On the variability of coastal processes within various time intervals

Abstract

Values and rate of changes in coastal morphology characteristics are shown to be essentially different when defined on different time scale (hours, months, years, millennia). Each estimate indicates the significance of a single f actor which controls coastal processes and acts within a certain time interval. With reference to longs fore sediment transport estimation in different parts of the World Ocean, strong storms (with frequence about once per year) have been proved to be f actor controlling coasts evolution within time interval of a few years to a few hundreds of years. By means of assessment of horizontal migration of the shoreline in a bay of the White Sea it was ascertained that tidal fluctuations of the sea level controlled the coast dynamics during the whole Holocene.