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Initial Expansion Of The Columbia River Tidal Plume: Theory And Remote Sensing Observations, David A. Jay, Edward D. Zaron, Jiayi Pan
Initial Expansion Of The Columbia River Tidal Plume: Theory And Remote Sensing Observations, David A. Jay, Edward D. Zaron, Jiayi Pan
Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations
Analysis of the Columbia River tidal plume using Lagrangian frontal equations provides a concise description of the evolution of frontal depth H, velocity U, reduced gravity g', and frontal internal Froude number F (sub R) . Because the estuary mouth is narrow, the initial radial plume motion is supercritical (F (sub R) > 1) for up to 12 hours. Understanding this supercritical phase is vital, because plume properties change rapidly, with strong ecosystem impacts. To analyze this expansion, analytical and numerical models (the latter with three mixing formulations) were tested. Model results are compared to synthetic aperture radar images to verify …