Abstract
This study aims to investigate characteristics of continental shelf wave (CSW) on the northwestern continental shelf of the South China Sea (SCS) induced by winter storms in 2021. Mooring and cruise observations, tidal gauge data at stations Hong Kong, Zhapo and Qinglan and sea surface wind data from January 1 to February 28, 2021 are used to examine the relationship between along-shelf wind and sea level fluctuation. Two events of CSWs driven by the along-shelf sea surface wind are detected from wavelet spectra of tidal gauge data. The signals are triply peaked at periods of 56 h, 94 h and 180 h, propagating along the coast with phase speed ranging from 6.9 m/s to 18.9 m/s. The dispersion relation shows their property of the Kelvin mode of CSW. We develop a simple method to estimate amplitude of sea surface fluctuation by along-shelf wind. The results are comparable with the observation data, suggesting it is effective. The mode 2 CSWs fits very well with the mooring current velocity data. The results from rare current help to understand wave-current interaction in the northwestern SCS.
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Acknowledgements
Sea surface wind data were obtained from Copernicus-Marine Environment Monitoring Service (HTTPS://RESOURCES.MARINE.COPERNICUS.EU/PRODUCT-DETAIL/WIND_GLO_WIND_L4_NRT_OBSERVATIONS_012_004). Tidal gauge data were obtained from Sea Level Station Monitoring Facility (http://www.ioc-sealevelmonitoring.org/).
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Foundation item: The National Key R&D Program of China under contract No. 2022YFC3104805; the Natural Science Foundation of China under contract Nos 42276019, 41706025 and 41976200; the Innovation Team Plan for Universities in Guangdong Province under contract No. 2019KCXTF021; the First-class Discipline Plan of Guangdong Province under contract Nos 080503032101 and 231420003; the Program for Scientific Research Start-up Funds of Guangdong Ocean University contract No. 060302032106; the Open Fund Project of Key Laboratory of Marine Environmental Information Technology (2019), Ministry of Natural Resources.
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Li, J., Zhou, C., Li, M. et al. A case study of continental shelf waves in the northwestern South China Sea induced by winter storms in 2021. Acta Oceanol. Sin. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-023-2150-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-023-2150-5