Oh, piosenniel, it's always so convincing to have a specialist explain things. I would've never thought of the consequences of such a cataclizm for the whole world. However from the Silmarillion I got an idea that it happened all of a sudden.
Quote:
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...the nothern regions of the western world were rent asunder, and the sea roared in throughmany chasms, and there was confusion and great noise; and rivers perished or found new paths, and the valleys were upheaved and the hills trod down.
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And this changed world is seen by the slaves just freed from Morgoth's dungeons. This really implies that Beleriand was broken in a matter of minutes.
Unfortunately I haven't read the Lost Road. But anyway piosenniel's post suggests that Silm's description doesn't go very well with science and common sence. The idea I've got just now is that The Silm, being an account of events long past and seemingly stylised as chronicles, deliberatly distorts the time
relations of events for the sake of a more dramatic effect. It's like people looking back at some event (from their life or from history) are not always sure about how long exactly something took, especially if it is some realy dramatic episode.