U.S. Department of the Interior Minerals Management Service Gulf of Mexico OCS Region Technical Announcement

Wave Climate and Bottom Boundary Layer Dynamics with Implications for
Offshore Sand Mining and Barrier Island Replenishment,
South-Central Louisiana

OCS Study MMS 2000-053

The Minerals Management Service (MMS), Gulf of Mexico OCS Region, announces the availability of a new study report, Wave Climate and Bottom Boundary Layer Dynamics with Implications for Offshore Sand Mining and Barrier Island Replenishment, South-Central Louisiana.

The project was a three-year field study of wave climate, wave-current interactions and bottom boundary layer dynamics, and sediment transport in the Ship Shoal area, landward to the inner shelf adjacent to the Isles Dernieres and was a follow-on effort to a numerical modeling effort completed in October 1996. The project involved (1) directional wave spectra measured simultaneously at two geographical locations to check the numerically modeled results obtained from the wave modeling effort; (2) direct field measurements of temporally and spatially varying directional wave spectra at two proposed locations conducted under different wave conditions (storms, fair weather, etc.) to facilitate numerical model output checking and to develop a quantitative wave climate for the study area; and (3) direct field measurements of bottom boundary layer hydrodynamic processes and suspended sediment transport. The data analysis indicates that massive and rapid sediment movement occurs on Ship Shoal. This sediment movement is important in understanding the dynamics of the shelf/shoal complex.

The study results are highly relevant to MMS's future involvement with mining Ship Shoal for beach nourishment along the Louisiana barrier islands and will assist in predicting sediment transport pathways and the fate of material mined from Ship Shoal and deposited on the inner shelf adjacent to the Louisiana barrier islands during future barrier island restoration efforts.

For more information about this study, contact Mr. Barry Drucker, Physical Scientist, MMS-INTERMAR (MS 4030), 381 Elden Street, Herndon, Virginia 20170, telephone (703) 787-1296. For questions concerning the MMS Environmental Studies Program in general, contact the Environmental Sciences Section (MS 5430), 1201 Elmwood Park Boulevard, New Orleans, Louisiana 70123-2394, telephone (504) 736-2752.

You can obtain copies of the report from the Minerals Management Service, Gulf of Mexico OCS Region, at a charge of $5.00 by referencing OCS Study MMS 2000-053. You will be able to obtain this report also from the National Technical Information Service in the near future. Here are the addresses. You may also inspect copies at selected Federal Depository Libraries.