NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF STORM SURGE GENERATED BY HURRICANE IWA IN HAWAII

Abstract eng:
The ADCIRC finite element model was applied to solve the depth-averaged shallow water equations to simulate storm surge generated by the 1982 Hurricane Iwa in Hawaii. This study is a follow-up to the recent study by Gica et al. (2001) where the storm surge generated by the 1992 Hurricane Iniki in Hawaii was simulated. The objective of the present study is to further investigate the effects of barometric pressure and wind stress in generating storm surge in the Pacific insular environment in the absence of continental shelves. Our simulated results were compared with the surge height recorded by a tidal gage in Nawiliwili Bay of Kaua’i Island in Hawaii. The results agreed well with the recorded data and this verifies our simulation. In addition, our results further confirmed that, for the Hawaiian coastal waters where water depth increases rapidly offshore, the barometric pressure was the dominant forcing in generating storm surge while the effect of wind stress was negligible.

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