Abstract
Meteorological tsunamis are frequently observed in different tide stations at the southeastern coast of South America. They are associated with the occurrence of atmospheric gravity waves during the passages of cold fronts over the Buenos Aires Province continental shelf. On the other hand, storm surges are also frequent in the region, and they are associated with strong and persistent southerlies, which are also frequent during cold front passages. The impact of meteorological tsunamis in coastal erosion and in the statistics of storm surge trends is discussed in this paper. For this study, fifteen meteorological tsunamis (with maximum wave heights higher than 0.20 m), seven of them simultaneous to the occurrence of storm surge events (with extreme levels higher than |±0.60 m|), are selected from April 2010 to January 2013. The impact of meteorological tsunamis in the storm erosion potential index (SEPI) is evaluated. Not significant differences are obtained between SEPI calculated with and without filtering the meteorological tsunami signal from the storm surge data series. Moreover, several experiments are carried out computing SEPI from synthetic sea level data series, but very low changes (lower than 4 %) are also obtained. It is concluded that the presence of moderate meteorological tsunamis on sea level records would not enhance this index at the Buenos Aires Province coast. On the other hand, taking into account that meteorological tsunamis can reach up the 20–30 % of the storm surge height, it was concluded that the statistics of storm surge trends (and their uncertainties) should be revised for Mar del Plata data series.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Balay M (1955) La determinación del nivel medio del Mar Argentino, influencias de las oscilaciones del mar no causadas por la marea. Dir Gral de Nav. Hidrog, Min de Mar 46
Campetella C, D’Onofrio E, Cerne B, Fiore M, Possia N (2007) Negative storm surges in the Port of Buenos Aires. Int J Climatol 27:1091–1101
D’Onofrio E, Fiore M, Romero S (1999) Return periods of extreme water levels estimated for some vulnerable areas of Buenos Aires. Cont Shelf Res 19:1681–1693
D’Onofrio E, Fiore M, Pousa JL (2008) Changes in the regime of storm surges in Buenos Aires, Argentina. J Coast Res 24(1A):260–265
D’Onofrio E, Oreiro F, Fiore M (2012) Simplified empirical astronomical tide model—an application for the Río de la Plata estuary. Comput Geosci 44:196–202
Dragani W (1988) Análisis del proceso físico generador de ondas largas en la costa bonaerense argentina. Thesis, Inst Tec Bs As, Buenos Aires, p 58
Dragani W (1997) Una explicación del proceso físico generador de ondas de largo período en la costa bonaerense argentina. Doctoral Thesis, Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, Universidad de Buenos Aires, p 222
Dragani W (2007) Numerical experiments of the generation of long ocean waves in coastal waters of the Buenos Aires province, Argentina. Cont Shelf Res. doi:10.1016/j.csr.2006.11.009
Dragani W, Mazio C, Nuñez M (2002) Sea-level oscillations in coastal waters of the Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. Cont Shelf Res 22:779–790
Dragani W, D’Onofrio E, Grismeyer W, Fiore M (2006) Tide gauge observations of the Indian ocean tsunami, December 26, 2004, at the Buenos Aires coastal waters, Argentina. Cont Shelf Res 26:1543–1550
Dragani W, D’Onofrio E, Grismeyer W, Fiore M, Violante R, Rovere E (2008) Vulnerability of the Atlantic Patagonian coast to tsunamis generated by submarine earthquakes located in the Scotia Arc region. Some numerical experiments. Nat Hazards 49:437–458. doi:10.1007/s11069-008-9289-4
Dragani W, D’Onofrio E, Grismeyer W, Fiore M, Campos MI (2009) Atmospherically-induced water oscillations detected in the Port of Quequén, Buenos Aires, Argentina. J Phys Chem Earth 34:998–1008
Dragani W, D’Onofrio E, Mediavilla D, Grismeyer W, Fiore M (2011) Tide gauge observations of the Indian ocean tsunami, December 26, 2004, at the Río de la Plata estuary, Argentina. In “The Tsunami Threat—Research and Technology”, Cap. 17:355–370. IN-TECH, Vienna. ISBN: 978-953-307-552-5
Fiore M, D’Onofrio E, Grismeyer W, Mediavilla D (2008) El ascenso del nivel del mar en la costa de la Provincia de Buenos Aires. Ciencia Hoy 18(106):50–57
Fiore M, D’Onofrio E, Pousa J, Schnack E, Bértola G (2009) Storm surges and coastal impacts at Mar del Plata, Argentina. Cont Shelf Res 29(14):1643–1649
Foreman MGG (1977) Manual for tidal heights analysis and prediction. Pac Mar Sci Rep 77(10):97
Hamming R (1977) Digital filters. Signal processing series. Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, p 219
Inman D, Munk W, Balay M (1962) Spectra of low frequency ocean waves along the Argentine shelf. Deep-Sea Res 8:155–164
Kalnay E, Kanamitsu M, Kistler R, Collins W, Deaven D, Gandin L, Iredell M, Saha S, White G, Woollen J, Zhu Y, Chelliah M, Ebisuzaki W, Higgins W, Janowiak J, Mo KC, Ropelewski C, Wang J, Leetmaa A, Reynolds R, Jenne R, Joseph D (1996) The NCEP/NCAR 40-year reanalysis project. Bull Am Meteorol Soc 77:437–471
Monserrat S, Vilibić I, Rabinovich AB (2006) Meteotsunamis: atmospherically induced destructive ocean waves in the tsunami frequency band. Nat Hazards Earth Syst Sci 6:1035–1051
Mouzo FH (1982) Geología Marítima y Fluvial. In: Historia Marítima Argentina. Armada Argentina, Ed. Cuántica, 2, 1, p 117
Nuñez M, Mazio C, Dragani W (1999) Estudio espectral de un lapso de intensa actividad de ondas de gravedad atmosféricas registradas en la costa bonaerense argentina. Revista Meteorologica 23(1–2):49–59
SHN (2013) Tablas de Marea, H-610. Servicio de Hidrografía Naval. Ministerio de Defensa, Buenos Aires
Torrence C, Compo GP (1998) A practical guide to wavelet analysis. Bull Am Meteorol Soc 71:61–78
USGS-NEIC (2013) United States Geological Survey—National Earthquake Information Center. http://earthquake.usgs.gov/regional/neic/
Zhang K, Douglas BC, Leatherman SP (2001) Beach erosion potential for severe nor’easters. J Coast Res 17(2):309–321
Acknowledgments
This paper is a contribution to the PIP 112-200801-02599, PIP 112-201101-00176 and UBACyT GC 20020100100840.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2014 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Dragani, W.C., D’Onofrio, E.E., Oreiro, F., Alonso, G., Fiore, M., Grismeyer, W. (2014). Simultaneous meteorological tsunamis and storm surges at Buenos Aires coast, southeastern South America. In: Vilibić, I., Monserrat, S., Rabinovich, A.B. (eds) Meteorological Tsunamis: The U.S. East Coast and Other Coastal Regions. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-12712-5_15
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-12712-5_15
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-12711-8
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-12712-5
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental ScienceEarth and Environmental Science (R0)