COMPILATION OF LONGSHORE CURRENT DATA 



by 



Cyril J. Galvin, Jr. and Richard A. Nelson 



Research Division 



U. S. Army Coastal Engineering Research Center 



I . I ntroduction 



The principal goal of longshore current studies has been the 

 prediction of longshore current velocity from measurable characteristics 

 of the waves generating these currents. In order to test theoretical pre- 

 dictions of velocity or to calculate empirical predictions of velocity, 

 data are necessary. Some data have been obtained and published in scattered 

 journals. To make this data conveniently available, this article reprints, 

 in standardized form, eight previously published sets of longshore current 

 data, including four sets of field measurements (Putnam, Munk, and Traylor, 

 1949; Inman and Quinn, 1951; Moore and Scholl, 1961; Galvin and Savage, 

 1966)* and four sets of laboratory measurements (Putnam, Munk, and Traylor, 

 1949; Saville, 1950, Brebner and Kamphuis, 1963; Galvin and Eagleson, 1965). 

 These data are presented in tables following the list of references. 



These eight sets of data, obtained under varying conditions using 

 differing experimental procedures, are not equally reliable. The purpose 

 of this paper is to merely list the data in convenient format and to briefly 

 describe how they were obtained as a background to the review and evaluation 

 given by Galvin (1967). Because the available data cannot be easily evalu- 

 ated, a secondary purpose of this paper is to suggest the full publication 

 of experimental procedure and statistics indicating the reliability of the 

 data obtained by future research. 



2. Variables Listed 



The eight sets of data, listed in the table, contain a total of 

 352 observations. A longshore current observation, for' the purpose of this 

 report, is the approximately simultaneous measurement of five variables: a 

 mean longshore current velocity (VMEAS), in feet per second, the direction 

 of the wave at breaking (THETAB) in degrees, the period of the breaking 

 wave (TB) in seconds, the height of the breaking wave (HB) in feet, and 

 the beach slope (SLOPE) d imension less. These variables are defined in 

 Figure I. Other measurements in the table include mean water depth at the 

 breaking point (DB) in feet, given with Putnam, Munk, and Traylor's labora- 

 tory data, the direction of the wave (THETAO) in degrees, and the height of 

 the wave in deep water (HO) in feet, as computed by Saville and Brebner and 

 Kamphuis for their laboratory data, and the horizontal distance from the 

 breaking position to the Stillwater line on the beach (BVAL) in feet, 



* Parenthetical notations refer to LITERATURE C1TED on page 8. 



