About Us  | Abstract  | Background | Simple Cases and Results | Complex Case: Sheboygan Harbor | Conclusion | References

Abstract

SMS is a program used for hydrodynamic modeling in up to three dimensions.  It is a useful tool for engineers because it allows them to model complex surface water environments on the computer.   The user of the program can create a "mesh" of their desired area as long as simple survey data is accessible.   Using this mesh, various scenarios can be created and analyzed by the many different interfaces SMS supports.  Some examples of these interfaces are:  RMA2, RMA4, HIVEL2D, SED2D-WES, FESWMS WSPRO, ADCIRC, STWAVE and CGWAV.  In our analysis, we chose to work with the STWAVE interface.

STWAVE is an interface that models near shore wind-wave growth, propagation, and transformation.  It is the industry standard for near shore wave modeling.  It has been said that its output results are accurate to within 5 % of the actual values.  With a basic knowledge of the program, it can be used in conjunction with SMS fairly easily.  We used these two programs to create simple scenarios and compared them to hand calculations.  We then used these programs to analyze a complex scenario- the Sheboygan Harbor in Wisconsin.


Figure 1:  Aerial View of the Sheboygan Harbor.