H. Ronald Riggs

TSUNAMI STRUCTURAL DESIGN PROVISIONS FOR A NEW UPDATE OF BUILDING CODES AND PERFORMANCE-BASED ENGINEERING

Since tsunami loading provisions were initially developed for Honolulu, Hawaii in the 1980s and subsequently utilized in other design guidelines for coastal construction, a comprehensive update of tsunami design provisions has not occurred. Furthermore, a national standard for engineering design for tsunami effects written in mandatory language does not exist. With the advent of the NSF George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) wave basin and wave flume facility at Oregon State University and the NSF/NEES research program, modern research using larger scale models has become available on which to base a new generation of tsunami design provisions. Devastating recent tsunamis in the Indian Ocean (2004), Samoa (2009), Chile (2010) and Japan (2011) indicate that explicit design procedures for risk mitigation of tsunamis is overdue. The recommended development of a new update of tsunami loading provisions will be discussed for prescriptive loading conditions for building codes and for the performance-based criteria for site-specific hazard analysis and design of essential facilities and other buildings.

Vulnerability assessment of coastal bridges on Oahu impacted by storm surge and waves

Vulnerability assessment of four selected prototype coastal bridges on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, to the combination of storm surge and waves is presented. The maximum storm surge condition is estimated by considering an extensive series of simulated hurricanes making landfall on the island of Oahu, where the bridges are located. For the given extreme environmental conditions, wave loads on the deck of the selected bridges are calculated by use of several theoretical and computational approaches, including Euler’s equations (OpenFOAM), the Green–Naghdi nonlinear equations, linear long-wave approximation and existing simplified, design-type force equations. Multiple scenarios of the relative location of the bridge deck and the still-water level are studied to determine the maximum possible wave loads on the bridge decks. Vulnerability of the coastal bridges to storm wave loads is determined by comparing the capacity of the bridge to the wave-induced loads on the structure.

Modeling of Seabed Liquefaction and Other Processes Responsible for Mine Burial

A new Office of Naval Research Program is focusing on developing new mine burial prediction models for a number of processes that have been identified for shallow water environments. These processes are briefly reviewed and preliminary modeling aspects and numerical computations for seabed liquefaction due to surface water waves are presented. Both a deterministic and a possible empirical approach are discussed.Copyright

2013 Best Paper Award

The Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering is pleased to announce that the Editorial Board has chosen “Wave Runup and Overtopping at Seawalls Built on Land and in Very Shallow Water,” by Hajime Mase, Takashi Tamada, Tomohiro Yasuda, Terence S. Hedges, and Maria T. Reis, published in the September 2013 issue (Vol. 139, No. 5, pp. 346–357), as the 2013 Best Paper. The Editorial Board appreciated the careful nature of the study and its direct applicability to engineering practice. The selection process for the best paper has resulted in five finalists being recognized as 2013 Outstanding Papers: • “Method for Estimating Future Hurricane Flood Probabilities and Associated Uncertainty,” by Jennifer L. Irish and Donald T. Resio (Vol. 139, No. 2, pp. 126–134); • “Is the Intensifying Wave Climate of the U.S. Pacific Northwest Increasing Flooding and Erosion Risk Faster Than Sea-Level Rise?” by Peter Ruggiero (Vol. 139, No. 2, pp. 88–97); • “Boat-Wake Statistics at Jensen Beach, Florida,” by Alex Sheremet,UriahGravois, andMiaoTian (Vol. 139,No. 4, pp. 286–294); • “Backfilling of a Scour Hole around a Pile inWaves andCurrent,” by B. Mutlu Sumer, Thor U. Petersen, Luca Locatelli, Jorgen Fredsoe, RosariaE.Musumeci, andEnricoFoti (Vol. 139,No.1, pp.9–23); and • “Advective Diffusion of Contaminants in the Surf Zone,” by Patricio Winckler, Philip L.-F. Liu, and Chiang C. Mei (Vol. 139, No. 6, pp. 437–454). The Editorial Board congratulates these authors and thanks them for their submissions. Assistant Editor Andrew Kennedy has led the selection process. TheBest PaperAward andOutstanding Papers are selected annually from all Technical Papers, Technical Notes, and Case Studies published in a calendar year.

2014 Best Paper Award

The Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering is pleased to announce that the Editorial Board has chosen “Numerical study of sandbar migration under wave-undertow interaction” by Jinhai Zheng, Chi Zhang, Zeki Demirbilek, and Lihwa Lin, published in the March/April 2014 issue (Vol. 140, No. 2, pp. 146–159), as the 2014 Best Paper Award winner. The selection process for the best paper has resulted in four additional finalists being recognized as 2014 Outstanding Papers: • “Cross-shore redistribution of nourished sand near a breaker bar” by Niels Gjol Jacobsen and Jorgen Fredsoe, published in the March 2014 issue (Vol. 140, No. 2, pp. 125–134). • “New physical insights and design formulas on wave overtopping at sloping and vertical structures” by Jentsje van der Meer and Tom Bruce, published in the November 2014 issue (Vol. 140, No. 6, 04014025). • “Numerical investigation of turbulence modulation by sediment-induced stratification and enhanced viscosity in oscillatory flows” by Xiao Yu, C. E. Ozdemir, Tian-Jian Hsu, and S. Balachandar, published in the March 2014 issue (Vol. 140, No. 2, pp. 160–172). • “Smoothed-particle hydrodynamics numerical modeling of structures impacted by tsunami bores.” Philippe St-Germain, Ioan Nistor, Ronald Townsend, and Tomoya Shibayama, published in the January 2014 issue (Vol. 140, No. 1, pp. 66–81). The Best Paper Award and Outstanding Papers are selected annually from all technical papers, technical notes, and case studies published in a calendar year. The Editorial Board congratulates the authors and thanks them for their submissions.