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3-D Flooding/Drying Process |
FVCOM has successfully simulated the 3-D flooding/drying processes over estuarine-tidal creek-intertidal salt marsh complex. During the flood tidal period, the water flows into tidal creeks and flood over barriers and salt marsh area. Most parts of the marsh are covered by the water at the high water level. This process reverses during the ebb tidal period, during which the water drains back to the main channel, and then restricted inside the channel and tidal creek at the low water level (Fig. 2). At the spring tidal cycle, the water could cover the entire area bounded by the 2-m elevation lines. Adding wind forcing has little influence on the flooding/drying processes inside the river, but it does show a significant impact on the circulation near the mouth of the river and over the inner shelf region (Fig. 3).
Fig. 1: Tidal animation for the case with M2 tidal forcing only. The light gray color is the water and white vector is the near-surface tidal current vectors.
Click here or figure to view the full-size animation. Note: Be patient because the file is too big.
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Fig.2 Distributions of water elevation and near-surface current at the high tide (left) and low tide(right) for the case with the only tidal forcing. Tidal forcing includes 5 Tidal constituents: M2, S2, N2, K1 and O1. Click here for the animation |
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Fig.3 Distributions of water elevation and near-surface current at the high tide (left) and low tide(right) for the case with tidal and wind forcings. Tidal forcing includes 5 tidal constituents: M2, S2, N2, K1 and O1. Click here for the animation |
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Contact:
Dr. Changsheng Chen
School for Marine Science
and Technology
University of Massachusetts Dartmouth
email: c1chen@umassd.edu
Dr. Mac V. Rawson
Georgia Sea Grant College Program
University of Georgia
Athens, GA 30602
email: mrawson@uga.edu
Dr. Randal L. Walker
Marine Extension Service
University of Georgia
Athens, GA 30602-3636
email: walker@uga.edu
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Copyright ©
2005
SMAST/ UMASSD All rights
reserved | |
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