HR: 0800h
AN: H21D-1371    [Abstracts]
TI: Toward a Testable Theory of Large, Lowland Floodplain Inundation
AU: * Johnson, N
EM: johnson.2024@osu.edu
AF: Environmental Sciences Graduate Program, the Ohio State University, 365 Kottman Hall 2021 Coffey Road, Columbus, OH 43210 United States
AU: Alsdorf, D
EM: alsdorf.1@osu.edu
AF: Department of Geological Sciences, the Ohio State University, Mendenhall Lab 125 S. Oval Mall, Columbus, OH 43210 United States
AU: Wilson, M
EM: Matthew.D.Wilson@exeter.ac.uk
AF: Department of Geography, University of Exeter, 3.046 UEC Tremough Campus Treliever Road Penryn , Cornwall, TR10 9EZ United Kingdom
AB: Floodplain inundation and drainage is a spatially and temporally sporadic process of the hydrology of the Amazon River. Predicting flooding hazards to recognize consequences of land use, land cover, and climatic changes is crucial for a world that has an ever increasing demand and reliance on fresh water. Using in-situ measurements to assess the vast, diffusive flow conditions and storage changes along the Amazon floodplain is essentially not possible, whereas, a technologically advanced method utilizing two-dimensional height mapping must be used to understand changes in h, dh/dx, and dh/dt. We modeled a section of the River Solimoes above Itap‚ua, Brazil using Lisflood and topographic data from the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM). Lisflood, a raster based flood modeling code, uses a one dimensional kinematic wave approximation for channel flow and is solved bu an explicit finite difference scheme. Floodplain inundation is modeled by a two dimensional diffusion wave. By simulating flooding along the River Solimoes, we are demonstrating that there is high potential for the simulations to be consistent with actual changes across floodplain channels. We seek simulations that predict h, dh/dx, and dh/dt across large, lowland floodplains particularly in support of the proposed Water Elevation Recovery (WatER) satellite mission. WatER will measure the elevations of water surfaces with a sub-100 m pixel spacing, thus our testable theory will provide relationships between water level measurements and the responsible flux and mass balances.
DE: 1820 Floodplain dynamics
DE: 1836 Hydrological cycles and budgets (1218, 1655)
DE: 1847 Modeling
DE: 1855 Remote sensing (1640)
DE: 5419 Hydrology and fluvial processes
SC: Hydrology [H]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005