Abstract
The coastal wave dynamics of Agatti island situated on a coral atoll in Lakshadweep, India, having a notable topographic feature of steeper eastern shore over the western shore, is analysed in this study. A multinested model setup is generated using the global third-generation models WAM (Wave Modeling) and SWAN (Simulating Waves Nearshore). A high resolution unstructured grid is generated for the domain containing the island using SMS (Surface-Water Modeling System) interpolated with merged GEBCO (General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans) and SRTM (Shuttle Radar Topography Mission) bathymetry. The SWAN model is integrated with a fine resolution of one minute by one minute during the tropical storm 01A (05–10 June 2004) which passed near the island. Model simulated significant wave height data when validated against satellite observations exhibited high accuracy. SWH (significant wave height) is observed to be greater for the west coast than that over the east coast of the island due to steeper eastern shore and there is widespread wave energy dissipation along the southwest direction of wave propagation during normal conditions. The one-dimensional energy density spectra generated during the storm period exhibit multimodality with structured and unstructured grids.
Highlights
Lakshadweep is an archipelago in the Arabian Sea (8∘– 12∘3N latitude and 71∘E–74∘E longitude) off the west coast of India and the region is well known for its coral diversity
The trend observed from the figure depicts reasonable accuracy of the magnitude of the significant wave heights
The correlation coefficient calculated is 0.5 and this may be due to high resolution and complex grid generation method used for the unstructured case
Summary
Lakshadweep is an archipelago in the Arabian Sea (8∘– 12∘3N latitude and 71∘E–74∘E longitude) off the west coast of India and the region is well known for its coral diversity. Various studies can be found conducted on the coral islands as they play crucial role in tourism, fishing, building materials, coastal protection, and providing new drugs and biochemicals [2]. The island is north-south elongated and is 7.5 km long. Agatti is surrounded on all sides by a coral reef as an atoll like with prominence in the west side of the island. The western shore of the Agatti island is exposed to high waves during the southwest monsoon [3]. The coral growth on that part is strong so as to protect the island from the southwest monsoon. Reference [4] reports the widespread bleaching of the corals in 2010 at Agatti Island, Lakshadweep, India, and its ecological and socioeconomic impacts. Reference [5] shows human dependence on coral reefs in small islands based on socioeconomic assessments.
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