Relative Sea Level Changes in Maldives and Vulnerability of Land Due to Abnormal Coastal Inundation

Oceanic Islands in the Pacific and Indian Oceans have extremely small land areas, usually less than 500 km2, with maximum height about 4 m above sea level. The Republic of Maldives is an independent island nation in the Indian Ocean south of Sri Lanka which stretches vertically in the Indian Ocean from 07° 06'N - 0° 42'S. The land area of this island country is about 300 km2, and none of Maldives' 1190 islands has an elevation more than 3 m above sea level. In fact the Maldives has the distinction of being the flattest country on earth, making it extremely vulnerable to the effects of global warming. Of the south Asian countries, the Maldives is the most vulnerable nation, facing severe consequences as a result of global warming and sea level rise (SLR). Because of their obvious vulnerability to SLR, the Government of Maldives is very much concerned about climate change. As global warming and the related SLR is an important integrated environmental issue, the need of the hour is to monitor and assess these changes. The present article deals mainly with the analysis of the tidal and Sea Surface Temperature (SST) data observed at Male and Gan stations along the Maldives coast in the northern and southern hemispheres, respectively. The objective of the analysis is to study the trends of these parameters. Trend analysis is also performed on the corresponding air temperature data of both stations. The results show that Maldives coastal sea level is rising in the same way (rising trend) as the global sea level. The mean tidal level at Male has shown an increasing trend of about 4.1 mm/year.Similarly at Gan, near the equator,it has registered a positive trend of about 3.9 mm/year.Sea level variations are the manifestations of various changes that are taking place in the Ocean-Atmosphere system. Therefore, the variations in SST and air temperature are intimately linked to sea level rise. It is found that SST and air temperature have also registered an increasing trend at both stations. The evidence of rising trends suggest that careful future monitoring of these parameters is very much required. Tropical cyclones normally do not affect the Maldives coast. However, due to its isolated location, the long fetches in association with swells generated by storms, that originated in the far south have resulted in flooding. Thus the rising rate of sea level with high waves and flat topography have increased the risk of flooding and increased the rate of erosion and alteration of beaches.     

Effect of Sea Level Variability on the Estimation of Mean Sea Surface Gradients

It is demonstrated that an along-track mean sea surface (MSS) model estimated with TOPEX altimeter data, including the large 1997-1998 El Niño event, is slightly less accurate than a MSS model calculated from less data where El Niño signals are small. The manner in which true sea level variability corrupts the estimation of MSS gradients is discussed. A model is proposed to reduce the error, based on scaling climate indices such as the Southern Oscillation Index, while accounting for phase shifts using a Hilbert transform. After modeling and removing the seasonal and interannual sea level variations, parameters to a plane MSS model are estimated using TOPEX altimeter data from January 1993 to June 2000. Results indicate an overall improvement over the earlier model based on four years of data, and no apparent degradation due to aliasing of sea level variability.     

Stochastic Modeling of Short Term Variations of Sea Level in Eastern Canada

Hourly sea level records from three stations in eastern Canada (Québec-Lauzon, Harrington-Harbour and Halifax) are analyzed both in frequency domain from 1970 to 1979 and in time domain during 1973. At the three stations, the deterministic model explains 90 to 96% of the total variability of sea level. The semidiurnal and diurnal tides contribute largely to its variations. The residual series, less than 10% of the initial variations of sea level, contain irregular values including extreme values of seiches and storm surges. Such random variations are analyzed and modeled following the method described by Box and Jenkins (1976). The long period variations (2 to 30 days) can be attributed to meteorological forcing (atmospheric pressure and winds). The short period variations (some hours to one day) can be attributed to longitudinal seiches, semidiurnal and diurnal atmospheric tides, and inertial oscillations. The water discharge from the St. Lawrence River contributes 29% of the monthly residual sea level at Qué     

Interannual Sea Level Variations and Annual Tides in the Northwestern Pacific

Specific properties of the interannual sea level variations and annual tides in the Northwestern Pacific were studied. Several tide stations were monitored. The monthly mean sea level for the year of 1995 was analyzed at each tide station. A seismic event in 1995, some tectonic activity around the subject area, and the Kuroshio (the oceanic western boundary current) may possibly contaminate results which would have occurred from the astronomical annual tide alone.     

