Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028

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Ocean Engineering
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/oceaneng

Tsunami intrusion through port breakwaters enclosed with

self-elevating seawalls
Hiroshi Takagi a, *, Ryoichi Tomiyasu b, Tomoyuki Oyake c, Taketo Araki b, Kyosuke Mori b,
Yasuhiro Matsubara b, Yohei Ninomiya c, Yoshifumi Takata a
a
School of Environment and Society, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Tokyo, Japan
b
Kyodo Engineering Corporation Ltd., Fukuoka, Japan
c
Oriental Shiraishi Corporation Ltd., Tokyo, Japan

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: An innovative self-elevating seawall is attracting attention as an effective countermeasure to protect ports and
Self-elevating seawall their hinterland from tsunamis. However, seawater may intrude into the port basin through a narrow gap be­
Tsunami intrusion tween its gate units, resulting in a significant water level change when a tsunami strikes. Herein, a 2D–3D hybrid
Gate gap
hydrodynamic model is used to investigate water inflow through the gap in a self-elevating seawall, induced by a
Practical formula
tsunami that approaches a port. A practical hydraulic head-to-discharge formula is then derived. This formula is
Case study
Breakwater rubble mound validated by a case analysis that numerically simulates the intrusion with a hypothetical time series of water
Level 1 tsunami levels originating from a tsunami and astronomical tide. A self-elevating seawall acts as an effective low-pass
Tide filter system, though it may not completely prevent inflow. A case study for assessing a medium sized fishery
Storm surge port also demonstrates that tsunami-induced impact can be significantly reduced by sheltering with the self-
Gate-opening-induced tsunami elevating seawall system. However, a longer wave component, such as astronomical tide, will inevitably
intrude into the port through the gate gap as well as the void of breakwater’s rubble mound as seepage flow. The
risk of a secondary tsunami, gate-opening-induced tsunami, is also addressed for appropriate gate operations after a
tsunami has receded. The proposed model can calculate rise/fall in water level over a port basin enclosed by the
self-elevating seawall and port breakwaters using a simple spreadsheet without expensive computational fluid
dynamics.

1. Introduction destroyed during the tsunami in 2011, allowing significant tsunami

The Great East Japan Earthquake and resulting tsunami that
occurred in 2011 revealed weaknesses in the flood-prevention structures
that are currently in place. Tsunami breakwaters have been constructed
in several bay mouths in northern Japan over the last few decades. These
breakwaters were exclusively designed to protect bays, ports, and
nearby communities from tsunamis. When designing these structures,
seismic and high-wave forces, as well as tsunami forces, must be
considered, resulting in breakwaters with massive dimensions and
expensive costs. For example, the Ofunato bay-mouth breakwater, the
oldest tsunami breakwater in Japan, was constructed immediately after
the Chilean tsunami in 1960. However, this breakwater was almost
completely destroyed by the tsunami in 2011. The Kamaishi tsunami
breakwater was the largest in the world and was built in a maximum
water depth of 63 m (Raby et al., 2015). However, this was also largely
intrusion into Kamaishi city. The hydrodynamic scour due to the over­
topping jet plunging down the landward side of the caisson and the
punching failure of the rubble mound foundation were considered two
fundamental causes of breakwater failure (Arikawa et al., 2012; Bricker
et al., 2013; Esteban et al., 2017). Immediately after the disaster, a
governmental research institute publicly estimated that the tsunami
height was probably reduced from 13.7 to 8.0 m, and that the tsunami
breakwater allowed residents an extra 6 min to evacuate. However, this
estimation may not be completely reliable as it neglected the influence
of several breakwater sections that were toppled during the tsunami
(Cyranoski, 2012). Therefore, much more research is needed to validate
this (Shibayama et al., 2013). In addition to uncertainties related to the
effectiveness and durability of the structure, the enormous construction
cost (e.g., 124 billion JPY (¼ approx. 1.1 billion $)) of the Kamaishi
tsunami breakwater will make it difficult to disseminate such

