Bubble transport in rip currents

Abstract

A number of remote and in situ acoustical sensors were mounted in the surf zone off Scripps Pier, La Jolla, California, during March 1997 and used to characterize rip currents and their ability to transport bubbles offshore from the surf zone. The bubble size distributions and air fractions at the injection point were measured using an acoustical resonator and a conductivity sensor right in the surf zone. The offshore moving bubble plume was tracked with a multibeam 100 kHz Doppler sidescan sonar, giving the spatial extent and offshore variability in the rip events as well as information about the surface wave field. Furthermore, three acoustical resonators were mounted at 2.5 m depth 55-60 m farther offshore to probe the bubble field 300-400 s after injection. These results are interpreted using models that include bubble buoyancy and dissolution, rip current advection, and the turbulent boundary layer, which is represented by the Christoffersen and Jonsson [1985] formulation. Copyright 2001 by the American Geophysical Union.