Abstract
Water flows from rivers into the sea (plumes) is a common phenomenon in many coastal zones. The hydro-logic behavior of plumes differs from one river to another depending on rainfall rate and intensity, as well as it is influenced by the hydrologic characteristics of river basin. In order to investigate the precipitation re-gime in a drainage basin versus the flow into the sea, sequential data must be available. Remotely sensed data can fulfill this scope, thus it can provide climatic and hydrologic data. The scope of this study is to monitor the behavior of water input in the catchments versus the output from rivers in the Lebanese coastal zone using remote sensing data. For this purpose, TRMM (Tropical Rainfall Mapping Mission) data and MODIS satellite images were used. Hence, rainfall data from TRMM was compared with the areal extent of water plumes from rivers. This enables establishing interpolation between water input/output for each river basin. In addition, the lag time and residence time of plumes into the sea can be measured and compared between the issuing rivers. The extracted data from remote sensing was compared with terrain measures and shows its reliability and accordance. The used approach proved to be creditable, non-invasive and cost effec-tive and can be applied to other costal river basins.
Highlights
Water runoff into the sea has been received substantial attention in several coastal zones worldwide, in time many of these zones experience water shortage
The hydrologic behavior of plumes differs from one river to another depending on rainfall rate and intensity, as well as it is influenced by the hydrologic characteristics of river basin
Rainfall data from TRMM was compared with the areal extent of water plumes from rivers
Summary
Water runoff into the sea has been received substantial attention in several coastal zones worldwide, in time many of these zones experience water shortage. This is well pronounced in arid and semi-arid regions, like the case of the Middle East. Studies carried out in this regard include the coast of Lebanon, Arabian Sea and the Arabian Gulf [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9] The discharged freshwater into the sea occurs either as direct surface runoff (i.e., from rivers and streams), or as groundwater discharge, which is commonly called “submarine springs ” and sometime as “invisible rivers”. In Lebanon, high precipitation rate (i.e., averaging 950-1100 mm) results large amounts of surface water that rapidly flows towards the sea due to steep terrain. The intensive fracture systems increase the flow regime of groundwater seaward
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