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: takagi@ide.titech.ac.jp (H. Takagi).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oceaneng.2020.107028
Received 9 September 2019; Received in revised form 28 January 2020; Accepted 28 January 2020
Available online 9 February 2020
0029-8018/© 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
H. Takagi et al.
technologies across the country and the world.
On the other hand, general breakwaters are attracting attention as
effective countermeasures to protect ports and their hinterland from
tsunamis as these appeared to reduce fatality ratios in most coastal areas
during the 2011 tsunami (Latcharote et al., 2016). Extensive investiga­
tion of the 1983 Japan Sea Tsunami also indicated that upright re­
vetments and breakwaters in many ports probably reduced tsunami
run-up heights (Tanimoto et al., 1983). However, the effectiveness of
general breakwaters, which were designed to reflect wind waves, in
reducing tsunami impact should not be overestimated (Takagi and
Bricker, 2014; Takagi, 2015). When comparing the region protected by
breakwaters with an unsheltered area in Ishinomaki, a tsunami simu­
lation model showed no noticeable differences in inundation due to the
2011 tsunami, because the tsunami intrudes through the port’s wide
openings (a few hundred meters) and rapidly fills the basin with
seawater. However, a hypothetical simulation revealed that water levels
could be greatly reduced if the port were fully enclosed by a
self-elevating seawall before a tsunami struck (Takagi and Bricker,
2014).
Storm-surge barriers have been studied, developed, and constructed
over the last few decades in several countries, such as the United States,
UK, Netherlands, Italy, France, and Japan (PIANC, 2006). Dircke et al.
(2012) present a systematic overview, comparison, and selection of six
navigable storm surge barriers: miter gate, vertical lifting gate, flap gate,
horizontal rotating gate, vertical rotating gate, and inflatable rubber
dam. The flap gate appears to be one of the most common self-elevating
structures. This consists of a straight or curved retaining surface, which
is pivoted on a fixed axis at the sill (Erbisti, 2004). Among several others,
the gates being constructed in the MOSE project (https://www.moseve
nezia.eu/), which aim to protect the city of Venice, may be the most
famous structure of this type in the world (Fig. 1 (a)). Iwate Prefecture
was the most damaged by the tsunamis in 2011 as these had heights
exceeding 20 m (Mori et al., 2012). With much support from the local
inhabitants, a port flap gate has been approved and its construction has
started at a fishing port in Ofunato Bay in Iwate (Fig. 1 (b)). Although
this has not been well recognized internationally, it will become the first
fully operational flap gate against tsunamis in the world. The gate,
Fig. 1. Coastal flood gates (Photos were all taken by the authors).
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Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028
which consists of four separate walls, is 32 m wide and 12 m high and is
placed at a water depth of 4.5 m. The estimated construction cost may
reach 2.5 billion JPY (22 million $). More recently, the Macau SAR
Government announced a plan for protecting the Inner Harbor Area­
—one of the areas most impacted—from storm surge. This plan involves
a 650-m long huge movable floodgate system at the mouth of the Wan
Chai waterway (Moura, 2018; Takagi et al., 2019a).
Although technologies are still being investigated, many researchers
have studied other types of self-elevating tsunami gates over the last
decade. For example, Kimura et al. (2010) proposed the flap-gate
breakwater, which normally lies down on the seabed and rises as a sea
wall driven by buoyancy when a tsunami strikes. This type of structure
appears similar to the gate of the MOSE project but employs a different
supporting method. Nakashima et al. (2011) investigated the perfor­
mance of a vertical telescopic breakwater, which consists of movable
upper and fixed lower steel pipes. Hofland et al. (2015) proposed a novel
tsunami barrier consisting of a membrane, floater, and cables, which are
normally stored underground and are automatically floated by buoy­
ancy. A Japanese Research Group for Self-elevating Seawall (RGSS)
(2016) proposed a new type of structure, which is stored under a
pneumatic caisson system and is elevated when a tsunami strikes
(Fig. 2). The pneumatic caisson method is utilized in this technology,
which allows the construction of an underground structure and simul­
taneous excavation of the soil, based on compressed-air geotechnical
engineering (Abe et al., 2017).
A common floodgate, such as that shown in Fig. 1(c), must be sup­
ported by massive columns to resist tsunami as well as seismic forces,
resulting in massive dimensions and costs. On the other hand, the self-
elevating seawall, which is normally stored under the sea, has many
advantages over traditional floodgates. Particularly, it is highly benefi­
cial that ships can enter the port without height restrictions under
normal operation. Also, these structures will not mar the scenery, unlike
vertical lifting gates supported by huge columns and beams or an
extension of the existing breakwater.
As shown in Fig. 3, a 2-m tsunami can be perfectly hold back by
implementing the self-elevating seawall if it can completely enclose the
opening of a medium sized fishery port (RGSS, 2016). However, there
H. Takagi et al. Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028

Fig. 2. Schematic drawings of a self-elevating seawall with a pneumatic caisson. The steel shell wall is stored inside the caisson under normal sea conditions. When
tsunamis or storm surges strike, the wall is elevated to close the port by remotely operating a wire rope and pulley system operating the inner wall (Adapted from
RGSS, 2016).

Fig. 3. Effectiveness of the self-elevating seawall against a 2-m tsunami, which is expected to arrive after an hour of a scenario earthquake. However, this simulation
was performed under an ideal condition without considering the gate gaps (Adapted from RGSS, 2016).

appear to be weaknesses in the self-elevating seawall structure. Most
importantly, a narrow gap between gate units would allow intrusion of
seawater into the port basin, which would probably cause significant
water level changes when a tsunami struck. While being sufficiently
small, a gap must exist between adjacent gate units because of me­
chanical systems that ensure smooth elevation of the gates even after a
major earthquake (Fig. 2).
The gate shown in Fig. 1(c), classified as a vertical lifting gate, will
not allow seawater intrusion when closed as the edges of the gate can be
almost perfectly sealed with the concrete columns. On the other hand,
self-elevating seawalls, such as those proposed by RGSS (2016) and Fujii
et al. (2018) (Figs. 2 and 4), flap gates in Venice (Fig. 1(a)), and the
rotating gate in the Netherlands (Fig. 1 (d)) inevitably have slight gate
gaps of at least a few tens of centimeters. Nakashima et al. (2011) sug­
gested that the gap width in the floating breakwater system should be
less than 3% of the total stretch of the port breakwater. However, no
technical procedure for estimating the tsunami inflow was presented.
Flow through such a constriction is usually complicated that the
resulting flow pattern is not readily subject to any analytical solution
(Chow, 1959).
The mechanism of tsunami intrusion through the gaps cannot be
easily evaluated using a commonly-used tsunami numerical model
because the gap is too narrow to be captured in the simulation. A
tsunami simulation protocol with a shallow-water wave model suggests
that the grid size should be reduced at a ratio of one third (UNESCO,
1997). For example, if the smallest grid is connected to an 810 m grid,
which is a typical grid size over a large computational domain covering
an ocean basin containing a seismic rupture area, the nesting procedure
must be repeated up to 10 times to obtain a 1 cm grid that is sufficient to
capture the narrow gap between individual gates. While theoretically
possible, such multiple connections appear to be computationally too
expensive.
A tsunami may also intrude through the void of rubble mound
beneath an existing breakwater (Fig. 5). A hybrid structure known as
caisson-type breakwater is composed of caisson concrete and rubble
mound (Tanimoto and Goda, 1991). The caisson structure is

