FLOW CHARACTERISTICS OF SURFACE CURRENTS AND MIXING BY CURTAINS

Abstract

Such flow characteristics of the front of a surface current in both buoyancy-inertia and buoyancy-viscous region as intrusion length, propagation speed, flow thickness and densimetric Froude number are quantified experimentally. Subsequently the effects of a curtain placed in the steady surface currents on the mixing of the currents are investigated experimentally. It is found that some of the heavier ambient fluid is lifted up by the upwelling motion of the lighter surface layer fluid along the curtain, and consequently the dilution rate of surface layer increases with the ratio of the submerged depth of the curtain to the inflow depth.