2023 Volume 79 Issue 17 Article ID: 23-17056
The Tsushima Straits have important port facilities such as the Port of Hakata and population centers of Fukuoka City and Kitakyushu City, and offshore wind power generation facilities are being planned in the Hibiki-Nada Sea facing the straits. Therefore, it is important to understand the characteristics of the sea-level anomalies that occur along the coast of the straits from the viewpoint of coastal disaster prevention and marine infrastructure development. In this study, the characteristics of sea-level anomalies along the coast of the Tsushima Straits were investigated in detail by analyzing observed data and conducting numerical simulations. As a result, it was found that the tidal level anomalies along the coast of the straits are strongly influenced by the Ekman transport by the wind blowing parallel to the straits rather than by the wind blowing into the straits, that the spatial characteristics of the Ekman transport are completely different from those of the wind blowing into the straits, and that the wind direction on which the sea-level anomalies most depends differs depending on inside the bay, outside the bay or angle between wind direction and coastline.
