• Journal of Korean Society of Coastal and Ocean Engineers
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.41-51
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• 2013

The tidal creek dependent mass transport characteristic in Gyeong-Gi Bay (west coast of Korea) was studied using field measured data and numerical model. Gyeong-Gi Bay consists of 3 main tidal channels and contains a well-developed vast tidal flat. This region is famous for its large tidal difference and strong current. We aim to study the effect of tidal creek in the tidal flat on the mass exchange between the estuary and the ocean. For numerical application, the application of unstructured grid feature is essential, since the tidal creek has complicated shape and form. For this purpose, the FVCOM is applied to the study area and simulation is performed for 2 different cases. In case A, geographic characteristics of the tidal creek is ignored in the numerical grid and in case B, the tidal creek are constructed using unstructured grid. And these 2 cases are compared with the field measured cross-channel mass transport data. The cross-channel mass transport at the Yeomha waterway mouth and Incheon harbor was measured in June, 9~10 (Spring tide) and 17~18 (Neap tide), 2009. CTD casting and ADCP cross-channel transect was conducted 13 times in one tidal cycle. The observation data analysis results showed that mass transport has characteristic of the ebb dominance Line 1 (Yeomha waterway mouth), on the other hand, a flood dominant characteristic is shown in Line 2 (Incheon harbor front). By comparing the numerical model (case A & B) with observation data, we found that the case B results show much better agreement with measurement data than case A. It is showed that the geographic feature of tidal creek should be considered in grid design of numerical model in order to understand the mass transport characteristics over large tidal flat area.