Shoreline Defense Force! A Novel Design of Educational Wave Flume to Illustrate the Impact of Shoreline Habitat on Coastal Erosion Processes
Abstract
Experimental hydraulic flumes are important research instruments used to test hydrodynamic and sediment transport processes in research laboratories. However, flumes can also be powerful tools to visualize erosion, which can be effectively leveraged towards environmental education and community engagement. Students from the Ecohydraulics Laboratory at UCF have designed a novel educational flume to engage nonscientific communities in the topic of shoreline erosion. The mobile flume is designed to go almost anywhere, is affordable to build, simple to operate, and flexible to engage diverse audiences (e.g. from very young to adult), yet preserves the rigor of critical scientific processes. The dual-chamber design with erodible bed allows for comparison of different habitat types side-by-side. For instance, observers can watch different erosion rates progress in real time along a hardened slope vs. within a structurally complex, biodiverse shoreline. With this documentation, anyone can learn about how to build and operate their own Shoreline Defense Force educational wave flume!