Predicting the breaking onset of surface water waves

Alexander Babanin; Dmitry Chalikov; Ian Young; Ivan Savelyev

doi:10.1029/2006GL029135

Predicting the breaking onset of surface water waves

Alexander Babanin^*, Dmitry Chalikov, Ian Young, Ivan Savelyev

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

105 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Why do ocean waves break? Understanding this important and obvious property of the ocean surface has been elusive for decades. This paper investigates causes which lead deep-water two-dimensional initially monochromatic waves to break. Individual wave steepness is found to be the single parameter which determines whether the wave will break immediately, never break or take a finite number of wave lengths to break. The breaking will occur once the wave reaches the Stokes limiting steepness. The breaking probability and the location of breaking onset can be predicted, properties of incipient breakers measured. Potential applications to field conditions are discussed.

Original language	English
Article number	L07605
Journal	Geophysical Research Letters
Volume	34
Issue number	7
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1029/2006GL029135
Publication status	Published - 16 Apr 2007
Externally published	Yes

Access to Document

10.1029/2006GL029135

Cite this

@article{ca6db78655854091a9a9ef6b114bb895,

title = "Predicting the breaking onset of surface water waves",

abstract = "Why do ocean waves break? Understanding this important and obvious property of the ocean surface has been elusive for decades. This paper investigates causes which lead deep-water two-dimensional initially monochromatic waves to break. Individual wave steepness is found to be the single parameter which determines whether the wave will break immediately, never break or take a finite number of wave lengths to break. The breaking will occur once the wave reaches the Stokes limiting steepness. The breaking probability and the location of breaking onset can be predicted, properties of incipient breakers measured. Potential applications to field conditions are discussed.",

author = "Alexander Babanin and Dmitry Chalikov and Ian Young and Ivan Savelyev",

year = "2007",

month = apr,

day = "16",

doi = "10.1029/2006GL029135",

language = "English",

volume = "34",

journal = "Geophysical Research Letters",

issn = "0094-8276",

publisher = "John Wiley & Sons Inc.",

number = "7",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - Predicting the breaking onset of surface water waves

AU - Babanin, Alexander

AU - Chalikov, Dmitry

AU - Young, Ian

AU - Savelyev, Ivan

PY - 2007/4/16

Y1 - 2007/4/16

N2 - Why do ocean waves break? Understanding this important and obvious property of the ocean surface has been elusive for decades. This paper investigates causes which lead deep-water two-dimensional initially monochromatic waves to break. Individual wave steepness is found to be the single parameter which determines whether the wave will break immediately, never break or take a finite number of wave lengths to break. The breaking will occur once the wave reaches the Stokes limiting steepness. The breaking probability and the location of breaking onset can be predicted, properties of incipient breakers measured. Potential applications to field conditions are discussed.

AB - Why do ocean waves break? Understanding this important and obvious property of the ocean surface has been elusive for decades. This paper investigates causes which lead deep-water two-dimensional initially monochromatic waves to break. Individual wave steepness is found to be the single parameter which determines whether the wave will break immediately, never break or take a finite number of wave lengths to break. The breaking will occur once the wave reaches the Stokes limiting steepness. The breaking probability and the location of breaking onset can be predicted, properties of incipient breakers measured. Potential applications to field conditions are discussed.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=34250738992&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1029/2006GL029135

DO - 10.1029/2006GL029135

M3 - Article

SN - 0094-8276

VL - 34

JO - Geophysical Research Letters

JF - Geophysical Research Letters

IS - 7

M1 - L07605

ER -

Predicting the breaking onset of surface water waves

Abstract

Access to Document

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this