3
H. Takagi et al.
Fig. 4. Construction procedure of a self-elevating seawall proposed by Fujii et al. (2018).
Fig. 5. Schematic diagram of the seepage flow induced by a seawater intruding through the rubble mound.
impermeable, whereas the rubble mound inevitably undergoes seepage
flow when difference in water level appears before and after the
breakwater. The rubble mound is submerged under the sea and gener­
ally as thin as 20–40% of the height of the caisson (Takagi and Esteban,
2013). A tsunami inflow due to the overtopping of a breakwater has
been extensively investigated over the last decade (Esteban et al., 2015).
However, the seepage flow during the rising phase of a tsunami appears
to be invisible, and thus this phenomenon tends to be overlooked. The
assessment of tsunami intrusion through the rubble mound is particu­
larly important when a vertical lifting gate is installed in the port
opening surrounded by long-stretched breakwaters. Even if the lifting
gate perfectly prevents from a tsunami entering, seawater through the
mound could raise the water level inside the port and might damage
ships, facilities, and buildings.
In light of the seepage flow, Takata and Takagi (2019) recently
proposed the following practical formula to estimate the inflow
discharge rate through a breakwater mound by conducting a hydraulic
experiment and numerical analysis using OpenFOAM. Their formula
considered the nonstationary flow (Forchheimer flow) in porous me­
dium using the formula of Ergun (1952), which incorporates size of
medium and porosity of the layer (usually about 40% for rubble mound).
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
v ¼ β 2gΔh (1)
where v is the mean velocity within rubble mound, β is an experimental
coefficient, and g is the gravitational acceleration. Δh is the hydraulic
4
Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028
head difference between the sea side and the port side of the breakwater.
The value of β is recommended to use 0.0354 to best estimate the rate of
seepage flow through the rubble mound composed of stones with the
mean diameter of 50 cm.
Rapid varied flows through the contractions in hydraulic structures
have been extensively studied by hydraulic engineers. For example, the
discharge coefficients for a vertical embankment with an opening can be
readily derived from the diagrams provided by Chow (1959). As these
studies mostly considered steady flow in an open channel, the continuity
equation is valid between the upstream and downstream boundaries,
thereby simplifying the required calculations. However, to the best of
the authors’ knowledge, no reliable and practical methods have been
proposed for estimating the intrusion of seawater, caused by tsunamis or
other types of long waves (e.g., storm surges, seiches), through gaps in
seawalls. Unlike in a river stream, the downstream discharge is not an a
priori condition when a tsunami approaches, representing an unsteady
flow. Therefore, the conventional diagrams for open-channel flows may
not be applied when assessing the intrusion of seawater through the gate
gaps due to a tsunami.
On the other hand, wind waves passing through cylinders have been
extensively studied by coastal engineers aiming to investigate the per­
formance of special types of breakwaters, such as wave screens and slit-
type breakwaters (e.g., Kakuno and Liu, 1993; Mei et al., 2005). The
most advanced solutions of these systems are based on potential flow
methods, in which the velocity potentials are solved for both the linear
incident and reflected waves by applying both far-field boundary
H. Takagi et al.
Fig. 6. A total of eight tsunami scenarios, with four different heights (1, 2, 3, and 4 m) and two temporal patterns (flat and Gaussian).
conditions and matching conditions at the wall boundary. Theoretical
and experimental studies have both demonstrated that wave trans­
mission decreases as the wave steepness increases and the porosity de­
creases (Kriebel, 1992). The solutions derived by those potential
approaches will satisfy the equation K2r þ K2t ¼ 1, where Kr and Kt are
the reflection and transmission coefficients, respectively. This implies
that the solution lacks information pertaining to the time lag between
the reflected and transmitted waves. As wind waves are repetitive and
short-period processes, this lag may not be very important. However,
tsunamis cause water-level rises/falls over a much longer duration.
Hence, the time lag of the water level between the two sides of a gate is
more significant. For example, a shorter time lags indicates a prompt
response of the water level inside of the port in response to the rise of the
water level due to tsunamis outside of the port, and consequently the
seawater will quickly rise in the port. However, this in turn reduces the
gradient of the sea surface between the outer sea and the port basin,
resulting in a reduction of the inflow discharge. This expected feedback
mechanism between water levels inside and outside of the port cannot
be readily accounted for by the potential theory used for wind waves.
Given the lack of practical methods, the present paper attempts to
derive a method for calculating the inflow discharge caused by a
tsunami whereby engineers can quickly estimate the water levels in an
enclosed port. One of the greatest motivations of this study is to provide
a methodology that can be performed using a spreadsheet and involves
no expensive numerical modeling processes. By simply using the derived
formula in a spreadsheet, a case study is then conducted to examine
whether or not a self-elevating wall is effective even under unfavorable
conditions considering inflows through the gate gap and the rubble
mound of a breakwater.
2. Methodology
This section describes tsunami waveforms assumed in this study,
followed by explanation on numerical models for the estimation of
tsunami intrusions through the gap of a gate. As a result, a hydraulic
head-to-discharge formula is derived to provide an assessment tool for
tsunami intrusion.
2.1. Model tsunamis
Since the Great East Japan earthquake and tsunami in 2011, the idea
that hard measures can completely protect the lives of inhabitants has
been abandoned (Shibayama et al., 2013). In order to classify according
to the frequency/magnitude of tsunami, two levels were introduced by
the Central Disaster Management Council of the Cabinet Office of Japan
5
Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028
(2011):
–Level 1 Tsunamis: These are events with a return period of several
decades to 150 years. They generate low to medium inundation depths,
typically less than several meters. Both human lives and properties
should be essentially saved by hard countermeasures.
–Level 2 Tsunamis: These are much rarer events, typically taking
place at intervals of a few hundred to a few thousand years. The tsunami
inundation depths would be much larger, typically over 10 m, but would
encompass inundations reaching 20–30 m. As hard countermeasures
cannot work against this level of tsunami, soft countermeasures need to
be implemented to save people.
Extremely high tsunami waves, such as those categorized as a Level 2
tsunami, may break offshore and propagate in shallow coastal areas in
the form of a violent hydraulic bore, which consists of hydrostatic, hy­
drodynamic, and surge forces (Nistor et al., 2009). In particular, the
surge force, which is generated by the impingement of the advancing
water front of a tsunami bore on a structure, causes huge forces.
Although accurately estimating the impact force remains a challenging
task, the City and County of Honolulu Building Code (CCH) has rec­
ommended the following formula to estimate this force based on a report
by Dames and Moore (1980):
Fs ¼ 4:5ρgh2 (2)
where Fs is the surge force per unit width of the wall and h is the surge
height. This force is equivalent to 9 times the hydrostatic force. Typical
coastal structures, buildings, and self-elevating seawalls may not with­
stand such enormous forces.
Given these emerging consensuses among Japanese engineers, the
present study considers only moderately high tsunami waves, such as
those categorized as a Level 1 tsunami. Against this level of tsunami,
protection measures must protect human lives and properties and
effectively facilitate the evacuation of local inhabitants to safer places
(Esteban et al., 2017). In this study, it was hypothesized that the
self-elevating seawall would not be breached by Level 1 tsunamis,
though water levels would rise in front of the gate. The range of tsunami
heights was set at 1–4 m because an ordinary flood protection system
can protect against this level of tsunami. On the other hand, a tsunami
exceeding this range may overtop the existing port breakwater even if
the port opening is closed by a gate, nullifying the entire system.
The present study assumes that the long waves of a tsunami are
represented by the flat pattern of water elevations shown. The Gaussian-
type tsunami pattern was also examined to investigate whether flow
characteristics are influenced by a rapid increase in water surface
elevation in front of the gate. A time series of water levels could be
H. Takagi et al. Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028

