My guess is that Noah may have had a historical model, not as an ark skipper, but as a guy who was able to save his family, goods and livestock by moving to high ground.