Scattering of swell by currents
From MaRDI portal
Publication:6089435
DOI10.1017/JFM.2023.686arXiv2305.12163OpenAlexW4388531159MaRDI QIDQ6089435FDOQ6089435
Authors: Han Wang, Ana B. Villas Bôas, W. R. Young, J. Vanneste 
Publication date: 17 November 2023
Published in: Journal of Fluid Mechanics (Search for Journal in Brave)
Abstract: The refraction of surface gravity waves by currents leads to spatial modulations in the wave field and, in particular, in the significant wave height. We examine this phenomenon in the case of waves scattered by a localised current feature, assuming (i) the smallness of the ratio between current velocity and wave group speed, and (ii) a swell-like, highly directional wave spectrum. We apply matched asymptotics to the equation governing the conservation of wave action in the four-dimensional position--wavenumber space. The resulting explicit formulas show that the modulations in wave action and significant wave height past the localised current are controlled by the vorticity of the current integrated along the primary direction of the swell. We assess the asymptotic predictions against numerical simulations using WAVEWATCH III for a Gaussian vortex. We also consider vortex dipoles to demonstrate the possibility of `vortex cloaking' whereby certain currents have (asymptotically) no impact on the significant wave height. We discuss the role of the ratio of the two small parameters characterising assumptions (i) and (ii) above and show that caustics are only significant for unrealistically large values of this ratio, corresponding to unrealistically narrow directional spectra.
Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/2305.12163
Recommendations
- COMPUTING CONNECTING ORBITS IN DELAY DIFFERENTIAL EQUATIONS USING DDE-BIFTOOL
- Water wave scattering
- Wave action on currents with vorticity
- Scattering of surface gravity waves by bottom topography with a current
- Water wave propagation across a shearing current
- Measurement of wave scattering by topography in the presence of currents
- Reflection of water waves by a weak rapidly varying shearing current
- Waves and mean flows
- scientific article; zbMATH DE number 3897466
- Waves on unsteady currents
Cites Work
- NIST handbook of mathematical functions
- Oceanic Rogue Waves
- Dynamics and Modelling of Ocean Waves
- Interaction of Water Waves and Currents
- On the chance of freak waves at sea
- Refraction of gravity waves by weak current gradients
- Directional diffusion of surface gravity wave action by ocean macroturbulence
- Wave–vortex interactions, remote recoil, the Aharonov–Bohm effect and the Craik–Leibovich equation
This page was built for publication: Scattering of swell by currents
Report a bug (only for logged in users!)Click here to report a bug for this page (MaRDI item Q6089435)