Fig. 7. Water levels observed at the three locations (Sendai, Mera, and Chiba) on March 11, 2011, when the Great East Japan Earthquake occurred. Sendai and Mera
both face the Pacific Ocean, while Chiba is located in the inner-most part of Tokyo Bay (data obtained from the NOWPHAS wave observation station at the Sendai
Port and the JMA tidal stations at Mera and Chiba).

represented by the following Gaussian distribution, which can repro­
duce a rapid rise and subsequent fall in water level of η.
� �
η ¼ ​ η0 exp ðt rÞ2 r (3)
where η0 denotes the tsunami height, t is time (minutes), and r is the rise
time, which is the time taken to reach the peak water level. A total of
eight water levels were examined in this study (Fig. 6).
The numerical offshore boundary condition will depend on how
quickly the seawater rises as a tsunami approaches. If the tsunami
strongly impacts the gate as an impulsive tsunami, a solitary wave or
dam-break-type wave boundary may be used. However, it is currently
generally acknowledged that incident tsunamis approaching coasts
behave either as leading depression waves or leading elevation waves,
rather than as steep solitary waves (Madsen et al., 2008). Although
tsunami wave forms may appear to be solitary waves, the actual wave
periods are generally much longer than those derived using the KdV
equation (typically shorter than 1 min).
For example, Fig. 7 shows the water levels observed at three tide
stations before and after the occurrence of the tsunami generated by the
Great East Japan Earthquake. Sendai Port is located close to the
epicenter, while Mera and Chiba are both relatively distant from the
epicenter. Mera faces the Pacific Ocean, while Chiba is inside of Tokyo
Bay. The identifiable major signals of the tsunami in these figures are not
very short, but it appears that each wave continued for at least 20 min. It
is also interesting to note that higher-frequency waves disappeared in

