Author(s): Yakun Wu; Yong Lu; Hao Sun; Heqing Huang

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Keywords: Densimetric Froude number; density flow; gravity flow; specific energy diagram; supercritical

Abstract: The kinetic energy coefficient of the specific energy of subaqueous gravity flows is derived and the specific energy diagram was checked for the first time for dilute saline density flows with constant influx via seven slopes. It is found that on most of the slope these currents do not meet the specific energy diagram criterion for supercritical flow even though their densimetric Froude number is larger than unity, and that these currents are supercritical only in short regions around slope breaks. These findings support the viewpoint that the critical densimetric Froude number of subaqueous density flow is not unity, which was pointed out by recent theoretical analyses, field and lab measurements.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00221686.2019.1573763

Year: 2020