Wave crest height distribution during the tropical cyclone period

Abstract

The wave crest height plays a vital role in designing both the fixed and floating marine structures. The present study examines the measured wave crest data at 18 m water depth off Visakhapatnam in the northwestern Bay of Bengal during the tropical cyclone (TC) Hudhud. The maximum significant wave height (Hs) measured during the TC is 7.59 m on 12 October 2014 at 1030 h; the maximum wave height is 10.75 m and the crest height is 6.81 m. The average ratio of the crest height of the wave to the wave height is 0.4–0.7 during the TC. For waves with Hs more than 6 m, the most extreme wave height is 1.46–1.83 times the Hs and the crest height of the wave is 0.81–1.47 times the Hs of the same 30-min record. The study shows that during the high wave events, the Weibull distribution agrees with the crest height distribution of observed data better than the Rayleigh distribution.