6
H. Takagi et al.
the inner bay at Chiba, wherein a wave period of approximately 60 min
became predominant. This is likely because of the shallow bathymetry
that smoothed the waves propagating into the bay.
Using satellite data, which was obtained during the 2004 Indian
Ocean Tsunami, Gower (2005) estimated a wavelength at 430 km with a
wave period of 37 min as the tsunami traveled over the deep ocean.
Given these observations, the long waves shown in Fig. 6, which possess
periods of 6 min, may be used to represent Level 1 tsunamis at a port site.
2.2. Model for tsunami intrusion via gate gaps
The authors used Delft3D-FLOW (Deltares, 2011), constructed on the
supercomputer TOKYO-TECH TSUBAME (Ver2.5; 17.1 PFLOPS of single
precision performance), to simulate the flow through the narrow gap of
a self-elevating seawall. The Delft3D-FLOW solves the unsteady
shallow-water equations in two or three dimensions. The system of
equations consists of the horizontal momentum equations, the conti­
nuity equation, the transport equation, and a turbulence model. The
vertical momentum equation is reduced to the hydrostatic pressure
relationship because the vertical accelerations are assumed to be small
compared to the gravitational acceleration. This feature makes the
model particularly suitable for simulating flows that occur in shallow
seas, coastal areas, and estuaries (Lesser et al., 2004; Deltares, 2011;
Sasaki et al., 2012).
This hydrodynamic model was the most commonly used open-source
software in the world and selected from other equivalent models for two
main reasons.
Firstly, it appears that a very small computational grid spacing, and
time step must be adopted to simulate a tsunami passing through such
narrow gate gaps, which connect with both the sea and port basin. If the
simulation is performed using an explicit scheme, such as Euler’s
method, a preliminary study revealed that a time step of an order of
0.001 s would be required to stably simulate tsunami propagation, as a
longer time step would cause numerical instability. This would not be
economical. On the other hand, the Delft model adopts the ADI (Alter­
nating Direction Implicit) method for time integration, which splits one-
time step into two stages. Since water velocities and water levels can be
implicitly solved along grid lines by this method, the Courant number
does not need to be below unity. In practical situations, the Courant
number could be relaxed to a value of 10 (Deltares, 2011), contributing
to a realistic computation. Secondly, the model adopts domain decom­
position (DD), which divides the computational domain into several
smaller domains. Communication between the domains occurs along
internal boundaries, so-called DD-boundaries, when using a parallel
computing technique. It should be noted that using a fully unstructured
grid would allow as much or even more flexibility than using the DD
method. However, connecting an unstructured grid with a spacing of
several meters to those with spacings of a few centimeters by a short
distance appears to be complex, and the resultant model may be both
inaccurate and inefficient.
Three computational domains, (1) outside the port, (2) the tsunami
gate, and (3) inside the port, are sequentially connected as shown in
Fig. 8 with the DD boundary. The middle domain was constructed with
the finest grids to reproduce the narrow gap width, assuming a range
from 10 to 30 cm. It is noted that a 3D grid vertically dividing 20 layers
was applied to the middle domain to determine whether vertical flows
are significant in addition to horizontal flows. The k-ε model was
adopted for simulating turbulence, while the bottom friction was eval­
uated with a Manning’s n value of 0.025, which is a typical value for
seabed (Bricker et al., 2015). The other two domains used a 2D hori­
zontal grid; thus, the code is equivalent to a shallow-water wave model
(Takagi et al., 2016). The grid size in the 2D–3D hybrid model varies in
the flow direction from a maximum of 50 m inside and outside the port
to a minimum of 4 cm within the narrow gap. The total area of the port
basin considered in this model is about 75,000 m2 (7.5 ha), which is
typical of medium-sized fishing ports in Japan. The computational time
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Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028
step was set as 0.03 s, which appears to be sufficiently small to stably
perform the computation, including the gate gap with the ADI method.
Incident water levels, as shown in Fig. 6, are imposed from the
offshore boundary of domain #1 with no incident angle. On the other
hand, an impermeable and indefinite high wall is assigned as the land­
ward boundary in domain #3 to inhibit overflow of the port’s apron. The
width of the tsunami gate was assumed to be 2 m by referencing to a
standard dimension of the self-elevating seawall proposed by RGSS
(2016).
2.3. Water levels and flow velocities inside and outside the gap
The profiles of simulated water levels along the cross section of the
gate gap clearly demonstrate that water surface elevation substantially
dropped behind the gate (Fig. 9). A total of eight incident wave patterns,
as shown in Fig. 6, were generated in front of the gate. For the flat water-
level pattern, the profiles are those output 3 min after the start of the
simulation, which coincides with the peak time of the Gaussian scenario.
All the water levels are normalized by dividing by the incident heights
(1, 2, 3, or 4 m) measured at 5 m in front of the dyke (shown as “FRONT”
in Fig. 8) to show the transmission ratio (Tr) during the passage of waves
through the gate gap.
The water level starts to drop immediately in front of the gate, and
the Tr decreases by about 40% for all the scenarios. The water level
further drops within the gate gap, but the extent of the drop is highly
dependent on the initial tsunami height. All the lines re-converge behind
the gate and drop rapidly to almost zero. The profiles of flat and
Gaussian patterns are not remarkably different.
The Tr decreases with increasing incident height inside the gate gap.
The larger the tsunami height, the faster the flow velocity, as shown in
Fig. 10. For example, the calculated velocity is about 1.5 m/s for a height
of 1 m, while it increases to 6 m/s for a height of 4 m. The velocity shown
in Fig. 10 is the depth-averaged velocity, which is calculated by dividing
the flow discharge through the gap by the water depth at a given time
and location. It was useful that the Delft3D-FLOW model contains a
module for estimating the depth-averaged velocity. Although the ve­
locity is relatively small before and after the gate, it increases consid­
erably when water passes through the gate gap.
Although the water level drops in a staircase pattern, there is no
strong undulation and turbulence for a gate gap of 30 cm. This is also
confirmed by Fig. 11, which shows the Froude Number (Fr) in addition
to the Tr. Fr increases as the gap width decreases. Fr exceeds unity when
the gate width is 10 cm and 15 cm, demonstrating that a hydraulic jump
occurs near the gate exit where water intrudes into the port basin. Ac­
cording to Chow (1959), Fr values between 1.7 and 2.5 and between 1
and 1.7 are classified as weak jumps and undular jumps, respectively. In
these states, the velocity is fairly uniform, and energy loss is low.
Although a series of small rollers develop on the surface of the jump, the
downstream water surface is expected to remain fairly smooth. On the
other hand, Fr is below unity for gap widths of 20 and 30 cm; therefore,
no remarkable jumps occur. One may consider making the gap as narrow
as possible to prevent water inflow. However, the gap width then
significantly influences the flow regime, implying a trade-off whereby a
narrower gap may reduce the stability of hydrodynamic conditions in­
side and behind the gate.
2.4. Hydraulic head-to-discharge formula
In this study, the middle point of the gate, indicated as “MID” in
Fig. 8, was selected for estimating the inflow discharge. This is because
the flow is relatively stable at this point, even in those cases with a
hydraulic jump, as demonstrated by Figs. 9, 10, and 11, enabling precise
measurement of the water discharge. Interestingly, Figs. 9 and 10
demonstrate that the influence of the tsunami rise time on the inflow
discharge is unremarkable, and both the velocity and water elevation
are similar for flat and Gaussian patterns. Nevertheless, Fig. 10 shows
H. Takagi et al. Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028

Fig. 8. Model for tsunami intrusion through gate

gaps. The entire computational domain is
composed of three sub-domains (#1: offshore
domain; #2: middle domain; #3: landward
domain). The self-elevating gate and its gap are
modelled within domain #2. The gap widths are
assumed to be W ¼ 10, 15, 20, and 30 cm, while
the cross section is kept constant at 2 m. The points
denoted as FRONT, IN, MID, and OUT indicate the
locations at which the computational results, such
as the water level and velocity, are output.

Fig. 9. Tsunami transmission through the gate gap, reproduced by inputting

eight tsunami scenarios. The gray rectangle indicates the horizontal width of
the gate. The water rises in front of the gate, as shown on the left-hand side. The
transmission ratio is defined by the water level η at a given location along the
cross-shore line divided by the incident water level η 5m at 5 m in front of
the gate.
that the velocity in the Gaussian case is about 6% smaller than in the flat
one for ηinput values of 2 and 3 m. However, for the safety of the design as
well as its practical simplicity, the flat pattern is used to investigate
water inflow via the gap in a self-elevating seawall from here onwards.
The flow discharge via the gap in a gate was calculated using the
following formula, which is like Torricelli’s theorem:
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
Q ¼ γC 2gðΔh hl Þ ​ w ​ h � γC 2gΔh ​ w ​ h
where Q is the flow discharge; C is the discharge coefficient (<1); g is the
gravitational acceleration; Δh and hf are the hydraulic head between the
sea side and port side of the gate and the friction loss within the gate gap,
respectively; w is the gap width; and h is the water depth in the gate gap.
γ is a correction factor, as will be explained later in this paper. The
friction loss, hl , can be calculated using the Darcy-Welsbach formula,
and this value should be small when the gate width is narrow (in this
Fig. 10. Depth-averaged flow velocities through the gate gap, reproduced by
inputting eight tsunami scenarios.
case study, the gate width is as narrow as 2 m). Given that the quanti­
fication of the energy loss is highly uncertain, this factor that reduces the
calculated inflow discharge should be neglected during design to ensure
that a safe design is achieved. The discharge coefficient C, which rep­
resents the total head loss, can be estimated by rearranging Equation (4),
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
i.e., C ¼ Q= 2gΔh ​ w ​ h, using the numerical result for Q, which is
presented in the previous section. The discharge coefficient represents
the balance between the momentum of a tsunami and energy loss that
leads to a reduction in discharge through friction, contraction, expan­
sion, and eddy. The larger the coefficient, the more predominant the
(4) momentum, which facilitates water flow via the gap. The regression
between the discharge coefficient and hydraulic head was derived for w
¼ 10, 15, 20, and 30 cm, as follows:
w ¼ 10 cm:
Δh � 2 : ​ C ¼ 0:24 ​ Δh þ 0:45 (5)
Δh > 2 : C ¼ 0:93 (6)
w ¼ 15 cm:

