BREACHING OF SEA DIKES

Abstract

Risk Analysis of sea dikes is a fundamental tool for protection of human health and safety, private and public property and cultural heritage. The modern risk concept defines risk as the product of inundation probability times the consequences of inundation. The risk concept is a versatile tool for any matter, public, private or environmental endangered by storm surges. The hydraulic task in a sea dike risk analysis is the determination of the internal water level. The present breaching intensity model, is part of a connected complex of models for transforming an external surge to an internal inundation. The complex is calibrated on the New Orleans East Back Levee breaches blown by hurricane Katrina in 2005.