Observing shoreline fluxes: implications for swash and surf zone modeling

Abstract

The scarcity of reliable and controlled observations of water and sediment fluxes near the shore is one of the main reasons for the many remaining challenges in the field of morphodynamics. In this paper we shall present three largescale data sets from the CIEM flume of the Maritime Engineering Laboratory (LIM/UPC) in Barcelona, looking for the distinctive behaviour of such fluxes between erosive and accretive conditions. Two different erosive conditions are presented, which report an expected different behaviour of the bar and measured physical parameters (wave height, velocity and suspended sediment cocentration). These erosive time series also report an unexpected similitude on the profile comparisson between both data sets from the bar until the shoreline. The acquired data under accretive conditions present the important control played by the initial bar, controlling the hydrodynamics of the surf and swash zones.