LONG-TERM TOPOGRAPHIC CHANGES AROUND SAND SPIT AND IMPACT OF EXTRAORDINARY HIGH WAVES DURING TYPHOONS

Abstract

Around the Mihono-matsubara sand spit in Suruga Bay in Japan, the beach was eroded owing to the decrease in the fluvial sand supply from the Abe River triggered by excess riverbed mining before 1967, together with the discharge of sand into the deep sea via a steep slope near the tip of the sand spit. As a measure against beach erosion, an artificial headland (HL) composed of two detached breakwaters and the breakwaters (BWs) placed along the shoreline have been constructed along with beach nourishment, but the beach is barely maintained by these measures. In 2013, two large typhoons hit the coast, causing rapid beach changes around the structures, and these beach changes were superimposed on the long-term topographic changes that have occurred over a long time as a geomorphological process. In this study, their impact to the beaches was investigated on the basis of the field data.