全新世以来山东半岛东北部海面变化的河流地貌响应

对全新世以来山东半岛东北部沿岸的相对海面（基准面）变化,不同河流有截然不同的地貌响应方式。大沽夹河型河流的下游河谷中有分别与相对海面升降对应的溯源堆积期和溯源侵蚀期,但不同规模的河流仍有差异。黄水河型河流河谷未因基准面升降而发生侵蚀或堆积,河谷仅起了输沙通道的作用。此外,大沽夹河型河流的中下游河型在相对海面上升或下降时,还可能发生相应地网状化或曲流化。     

A NOTE ON THE APPLICATION OF LINEAR WAVE THEORY AT A CRITICAL LEVEL

The purpose of this note is to estimate the accuracy and practical limitations of applying linear theory at a critical level over a realistic range of atmospheric stabilities for an idealized surface terrain. These estimates are made by comparing the results of a linear model with a nonlinear numerical model at a critical level. Essentially similar results are obtained from each model for wave stress, wave breaking height and wave dissipation through the critical level. Because gravity waves can be either evanescent or internal depending on the relative sizes of the Scorer parameter and the wavenumber of the ground surface disturbance, the somewhat paradoxical result develops that wave breaking and non-linearity increase with increasing bulk Richardson number. It is recommended that steady linear wave theory be used in gravity wave drag parameterizations provided near real time profiles of background velocity and temperature are available.     

结合灰度和基于动态窗口的纹理特征的遥感影像分类

在基于灰度共生矩阵提取遥感影像纹理特征的基础上,针对固定窗口算法的局限性,提出了动态窗口算法;并将不同滑动窗口算法提取的纹理特征与影像灰度组合进行支持向量机(SVM)分类,对分类结果进行定性和定量比较分析。实验结果表明:影像灰度结合动态窗口算法提取的纹理特征进行SVM分类的分类精度优于灰度结合固定窗口算法提取的纹理特征的分类精度。因此,提出的算法较传统的固定窗口算法更具优势,是一种有效纹理信息提取方法。     

1966年邢台强震群震前、 同震和震后断层运动特征分析

在1966年3月邢台强震群水准观测基础上, 本文首先对同震位移和数值模拟结果进行了对比, 认为邢台强震群发震断层浅层是牛家桥阳断层和永福庄断层, 深部发震断层是倾向北西的北东向断层; 然后以区域水准观测为约束, 通过反演给出了邢台强震群震前断层无震滑移、 同震断层位错和震后断层余滑空间分布。 结果表明, 震前显著无震滑移主要发生在3月8日6.8级前震的发震断层上, 而3月20日宁晋7.2级和6.7级地震发震断层深部同震位错相对弱的断层段, 震前也存在较为明显的无震滑移; 震后断层余滑主要分布在束鹿凹陷西侧的牛家桥阳断层。 从邢台强震群过程中断层运动时空演化特征可以看出, 强震破裂成核过程中震前断层无震滑移既可能发生于前震发震断层, 也可能发生于主震发震断层, 震后断层位移空间分布与同震位错具有互补性; 而震前断层无震滑移是否为有关震前前兆的真正原因, 是值得进一步深入研究的问题。     

非饱和花岗岩残积土水-气两相驱替过程数值模拟

水流在非饱和土体中的入渗过程实质上是水在下渗的过程中驱替空气的两相流问题。为揭示非饱和花岗岩残积土水-气两相驱替动态渗流机理,选取福州某地原状花岗岩残积土作为研究对象,基于工业CT扫描图像与Level Set方法,研究了原状土样两相驱替的动态特征。结果表明：对于细观尺度水-气两相驱替模拟,Level Set法能很好地捕捉两种不混溶流体间的界面位置;水-气两相驱替过程存在大孔隙优先流特征,且“绕流”现象一般易于出现在孔隙成圆度较高处;两相渗流速度主要受孔道迂回度控制,笔直、较宽孔道,渗流速度相对较高,同时存在明显的“优势通道”,且随渗流时间增大以先急后缓的特征呈正相关变化,最大增速率为 10.77%,最小仅 1.90%;孔道横截面速度大小分布与孔隙结构有关,“回流”和“绕流”现象会使驱替速度骤降,降低幅度可达21.62%;驱替阻力最大出现在孔壁处,孔道越窄,阻力越大;驱替效率与驱替压差成正比关系,且初期加压增速效果显著,可达25.49%,后期仅为1.47%。该研究成果可丰富降雨型滑坡理论基础并预防灾害产生,具有重要的理论价值及工程意义。