8
H. Takagi et al.
Fig. 11. Transmission ratios, Tr (left vertical axis) and Froude numbers, Fr
(right axis) for three different gap widths, W ¼ 10, 15, 20, and 30 cm. A con­
stant water level of η ¼ 4 m is imposed.
C¼ 0:04Δh2 þ 0:34Δh þ 0:18 ð � 0:93Þ
w ¼ 20 cm:
C ¼ 0:15 ​ Δh þ 0:29 ð � 0:93Þ
w ¼ 30 cm:
C ¼ 0:15 ​ Δh þ 0:25 ð � 0:93Þ
Fig. 12 demonstrates some general characteristics of these relation­
ships. For example, the discharge coefficient increases with the hy­
draulic head, implying that seawater flows more easily into the port
basin with relatively less momentum reduction as the tsunami height
increases. The discharge coefficient for a 10 cm gap is composed of two
regression lines, while the coefficients with the other gap widths are
drawn in a simple linear manner. This is because a hydraulic jump ap­
pears for a width of 10 cm, and it begins when the hydraulic head ex­
ceeds 2 m. If the flow becomes supercritical (Fr > 1), the fluid motion is
determined by the water levels in the downstream part of the port, and
subsequently the flat regression line is derived. Interestingly, the
regression line for a 15-cm gap can be expressed with a polynomial
curve, exhibiting a transition between the linear regression groups.
Equation (4) is based on Torricelli’s theorem. However, the
Fig. 12. Hydraulic head-to-discharge formula, which varies with the gate-gap
width, derived for widths of 10, 15, 20, and 30 cm.
Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028
discharge coefficients with Equations (5)-(9) were purely derived from
the numerical analysis. Therefore, the correction factor, γ, aims to
modify the formula by incorporating some of the other energy dissi­
pating mechanisms that cannot be fully reproduced by the present hy­
drodynamic model. For example, the Delft3D FLOW model can
reproduce moderate turbulence using the k-ε model. However, this
model cannot simulate highly turbulent flow, such as breaking waves
and dam-break waves, because the hydrostatic pressure assumption may
limit the representation of fluid dynamics within/around the gate gap.
Nevertheless, as explained earlier, impulsive tsunami impacts are not
considered in the present analysis because the self-elevating seawall is
expected to be designed considering the gradual rise/fall in water levels.
In such an environment, the hydrostatic assumption may be reasonable
as the forces resulting from the tsunami should predominantly act in the
horizontal direction.
The correction factor, γ, may be modified via experiment using a
water flow or wave flume. However, the physical hydraulic test cannot
also be readily carried out because the gate gap (10–30 cm in this study)
must be the same between the test-scale model and the actual-scale gate
(i.e. the components in the experiment cannot be scaled down using the
Froude similitude). This condition cannot be reproduced within a
normally-sized flume, which typically possesses a length of 10–20 m and
(7)
a width of 1 m or less. Even if a large flume is available, a very large
pump with a high discharge capacity (over 1 m3/s) is required to
maintain the water level difference in front of/behind the gate. Obvi­
(8)
ously, this is not a readily available option. In addition, the pump will
also generate unnecessary and strong turbulence. The authors wish to
carry out large-sized flume tests to validate the calculated discharge
(9)
coefficients in the near future, but it is recommended that the correction
factor, γ, is simply assumed to be unity for now.
3. Results
This section describes the reliability of the proposed formula by
comparing it with the numerical model. A spectrum analysis is also
performed to investigate if any difference in performance of the self-
elevating seawall occurs as wave period changes. Finally, a case study
is conducted to examine the performance of the self-elevating seawall
under a realistic condition. Some of extra considerations are also
addressed for achieving appropriate gate operations.
3.1. Simplified formula vs numerical model
Water discharge through a gate gap can be easily calculated by
applying the discharge coefficients to the formula of Equation (4). It is
straightforward to investigate changes in water surface variation inside
the port over time by assuming parameters such as the number of gate
gaps, gap width, depth, tsunami scenario, and area of the port basin.
This level of calculation can be achieved even using an ordinary
spreadsheet.
The proposed model was examined based on its ability to a reason­
able prediction equivalent to the numerical simulation. The water level
in the port basin was output using Delft3D to compare the proposed
method with the numerical simulation. Although the same domain as
that shown in Fig. 8 was used for the simulation, a total of five gaps, each
with a 30 cm width, were allocated at intervals of 15 m. Thus, the sum of
the gate gaps accounts for 0.7% (¼1.5/215 m) of the total extent of the
self-elevating seawall. For this trial, a hypothetical test tsunami up to
2.5 m was generated by combining a 2 m high tsunami (r in Equation (3)
was set as 60 min) and a semi-diurnal tidal oscillation with a 1 m
amplitude, as shown in Fig. 13. The output point for the numerical result
was placed at the center of a port basin with an area of 350 � 215 m.
After 60 min, the tsunami reached its highest peak with a resultant water
level reaching 2.5 m. Water-level variations inside the port showed
excellent agreement with each other, validating the proposed formula.
In both results, the sharp tsunami signal almost disappeared inside the
9
H. Takagi et al. Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028

Fig. 13. Comparison between numerical and simplified models of a tsunami

intrusion. The Delft3D model is used for the numerical simulation, while the
Fig. 14. A white noise tsunami generated by combining 60 different periodic
simplified discharge model is formulated on an Excel spreadsheet.
waves with equal amplitudes of 20 cm. The signal response inside the port was
calculated using the spreadsheet.
port, clearly showing the effectiveness of the self-elevating seawall. On
the other hand, the semi-diurnal tide penetrated the port shows only
slight attenuation. As discussed further in the following section, this
implies that the performance of the gate depends on wave frequency, as
it tends to admit longer-period waves.

