Tide and skew surge independence: New insights for flood risk
Abstract Storm surges are a significant hazard to coastal communities around the world, putting lives at risk and costing billions of dollars in damage. Understanding how storm surges and high tides interact is crucial for estimating extreme water levels so that we can protect coastal communities. W...
Saved in:
| Main Authors: | , , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Wiley
2016-06-01
|
| Series: | Geophysical Research Letters |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1002/2016GL069522 |
| Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1849321805296173056 |
|---|---|
| author | Joanne Williams Kevin J. Horsburgh Jane A. Williams Robert N. F. Proctor |
| author_facet | Joanne Williams Kevin J. Horsburgh Jane A. Williams Robert N. F. Proctor |
| author_sort | Joanne Williams |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract Storm surges are a significant hazard to coastal communities around the world, putting lives at risk and costing billions of dollars in damage. Understanding how storm surges and high tides interact is crucial for estimating extreme water levels so that we can protect coastal communities. We demonstrate that in a tidal regime the best measure of a storm surge is the skew surge, the difference between the observed and predicted high water within a tidal cycle. Based on tide gauge records spanning decades from the UK, U.S., Netherlands, and Ireland we show that the magnitude of high water exerts no influence on the size of the most extreme skew surges. This is the first systematic proof that any storm surge can occur on any tide, which is essential for understanding worst‐case scenarios. The lack of surge generation dependency on water depth emphasizes the dominant natural variability of weather systems in an observation‐based analysis. Weak seasonal relationships between skew surges and high waters were identified at a minority of locations where long‐period changes to the tidal cycle interact with the storm season. Our results allow advances to be made in methods for estimating the joint probabilities of storm surges and tides. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-df98a366a3fd4e5680f9cd913c20191d |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 0094-8276 1944-8007 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2016-06-01 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Geophysical Research Letters |
| spelling | doaj-art-df98a366a3fd4e5680f9cd913c20191d2025-08-20T03:49:37ZengWileyGeophysical Research Letters0094-82761944-80072016-06-0143126410641710.1002/2016GL069522Tide and skew surge independence: New insights for flood riskJoanne Williams0Kevin J. Horsburgh1Jane A. Williams2Robert N. F. Proctor3National Oceanography Centre Liverpool UKNational Oceanography Centre Liverpool UKNational Oceanography Centre Liverpool UKNational Oceanography Centre Liverpool UKAbstract Storm surges are a significant hazard to coastal communities around the world, putting lives at risk and costing billions of dollars in damage. Understanding how storm surges and high tides interact is crucial for estimating extreme water levels so that we can protect coastal communities. We demonstrate that in a tidal regime the best measure of a storm surge is the skew surge, the difference between the observed and predicted high water within a tidal cycle. Based on tide gauge records spanning decades from the UK, U.S., Netherlands, and Ireland we show that the magnitude of high water exerts no influence on the size of the most extreme skew surges. This is the first systematic proof that any storm surge can occur on any tide, which is essential for understanding worst‐case scenarios. The lack of surge generation dependency on water depth emphasizes the dominant natural variability of weather systems in an observation‐based analysis. Weak seasonal relationships between skew surges and high waters were identified at a minority of locations where long‐period changes to the tidal cycle interact with the storm season. Our results allow advances to be made in methods for estimating the joint probabilities of storm surges and tides.https://doi.org/10.1002/2016GL069522storm surgeskew surgetides |
| spellingShingle | Joanne Williams Kevin J. Horsburgh Jane A. Williams Robert N. F. Proctor Tide and skew surge independence: New insights for flood risk Geophysical Research Letters storm surge skew surge tides |
| title | Tide and skew surge independence: New insights for flood risk |
| title_full | Tide and skew surge independence: New insights for flood risk |
| title_fullStr | Tide and skew surge independence: New insights for flood risk |
| title_full_unstemmed | Tide and skew surge independence: New insights for flood risk |
| title_short | Tide and skew surge independence: New insights for flood risk |
| title_sort | tide and skew surge independence new insights for flood risk |
| topic | storm surge skew surge tides |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1002/2016GL069522 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT joannewilliams tideandskewsurgeindependencenewinsightsforfloodrisk AT kevinjhorsburgh tideandskewsurgeindependencenewinsightsforfloodrisk AT janeawilliams tideandskewsurgeindependencenewinsightsforfloodrisk AT robertnfproctor tideandskewsurgeindependencenewinsightsforfloodrisk |