Prakash Chandra Mohanty

Modeling Storm Surge and its Associated Inland Inundation Extent Due to Very Severe Cyclonic Storm Phailin

A hindcast simulation of storm surge and inundation from tropical cyclone Phalin, which made landfall at Odisha, India, on 12 October 2013, was carried out using ADCIRC model. Model-simulated inundation extent matched well with field surveys at Ganjam, Odisha, within a few days of landfall. Further, the model reproduced the temporal evolution of the surge residual with respect to observations from a tide gauge at Paradip (correlation 0.8, RMSE 0.26 m). However, the model marginally underestimated the magnitude with respect to observations, which can be attributed to the lack of wave setup in the model and uncertainty in wind and pressure information. The experiment also involved the use of two idealized scenarios, that is, variation of landfall timings with the ebbing and high tide phase. These scenarios were required for better understanding the sensitivity of inundation to the phase of tide in the model. Simulation with landfall at flooding (ebbing) tide showed greater (lower) inundation than the real scenario. Results from idealized scenarios confirmed the significance of the accuracy needed in forecasting landfall time. Our results clearly indicate that the overall performance of the model is good and therefore is of potential use as a tool to forewarn disaster management authorities.

Assessment of the coral bleaching during 2005 to decipher the thermal stress in the coral environs of the Andaman Islands using remote sensing

Abstract Sea Surface Temperature (SST) derived from the NOAA AVHRR satellite data were used to generate the Degree of Heating Weeks (DHW) and Hot Spot (HS) products. Combination of the cumulative temperature anomalies and the thermal stress studies were yielded to synoptically identify the probable areas of bleaching. The bleaching status of the Andaman region was assessed based on the DHW and HS for the bleaching event occurred in the Andaman region in April/May 2005. The bleaching status up to Alert Level-1 was recorded with the maximum HS of 3°C and DHW 6°C-week. Simultaneous in-situ reef observations conducted in the Andaman Sea confirmed the coral bleaching event. The maximum mortality in the region due to coral bleaching was shown by the Acropora species (43%) followed by Montipora species (22%) and Porites species (14%). This study focused on detection of coral bleaching warning based on the SST in compliment with the in-situ observations.

Algal species dynamics in North Arabian Sea using long term ocean colour satellite data

North Arabian Sea experiences massive proliferation of variable algal species. The study presents variability of Noctiluca and its association with hydrographic parameters such as sea surface temperature (SST) and water column stability using ten years of satellite data. The area was categorized into three regions, North (23 to 26°N and 56 to 70°E), West (18 to 23°N and 56 to 62°E) and East (18 to 23°N and 62 to 74°E). The Noctiluca dominated area was extracted following approach of Dwivedi et. al. (2015) based on slope of Remote Sensing Reflectance (Rrs) between 488 to 443nm and 488 to 531nm. The data used in the present study depicted two distinct clusters based on regression between difference of Rrs(488) and Rrs(443) with Rrs(488) and Rrs(531). The major clusters representing Noctiluca falls within the range of 0.0004 to 0.0015 (Rrs488-Rrs443) and -0.0012 to -0.0004 (Rrs488-Rrs531). The occurrence of Noctiluca showed bi-modal distribution at an annual scale with the dominance in the northern region during winter monsoon (February- March). In western and eastern region higher frequency of Nuctiluca was during post monsoon having lag of one month from western (September) to eastern (October) region. The periodicity of Noctiluca, carried out using Fourier analysis, showed predominance at annual scale in Northern and semi-annual scale in Western and Eastern region. This indicates that the Noctiluca bloom in the northern region is primarily triggered by winter mixing whereas in western and eastern part of northern Arabian Sea it has combined effect of summer upwelling as well as winter mixing.

Identification of coral reef feature using hyperspectral remote sensing

Present study employs reef-up approach to map coral reef zones along the Sentinel Island of Andaman using high spectral resolution offered by hyper spectral imagery by Hyperion mission of NASA. This data consisting of 242 spectral bands, provide a unique ability to identify Coral substrate based on their spectral properties. We applied atmospheric correction with the help of Fast Line-of-sight Atmospheric Analysis of Hypercubes (FLAASH) module of ENVI software. This atmospherically corrected was used to extract Coral Reef Zones (CRZ) based on specific threshold limits after subtracting data of 782.95nm band from 579.45nm band of Hyperion imagery. Both of these bands were chosen due to their property of exhibiting maximum spectral contrast that determines threshold limits to distinguish a coral area from its non-coral counterpart. These CRZs were compared with the coral reef zones base map developed using LISS-III data by INCOIS, Hyderabad and SAC, Ahmadabad under CZS project. We observed that extracted CRZ area was 85.25 m2 and 110.1 m2 using LISS-III and Hyperion Data respectively. Despite the overestimation of CRZ by Hyperion data as compared to LISS-III, the spatial distribution of CRZ showed reasonable similarity in both.