Abstract
Freshwater plume represents a key passage for the river to deliver sediment to the coastal ocean. A water-sediment regulation scheme was implemented for the Huanghe River in 2005; in order to examine the effect of such an activity on the river plume dynamics, three cruises were carried out off the Huanghe River mouth. The preliminary results of the in-situ measurements suggested that the plume pathway shifted rapidly during the period of less than twenty days, which was confirmed by satellite remote sensing data in the same period. The rapid shifts were resulted from intensive interactions between river discharge and the varying bathymetry in the river mouth area. A large amount of river sediment was delivered to the coastal region during this period and mostly deposited in the mouth bar area due to jet-flow deceleration, forming a cluster of mouth bars across the river mouth, which caused the rapid shifts of the plume pathway.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Milliman, J. D., Meade, R. H., World-wide delivery of river sediment to the oceans, Journal of Geology, 1983, 91: 1–21.
Yang, Z. S., Milliman, J. D., Liu, J. P. et al., Yellow River’s water and sediment discharge decreasing steadily, EOS, 1998, 79: 589–592.
Xu, J., Sediment flux to the sea as influenced by changing human activities and precipitation: example of the Yellow River, China, Environmental Management, 2005, 31(8): 328–341.
Li, G. Y., The Yellow River water and sediment regulation, The Yellow River (in Chinese), 2002, 24(11): 1–5.
Ministry of Water Resources of People’s Republic of China, River Sediment Bulletin of China (in Chinese), 2003, available at www.hydroinfo.gov.cn.
Zhang, J. H., Xu, C., Gao, G., Regime variation of the Yellow River Estuary during 2002 water and sediment regulation test, Journal of Sediment Research (in Chinese), 2004, 5: 68–71.
Mao, H. L., Gan, Z., Lan, S., Preliminary study on the Changjiang (Yangtze) diluted water and its mixing, Oceanologia ET Limnologia (in Chinese), 1963, 5(3): 183–206.
Zhu, L. B., Zhao, B., Liu, K., Preliminary study on the deflection of the Huanghe River (Yellow River) diluted water, Studia Marina Sinica (in Chinese), 1997, 38: 61–67.
Le, K. T., Preliminary study on the path of the Changjiang (Yangtze) diluted water, Oceanologia ET Limnologia (in Chinese), 1984, 15(2): 157–166.
Beardsly, R. C., Hart, J., A simple theoretical model for the flow of an estuary onto a continental shelf, Journal of Geophysics Research, 1978, 83: 873–883.
Beardsly, R. C., Limeburner, R., Yu, H., Discharge of the Changjiang (Yangtze River) into the East China Sea, Continental Shelf Research, 1985, 4: 57–76.
Takano, K., On the velocity distribution off the mouth of a river, Journal of Oceanography Society of Japan, 1954, 10(2): 60–64.
Li, G. X., Yang, Z. S., Yue, S. H. et al., Sedimentation in the shear front off the Yellow River Mouth, Continental Shelf Research, 2001, 21: 607–625.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
About this article
Cite this article
Wang, H., Yang, Z., Bi, N. et al. Rapid shifts of the river plume pathway off the Huanghe (Yellow) River mouth in response to water-sediment regulation scheme in 2005. Chin.Sci.Bull. 50, 2878–2884 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1360/982005-1196
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1360/982005-1196