The Circulation and the Submarine Topography in Asan Bay

아산만의 해저지형과 해수유동

A series of echo-sounding and current measurements as well as the drogue and the drift bottle experiments were carried out in Asan Bay since November 1974. Several sand bars or sand flats covered by silts were developed at ebb tide in the bay. Sand waves and sand ripples were seen on the surface of the sand bars, around which sea channels of 8~ 12 meters in depth are formed. The main stream axis of the flood current which is separated into east and west branch flows southward. A cyclonic and an anticyclonic eddy are developed at the early stage of flood tide. They are transformed into a clockwise eddy before the slack water. The maximum tidal current speed observed was 3.1 ~ 3.2 knots at the entrance of the bay, while it was 1.O ~ 2.8 knots in the bay. The location of the main stream axis of the tidal current coincides well with the sea channel. A salt wedge was observed at the estuary of the Sabgyo-cheon River.