Exam 20: Shorelines

What system of measurement is used to categorize the strength of a hurricane?

Which beach stabilization technique requires dumping many truckloads of sand on a beach to build it up?

________ form when waves that approach the beach at an angle and produce a net current direction that is parallel to the shore, resulting in beach drift.

Which of the following coastal features is not a characteristic of a submergent coastline?

Beaches are locations along the shoreline where excess sediment has accumulated on shore.

Which of the following deposition/erosion scenarios will develop when a groin is constructed on the beach?

________ is the turbulent water created by breaking waves.

What is the wave base?

As the quantity of energy transferred to the wave increases, what will happen to the height and the steepness of the wave?

The shoreline represents an interface between the land, sea, and air.

Circular orbital motion in waves will occur in ________ water.

Which central part of a hurricane is characterized by a calm zone where precipitation and winds cease?

This image contains a spit, which is identified by an arrow.(The arrow is only for identification purposes.)Using the shape of the spit, from which direction is the longshore current coming? Assume for our purposes that the top of the figure is north.

What is a berm?

A ________ is a hard shoreline stabilization feature, detached from the shoreline, that protects shorelines from the pounding of waves by creating an area of quiet water behind it.

How has sea level changed over the last few thousand years?

________ is a strong current formed by backwash concentrated into small channels and flows rapidly away from the beach.

What coastal erosion feature is visible in this image?

How would coastline composition (rocky versus sandy)differ from the coastline of the Pacific Northwest and that of the Carolinas?

Barrier islands are more common along the Atlantic Coast than the Pacific Coast.