Publications
Scientific reports, journal articles, and information products produced by USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center scientists.
Filter Total Items: 1331
Book review of "Tsunami Propagation in Tidal Rivers", by Elena Tolkova
No abstract available.
Authors
Eric L. Geist
Submarine landslide kinematics derived from high-resolution imaging in Port Valdez, Alaska
Submarine landslides caused by strong ground shaking during the M9.2 1964 Great Alaska earthquake generated a tsunami that destroyed much of the old town of Valdez, Alaska, and was responsible for 32 deaths at that location. We explore structural details of the 1964 landslide deposit, as well as landslide deposits from earlier events, in order to characterize kinematics of the landslide process. W
Authors
Emily Roland, Peter J. Haeussler, Thomas E. Parsons, Patrick E. Hart
Impacts of hydrothermal plume processes on oceanic metal cycles and transport
Chemical, physical and biological processes in hydrothermal plumes control the flux of elements from hydrothermal vents to the global oceans. The timescales of these processes range from less than a second, as the hydrothermal fluid mixes with seawater at the seafloor, to decades, as the plume disperses over thousands of kilometers. Integrating hydrothermal geochemistry throughout the lifetime of
Authors
Amy Gartman, Alyssa J. Findlay
Sediment transport in a restored, river-influenced Pacific Northwest estuary
Predicting the success of future investments in coastal and estuarine ecosystem restorations is limited by scarce data quantifying sediment budgets and transport processes of prior restorations. This study provides detailed analyses of the hydrodynamics and sediment fluxes of a recently restored U.S. Pacific Northwest estuary, a 61 ha former agricultural area near the mouth of the Stillaguamish Ri
Authors
Daniel J. Nowacki, Eric E. Grossman
Observations of coastal change and numerical modeling of sediment-transport pathways at the mouth of the Columbia River and its adjacent littoral cell
Bathymetric and topographic surveys performed annually along the coastlines of northern Oregon and southwestern Washington documented changes in beach and nearshore morphology between 2014 and 2019. Volume change analysis revealed measurable localized erosion and deposition throughout the study area, but significant net erosion at the regional scale (several kilometers [km]) was limited to Benson
Authors
Andrew W. Stevens, Edwin Elias, Stuart Pearson, George M. Kaminsky, Peter R Ruggiero, Heather M. Weiner, Guy R. Gelfenbaum
Impacts of sea-level rise on the tidal reach of California coastal rivers using the Coastal Storm Modeling System (CoSMoS)
In coastal rivers, the interactions between tides and fluvial discharge affect local ecology, sedimentation, river dynamics, river mouth configuration, and the flooding potential in adjacent wetlands and low-lying areas. With sea-level rise, the tidal reach within coastal rivers can expand upstream, impacting river dynamics and increasing flood risk across a much greater area. Rivers along the Pac
Authors
Andrea C. O'Neill, Li H. Erikson, Patrick L. Barnard
Sediments and the sea floor of the continental shelves and coastal waters of the United States—About the usSEABED integrated sea-floor-characterization database, built with the dbSEABED processing system
Since the second half of the 20th century, there has been an increase in scientific interest, research effort, and information gathered on the geologic sedimentary character of the continental margins of the United States. Data and information from thousands of sources have increased our scientific understanding of the character of the margin surface, but rarely have those data been combined and i
Authors
Brian J. Buczkowski, Jane A. Reid, Chris J. Jenkins
Hydro-morphological characterization of coral reefs for wave runup prediction
Many coral reef-lined coasts are low-lying with elevations <4 m above mean sea level. Climate-change-driven sea-level rise, coral reef degradation, and changes in storm wave climate will lead to greater occurrence and impacts of wave-driven flooding. This poses a significant threat to their coastal communities. While greatly at risk, the complex hydrodynamics and bathymetry of reef-lined coasts ma
Authors
Fred Scott, Jose A. A. Antolinez, Robert T. McCall, Curt D. Storlazzi, Ad Reiners, Stuart Pearson
Submarine canyons, slope failures and mass transport processes in southern Cascadia
The marine turbidite record along the southern Cascadia Subduction Zone has been used to interpret paleoseismicity and suggest a shorter recurrence interval for large (>M7) earthquakes along this portion of the margin; however, the sources and pathways of these turbidity flows are poorly constrained. We examine the spatial distribution of sediment storage, downslope transport, and slope failures a
Authors
Jenna C. Hill, Janet Watt, Daniel S. Brothers, Jared W. Kluesner
Active steady-state creep on a nontectonic normal fault in southeast Utah: Implications for strain release in a rapidly deforming salt system
Characterizing short-term temporal variations of fault creep provides insight into the evolution, mechanics, and strength of fault systems. Using spirit leveling and an extensome- ter, we measured surface displacement of a fault southwest of the Needles District, Canyon- lands National Park, Utah, where extension is driven by differential unloading of a subsur- face salt layer due to incision of t
Authors
Katherine Kravitz, Karl Mueller, Roger Bilham, Maureen A. L. Walton
Lessons learned from monitoring of turbidity currents and guidance for future platform designs
Turbidity currents transport globally significant volumes of sediment and organic carbon into the deep-sea and pose a hazard to critical infrastructure. Despite advances in technology, their powerful nature often damages expensive instruments placed in their path. These challenges mean that turbidity currents have only been measured in a few locations worldwide, in relatively shallow water depths
Authors
Michael Clare, D. Gwyn Lintern, Kurt J. Rosenberger, John Hughes Clarke, Charles K. Paull, Roberto Gwiazda, Matthieu J.B. Cartigny, Peter J. Talling, Daniel Perara, Jingping Xu, Daniel Parsons, Ricardo Silva Jacinto, Ronan Apprioual
The role of seismic and slow slip events in triggering the 2018 M7.1 Anchorage earthquake in the Southcentral Alaska subduction zone
The M 7.1 2018 Anchorage earthquake occurred in the bending part of the subducting North Pacific plate near the geometrical barrier formed by the underthrusting Yakutat terrane. We calculate the triggering potential related with stress redistribution from deformation sources including the M 9.2 1964 earthquake coseismic slip, postseismic deformation, slip from regional M > 5 earthquakes, and the
Authors
Margarita Segou, Thomas E. Parsons