Simulation of storm surge, wave, currents, and inundation in the Outer Banks and Chesapeake Bay during Hurricane Isabel in 2003: The importance of waves

Abstract

[1] This paper investigates the effects of waves on storm surge, currents, and inundation in the Outer Banks and Chesapeake Bay during Hurricane Isabel in 2003 through detailed comparison between observed wind, wave, surge, and inundation data and results from an integrated storm surge modeling system, CH3D-SSMS. CH3D-SSMS, which includes coupled coastal and basin-scale storm surge and wave models, successfully simulated measured winds, waves, storm surge, currents, and inundation during Isabel. Comprehensive modeling and data analysis revealed noticeable effects of waves on storm surge, currents, and inundation. Among the processes that represent wave effects, radiation stress (outside the estuaries) and wave-induced stress (outside and inside the estuaries) are more important than wave-induced bottom stress in affecting the water level. Maximum surge was 3 m, while maximum wave height was 20 m offshore and 2.5 m inside the Chesapeake Bay, where the maximum wave-induced water level reached 1 m. Significant waves reached 3.5 m and 16 s at Duck Pier, North Carolina, and 1.6 m and 5 s at Gloucester, Virginia. At Duck, wave effects accounted for $36 cm or 20% of the peak surge elevation of 1.71 m. Inside the Chesapeake Bay, wave effects account for 5-10% of observed peak surge level. A two-layer flow is found at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, during the peak of storm surge owing to the combined effects of wind and wave breaking.

Modeling Flood Inundation Induced by River Flow and Storm Surges over a River Basin

“…Sheng et al [15] reported that the accuracy of a storm surge simulation depends on many factors including the input data (e.g., bathymetry, topography, and wind/pressure fields), the representation of important processes (e.g., flooding and drying and bottom friction), the model grid resolution, and the open boundary conditions. Simulating inundation is an important aspect of storm surge modeling.…”

“…The hydrodynamic component of the modeling system was based on the Princeton Ocean Model, and a scheme with a multiple inundation speed option was embedded in the model for the inundation calculation. Sheng et al [15] investigated the effect of waves on storm surges, currents, and inundation in the Outer Banks, North Carolina and the Chesapeake Bay during Hurricane Isabel in 2003 by making a detailed comparison between the observed wind, wave, surge, and inundation data and the results from an integrated storm surge modeling system. Xie et al [20] used a three-dimensional storm surge model to study the effect of the asymmetric structure of a hurricane wind field on the storm surge and the inundation extent.…”

Atmospheric storm surge modeling methodology along the French (Atlantic and English Channel) coast

“…The sea surface drag coefficient formulation plays a key role in storm surge modeling (Nicolle et al 2009;Sheng et al 2010). According to shallow water equations which are the basis of the surge model and under some assumptions (1D uniform steady flow over a flat bed with wind directed to the coast, neglecting Coriolis effect), it is possible to analytically …”

Towards the Development of an Operational Forecast System for the Florida Coast

“…CH3D-SSMS (Storm Surge Modeling System) is a modeling suite that features coupled CH3D and SWAN models for coastal dynamics and large scale surge-wave models that are used to extract boundary conditions for the coastal model [11,17], which has been used extensively to simulate storm surge and inundation due to various tropical cyclones including Hurricanes Charley [11][12][13][17][18][19]. Details of the CH3D model, including equations of motion and boundary and initial conditions, are described in [11].…”