Abstract. The paper presents an application of shoreline monitoring aimed at understanding the response of a beach to single storms and at identifying its typical behaviour, in order to be able to predict shoreline changes and to properly plan the defence of the shore zone. On the study area, in Jesolo beach (northern Adriatic Sea, Italy), a video monitoring station and an acoustic wave and current profiler were installed in spring 2013, recording, respectively, images and hydrodynamic data. The site lacks previous detailed hydrodynamic and morphodynamic data.Variations in the shoreline were quantified in combination with available near-shore wave conditions, making it possible to analyse the relationship between the shoreline displacement and the wave features. Results denote characteristic patterns of beach response to storm events, and highlight the importance of improving beach protection in this zone, notwithstanding the many interventions experimented in the last decades. A total of 31 independent storm events were selected during the period October 2013-October 2014, and for each of them synthetic indexes based on storm duration, energy and maximum wave height were developed and estimated. It was found that the net shoreline displacements during a storm are well correlated with the total wave energy associated to the considered storm by an empirical power law equation. A sub-selection of storms in the presence of an artificial dune protecting the beach (in the winter season) was examined in detail, allowing to conclude that the adoption of this coastal defence strategy in the study area can reduce shoreline retreat during a storm. This type of intervention can sometimes contribute to prolonging overall stability not only in the replenished zone but also in downdrift areas.The implemented methodology, which confirms to be economically attractive if compared to more traditional monitoring systems, proves to be a valuable system to monitor beach erosive processes and provide detailed indications on how to better plan beach-maintenance activities. The presented methodology and the proposed results can therefore be used as a basis for improving the collaboration between coastal scientists and managers to solve beach erosion problems, in locations where data are scattered and sporadic.

Numerical modelling of floating bodies is still being a very challenging issue, especially for large body displacements. Despite of the good performance of potential flow models in predicting floating body dynamics, there are still physical processes which are not well reproduced with that approximation. Their strong assumptions yield a lack of accuracy when high non-linear effects become predominant. In addition, the presence of restrictions to motion induced by mooring elements also introduces additional non-linear features which are sometimes out of the framework of the use of potential flow models. The use of CFD approach overcomes potential model limitations especially for non-linear effects. When CFD models are applied to solve waves and current interaction with floating bodies, several issues arise such as the numerical treatment of the floating element, mooring implementation and also the computational cost. Although several approaches are available in literature regarding the numerical implementation of floating bodies, the use of the Overset mesh appears as the more suitable one for large body displacement. Although accurate results have been obtained with re-meshing or even morphing techniques, large mesh deformation can yield into non-acceptable skewness and aspect ratio for the cells, consequently inducing numerical instabilities. In this work, we will present a numerical analysis of wave and current interaction with floating bodies. The objective of the work is to present a set of numerical implementations performed in OpenFOAM environment with the use of the Overset mesh method to study moored floating body dynamics due to the combined action of waves and current. The implementations, included in IHFOAM (www.ihfoam.ihcantabria.com) are a new set of boundary conditions to generate waves and current without the use of relaxation zones. The main consequence is that the computational cost can be reduced due to the use of smaller domains. In addition, the implementation of mooring will be also presented in order to extend the use of the model to realistic conditions. Numerical model predictions compared with laboratory data of wave interaction with moored floating bodies have been performed showing a high degree of agreement. Comparison of floating body displacement and mooring tension will be presented. The combined effect of waves and current, traveling in the same and in opposite directions than waves, and their interaction with floating bodies and mooring will be also studied. Results will show the applicability of current method to model floating bodies.

Abstract. The paper presents an application of shoreline monitoring aimed to understand the response of a beach to single storms and to identify its typical behaviour, in order to be able to predict shoreline changes and to properly plan the defence of the shore zone. On the study area, in Jesolo beach (Nothern Adriatic sea, Italy), a video monitoring station and an acoustic wave and current profiler were installed in spring 2013, recording respectively images and hydrodynamic data. The site lacks of previous detailed hydrodynamic and morphodynamics data. Variations in the shoreline were quantified in combination with available nearshore wave conditions, making it possible to analyse a relationship between the shoreline displacement and the wave features. Results denote characteristic patterns of beach response to storm events, and highlight the importance of improving beach protection in this zone, notwithstanding the many interventions experimented in the last decades. A total of 31 independent storm events were selected during the period October 2013–October 2014, and for each of them synthetic indexes based on storm duration, energy and maximum wave height were developed and estimated. It was found that the mean shoreline displacements during a storm are well correlated with the total wave energy during the considered storm by an empirical power law equation. A sub-selection of storms on beach protected by artificial dunes (in winter season) was examined in detail; we can conclude that the extensive adoption of artificial dunes in the study area was useful in the past also to reduce shoreline retreat during the storm. This type of interventions can sometimes contribute to prolonged overall stability not only in the replenished zone but also in down drift areas. The implemented methodology, which confirms to be economically attractive if compared to more traditional monitoring systems, proves to be a valuable system to monitor beach erosive processes and provide detailed indications on how to better plan beach maintenance activities. The presented methodology and the proposed results can therefore be used as a basis for improving the collaboration between coastal scientists and managers to solve beach erosion problems, in a location where data are seldom.

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