3.2. Frequency analysis

To further determine to what extent wave transmission through a

self-elevating seawall depends on its frequency, a random tsunami was
used as a test case, generated by composing multiple component waves.
The range of long-period waves is typically 5 min to 12 h, covering
tsunamis to astronomical tides (Munk, 1950). In response to such a wide
range of periods, a total of 60 multiple component waves with equal
amplitudes (20 cm was assumed for this study) and different periods
were superimposed, resulting in a pseudorandom signal, as shown in
Fig. 14. The phase lag of each wave was determined by generating a
uniformly distributed random number. Here the test wave is referred as
a white noise tsunami because the signal is equivalent to random white
noise in signal processing. This test intends to examine the inflow
characteristics in terms of the wave periods. Tsunamis naturally consist Fig. 15. Spectrum of a white noise tsunami, represented by a transmission
of a number of transient, non-periodic, shorter, and longer waves. ratio, which was calculated by dividing the output signal by the input signal.
During the propagation of these waves from the ocean to a nearshore
area, these waves are gradually modified with respect to their ampli­ reduced because typically it lasts over a few hours, though shorter wave
tudes, wave lengths, and wave periods (Madsen et al., 2008). Therefore, components during a storm (e.g. wind waves, infragrabity waves) will be
this test that involves the use of a white noise tsunami may be mean­ much reduced. On the other hand, a tsunami component, which is
ingful to investigate the performance of the self-elevating seawall typically shorter than an hour, will be efficiently attenuated on passing
against tsunamis composed of many different wave components, such as the gate gap. For this case, the tsunami amplitude was reduced by 80%
those shown in Fig. 7. The thick red line in Fig. 14 shows the output and 90% with ten and five gaps, respectively. The self-elevating seawall
signal, which corresponds to the water level inside a port protected by a effectively functions as a low-pass filter system, though it may not
self-elevating seawall with five gaps (each with a 30 cm width). completely hold back seawater.
Short-period waves found in the input signal appear to mostly disappear,
whereas a long-period fluctuation remains visible. 3.3. Case study
A more detailed response is shown in Fig. 15, which is the result of a
fast Fourier transform (FFT). Rather than showing an ordinary ampli­ All the observed tsunamis shown in Fig. 7 include a high degree of
tude spectrum, the vertical axis indicates the transmission ratio of each uncertain fluctuations. Therefore, a detailed design must be conducted
wave component, which was calculated by dividing the output ampli­ by incorporating a more realistic time series of tsunami fluctuation
tude (inside the port) by the input amplitude (outside the port, 20 cm). A rather than a distinctive solitary wave, such as the tsunami model shown
longer wave component, which is associated with the astronomical tide, in Fig. 13. For example, the Cabinet Office of Japan has publicized
can be sufficiently reduced if there is only one gap. However, astro­ various tsunami scenarios that may occur along the coast of western
nomical tidal components cannot be eliminated as the number of gaps Japan during the imminent megathrust earthquake, known as the
increases. Likewise a typhoon storm surge may not be substantially Nankai Trough Earthquake, which is anticipated to happen within the

