HR: 09:30h
AN: OS41A-07    [Abstracts]
TI: Nonhydrostatic Modeling of the Transformation and Interaction of Nonlinear Internal Waves in the South China Sea
AU: * Gallacher, P C
EM: gallacher@nrlssc.navy.mil
AF: Ocean Sciences Branch, Oceanography Division, Naval Research Laboratory, (Code 7331), Stennis Space Center, LA 39529, United States
AU: Schaferkotter, M R
EM: schaferkotter@nrlssc.navy.mil
AF: Jacobs Inc, Room 145, Building 1210, Stennis Space Center, LA 39529, United States
AB: Nonlinear internal waves (NLIWs) are generated at the Luzon Straits. As these waves propagate across the South China Sea their amplitudes increase and they steepen forming solitary wave trains. These waves impinge on the slope of the Dong Sha Plateau where they under go significant transformations and interact with locally generated NLIWs. These transformations from waves of depression to waves of elevation and from solitary waves to multi-crested waves are highly nonlinear and nonhydrostatic. Furthermore the interactions with locally generated waves are complex and also nonhydrostatic. We study the transformation and interactions of these waves using local, nested nonhydrostatic models which are in turn nested inside hydrostatic models. This method allows the use of high resolution nonhydrostatic models which would be computationally prohibitive if used over the entire South China Sea. However it requires that the open boundary values for the nonhydrostatic models be a hybrid of the values from the hydrostatic models, which predict the phase of the NLIWs well but underpredict the amplitude, and values from a semi- analytic model which more correctly predicts the amplitude. Low resolution results have shown the transformation from waves of depression to waves of elevation and have demonstrated the interaction of the solitary wave trains with the topography.
DE: 4528 Fronts and jets
DE: 4544 Internal and inertial waves
DE: 4562 Topographic/bathymetric interactions
DE: 4568 Turbulence, diffusion, and mixing processes (4490)
DE: 4572 Upper ocean and mixed layer processes
SC: Ocean Sciences [OS]
MN: 2007 Joint Assembly