Miguel Ortega Sánchez, of the Department of Mechanics of Continuous Means and Theory of Structures of the UGR, expounds in his doctoral thesis “Hidrodynamic and sedimentary processes hidrodinámicos y sedimentar in littoral forms of a large scale” a series of data that allow to predict a need for changes in coast constructions. According to researchers, within a period of ten to fifteen years, measures will have to be taken to prevent the sea from reaching the first lots, crammed with greenhouses and beach establishments, and the road.
The features observed in the beach of Carchuna can be extended to other areas of the Andalusian Mediterranean. Among them, its configuration with thick pebbles covered by thinner sediments. At first, this may result in a fixing of the coastline: sea level variations may modify the coastline slowly but firmly. Thus, swell and circulatory systems caused by waves are leading to a backward movement of the characteristic points of this area of the coast, and especially the beach intervals berween them.
All the variables that shape the littoral have been studies in this scientific work, carried out in the installations of the Andalusian Centre of Environment Studies (CEAMA) under the direction of Professor Miguel Ángel Losada: Geomorphology is continuously influenced by the swell, the tide or the environment in general. Both in El Rompido and in Carchuna, in a more exhaustive way, we have attached great importance to observe how the way waves break in the coast modifies its morphology together with other dynamics.
For that reason, it has been especially interesting to have the first coastal monitoring stations installed in Andalusia, specifically in the Lighthouse of Sacratif, in Carchuna. From this exceptional point, three images per camera can be obtained. “It is useful to corroborate the data that we have previously observed according to maps and reports from other works taken with more traditional instruments like ships”, Ortega Sánchez explains. And he adds: “The station collects information and climatic changes are not an objection”.
The Atlantic and the Mediterranean
In Huelva, the point of El Rompido, which meets the mouth of the river Piedras and could end up blocking it, causing serious damage in an area where there are two ports, has been analysed. In fact, currently, a great amount of sediments are being removed from this part of the river every four years to prevent it. In the Andalusian Atlantic, unlike the Mediterranean, the configuration of the beach is of thin sediment, the swell is stronger and the coast tends to reclaim land from the sea.
Apart from Sacratif, it has recently been installed another monitoring station in Trafalgar to compare the obtained data in works with a promising future, as different international scientific journals indicate.
Coast ingineering is a relatively new subject and several groups are working on it in Spain; one of the main representants at a national level is the supervisor of this thesis, Miguel Ángel Losada.
Reference: Miguel Ortega Sánchez.
Phone number: 958 815 999.
E-mail: miguelos@ugr.es
Prof. Miguel Ángel Losada Rodríguez.
Phone number: 958 814 862.
E-mail: mlosada@ugr.es