10
H. Takagi et al.
next 30 years at a likelihood of 80% (http://www.bousai.go.jp/jishi
n/nankai/). In the case that the authority responsible for overseeing
tsunami disasters has already established such future tsunami scenarios,
engineers may directly use the official scenarios without performing any
advanced simulations themselves.
Fig. 3 shows that a 2-m level tsunami, which is one of the scenarios of
the Cabinet Office of Japan, could be completely hold back by con­
structing a self-elevating seawall in the opening of a port (RGSS, 2016).
The study by Takagi and Bricker (2014) also supports these expectations
through their hypothetical analysis applied to Ishinomaki Fishery Port,
where the 2011 Tohoku tsunami devastated the town behind the port.
However, their analysis essentially neglected possibility of tsunami
intrusion through various voids such as gate gap and breakwater rubble
mound.
Therefore, the authors re-evaluated effectiveness of the self-elevating
seawall system by considering the combined influence of tsunami
intrusion through the gate gap and the mound. The port geometry is
similar with the one studied by RGSS (2016), as shown in Fig. 16.
Equations (1) and (4) were used to evaluate inflow discharge through
the mound and the gap, respectively, and these results were linearly
combined to calculate increase/decrease in water level inside the port
with its basin of 7.5 ha. The breakwater is composed of caisson and
rubble mound. As the caisson is an impermeable structure, only the
submerged mound layer with a 2-m thickness is considered as a
permeable part. This port is assumed to be enclosed by a total of three
self-elevating gate units. As a result, 4 gate gaps (each with a 30 cm
width) are created. The discharge coefficient can be calculated by
applying Equation (9).
Fig. 17 shows how the water level inside the port changes with water
level outside, which is composed of a Level 1 tsunami for this port and
astronomical tide (a semi-diurnal tide). The time-history of this potential
tsunami was originally provided by a prefectural office, which was based
on the fundamental scenarios presented by the Cabinet Office of Japan
(http://www.bousai.go.jp/jishin/nankai/taisaku/pdf/1_1.pdf). While
the longest wave component induced by the tide is not significantly
reduced, the rapid fluctuation due to the tsunami is mostly vanished
within the port basin. Unlike the assessment by RGSS (2016) under the
ideal assumption, tsunami substantially intrudes into the port. However,
the peak of the tsunami can be reduced by about 90 cm, which would
mitigate the most powerful impact caused by the tsunami. Although this
is highly dependent on the layout of port, Fig. 16 demonstrates that the
predominant influence is not caused by the inflow through the gate gap,
but that through the rubble mound. Hence, the preliminary survey will
Fig. 16. Case study of installation of self-elevating seawall in a medium sized fishery port.
11
Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028
be the most important factor to make the planned project to be success
by finding a suitable port for installation of self-elevating seawall.
3.4. Discussion - extra considerations required
The fewer the gate gaps, the lower the wave transmission. To mini­
mize water intrusion induced by tsunamis and tides, it is important to
reduce the number of gate gaps as much as possible. However, a port
opening of an order of 100 m will be protected by at least several
separate gates of the self-elevating seawall system (RGSS, 2016).
Therefore, planners and engineers in charge must firstly recognize that
tsunami intrusion is unavoidable to some extent even if the port is
protected by a well-designed self-elevating seawall. A tsunami mitiga­
tion plan should be planned to minimize the impact of a tsunami inside
the port area, rather than aim for total elimination of tsunamis.
Once water is allowed to enter to some extent, engineers must
consider additional design issues. For example, a strong water jet
through a narrow gate gap might cause scouring/erosion behind the self-
elevating seawall. Such strong flows might even destabilize ships on the
port basin, and thus an appropriate design for ensuring that ships are
safely moored will also be required. Although this is outside the scope of
the present paper, the calculated discharge with the proposed formula
can be used as an input boundary for computing velocity fields within
the port basin. Such analysis will be highly useful for investigating the
influence of tsunami intrusion on moored ships or estimating scouring
behind the gate.
Given that it takes 15–20 min to mechanically uplift the embedded
gate, it is required for the disaster management authority to immedi­
ately start the operation after the earthquake. However, it should be
recognized that any modern system, including self-elevating seawall, is
unlikely to work against a very short-warning time tsunami, such as that
triggered by submarine and/or subaerial landslide (Takagi et al., 2019b;
Heidarzadeh et al., 2020).
The risk of a gate-opening-induced tsunami should also be addressed.
This secondary tsunami could potentially occur if the gate is uncon­
sciously reopened. For example, if the water level outside the port is
about to drop to zero at 360 min as shown in Fig. 13, the port authorities
may decide to reopen the gate at this moment because rapid resumption
of port operations is critical. However, the water level inside the port
still exceeds 50 cm. If the gate is suddenly opened, a gate-opening-
induced tsunami could be generated, which could result in many unfa­
vorable effects such as a strong drag on moored vessels and a returning
tsunami engulfing adjacent coastal areas. To avoid such unexpected
H. Takagi et al.
Fig. 17. Estimated water levels inside the port, when tsunami intrusion through the gate gaps and rubble mound take place.
impacts, the port authorities must wait for the water levels outside and
inside the port to coincide (e.g., at 600 min in Fig. 13).
A self-elevating seawall can work only when adjacent port facilities
also work against earthquakes as well as tsunamis. Out of 67 port
breakwaters in the Tohoku region, 29 suffered damage due to the 2011
tsunami (Takagi, 2015). Many floodgates even withstood the 2011 Great
East Japan earthquake and tsunami (e.g., those in Minami Sanriku,
Japan, Fig. 18), but their adjacent coastal structures were destroyed,
nullifying the function of the gate itself. Such disastrous incidents may
occur unless the adjacent structure is also carefully examined and
improved if necessary, as a part of the self-elevating seawall system.
4. Conclusions
Self-elevating seawalls are attracting attention as effective counter­
measures against tsunamis, particularly after the Great East Japan
earthquake and tsunami in 2011. However, a narrow gap between
adjacent gate units would inevitably cause an intrusion of seawater into
the port basin, which cannot be simply simulated using common
tsunami models because the gap is too small to be reproduced in the
model. The present study examines the water flow passing through a
gate gap by applying a 2D-3D hybrid hydrodynamic model to derive the
hydraulic head-to-inflow discharge conversion formula, which is
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
defined as Q ¼ γC 2gΔh ​ w ​ h ​ , where Q is the discharge, g is gravi­
tational acceleration, Δh is the hydraulic head difference between the
Fig. 18. Floodgates in Minami Sanriku City that withstood the 2011 Great East Japan tsunami, though their adjacent protection was totally destroyed (photos taken
by the author in April 2011).
12
Ocean Engineering 199 (2020) 107028
sea side and the port side of the seawall, h is the water depth, and w is the
gap width. The correction factor γ may be modified via experiment. The
discharge coefficient of C can be estimated by a regression formula,
which varies with the gap width between the relevant floodgates. For
example, the relationship C ¼ 0:15 ​ Δh þ 0:25 was derived for the case
where w ¼ 0.3m. The proposed model was verified through case studies
in which a time series of hypothetical water levels composed of a Level 1
tsunami and semi-diurnal tide was simulated for a medium-sized port.
With this proposed method and given the water level outside the port,
the water level rising over a port basin enclosed by floodgates and
breakwaters can be calculated using a spreadsheet that do not require
expensive computational fluid dynamics. A frequency analysis is also
performed to investigate to what extent the performance of the system is
influenced by differences in wave period. A self-elevating seawall system
acts as an effective low-pass filter system against tsunamis, though it
may not completely hold back much longer wave components such as
tides and storm surges. Last, but not least, the tsunami waveforms
assumed in this study may not represent an impulsive solitary wave, and
therefore the derived formula should not be applied to such a violent
tsunami.
Declaration of competing interest
We have no conflict of interest to declare.
H. Takagi et al.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Ryoichi Tomiyasu: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing.
Tomoyuki Oyake: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing.
Taketo Araki: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing. Kyosuke
Mori: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing. Yasuhiro Mat­
subara: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing. Yohei Nino­
miya: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing. Yoshifumi
Takata: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing.
Acknowledgments
Funding for this research was supported by the grants to Tokyo
Institute of Technology from the JSPS KAKENHI (No.16KK0121 and
19K04964) and the Maeda Engineering Foundation. The spreadsheet
can be shared upon request (takagi@ide.titech.ac.jp).
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