Abstract
Korean shipbuilding companies have sometimes carried out sea trials to measure a vessel's speed performance around the western channel of the Straits of Korea, where the flow fields are very complicated because of the effect of various flows such as sea, tidal, geostrophic, and wind-driven currents. Because these flows seem to present significant interference to a ship, the numerical reproduction of the flow-fields in the vicinity of the target sites could provide a better understanding of the sea environments while performing sea trials. In this study, we used the MEC ocean model to simulate the tidal currents around Tsushima Island and compared the simulated tidal amplitudes and currents with the measurements of Teague et al. (2001). The tidal amplitudes of the present simulation results agreed well with the observations. Based on the numerical simulation, the optimal direction and proper sites for a speed trial are described.