Moulton Melissa

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Last Name
Moulton
First Name
Melissa
ORCID
0000-0002-8899-0437

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Subject: Rip currents ×

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  • Preprint
    Improving the time resolution of surfzone bathymetry using in situ altimeters
    ( 2013-06) Moulton, Melissa ; Elgar, Steve ; Raubenheimer, Britt
    Surfzone bathymetry often is resolved poorly in time because watercraft surveys cannot be performed when waves are large, and remote sensing techniques have limited vertical accuracy. However, accurate high-frequency bathymetric information at fixed locations can be obtained from altimeters that sample nearly continuously, even during storms. A method is developed to generate temporally and spatially dense maps of evolving surfzone bathymetry by updating infrequent spatially dense watercraft surveys with the bathymetric change measured by a spatially sparse array of nearly continuously sampling altimeters. The update method is applied to observations of the evolution of shore-perpendicular rip current channels (dredged in Duck, NC, 2012) and shore-parallel sandbars (observed in Duck, NC, 1994). The updated maps are compared with maps made by temporally interpolating the watercraft surveys, and with maps made by spatially interpolating the altimeter measurements at any given time. Updated maps of the surfzone rip channels and sandbars are more accurate than maps obtained by using either only watercraft surveys or only the altimeter measurements. Hourly altimeter-updated bathymetric estimates of five rip channels show rapid migration and infill events not resolved by watercraft surveys alone. For a 2-month observational record of sandbars, altimeter-updated maps every 6 h between nearly daily surveys improve the time resolution of rapid bar-migration events.
  • Article
    Rip currents and alongshore flows in single channels dredged in the surf zone
    (John Wiley & Sons, 2017-05-08) Moulton, Melissa ; Elgar, Steve ; Raubenheimer, Britt ; Warner, John C. ; Kumar, Nirnimesh
    To investigate the dynamics of flows near nonuniform bathymetry, single channels (on average 30 m wide and 1.5 m deep) were dredged across the surf zone at five different times, and the subsequent evolution of currents and morphology was observed for a range of wave and tidal conditions. In addition, circulation was simulated with the numerical modeling system COAWST, initialized with the observed incident waves and channel bathymetry, and with an extended set of wave conditions and channel geometries. The simulated flows are consistent with alongshore flows and rip-current circulation patterns observed in the surf zone. Near the offshore-directed flows that develop in the channel, the dominant terms in modeled momentum balances are wave-breaking accelerations, pressure gradients, advection, and the vortex force. The balances vary spatially, and are sensitive to wave conditions and the channel geometry. The observed and modeled maximum offshore-directed flow speeds are correlated with a parameter based on the alongshore gradient in breaking-wave-driven-setup across the nonuniform bathymetry (a function of wave height and angle, water depths in the channel and on the sandbar, and a breaking threshold) and the breaking-wave-driven alongshore flow speed. The offshore-directed flow speed increases with dissipation on the bar and reaches a maximum (when the surf zone is saturated) set by the vertical scale of the bathymetric variability.