Disaster Mitigation Structures for Tsunamis, Floods, and Scour Countermeasures

Dear Colleagues,

In response to the increasing threats posed by tsunamis and floods, the geoscience community is actively engaged in devising innovative strategies to strengthen coastal regions, rivers and waterways against erosion, scour, and the potential breaching of levees. This Special Issue aims to provide valuable insights into the complex dynamics of disaster prevention or a mitigation system that is under the threat of severe erosion.

(1) Introduction, including scientific background and highlighting the importance of this research area.

The recent mega tsunamis, the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami and the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, caused catastrophic damage and showed the limitations of coastal concrete infrastructures or earthen levees when overflowing occurs. Moreover, buildings, as well as infrastructures and natural structures, may produce large amounts of debris and cause fatal harm to people's lives. Following the past recorded tsunamis, storm surges, and typhoons, researchers emphasized the need for safe designs of disaster prevention/mitigation structures, including tsunami evacuation buildings, while highlighting the significance of structural integrity in lowering flood-induced loads. Numerous researchers have brought various configurations and computational methods into a physical study and elucidated the effective tsunami mitigation system. Although the idea of ecosystem-based disaster risk reduction (Eco-DRR) or the hybrid defense approach (HDA) is proposed, the functional limitations of the structures under the effect of erosion around them or the earthen levee itself are still not well understood because of the complexity of the three-dimensional scour phenomena. In addition, secondary damage by water-borne debris needs to be analyzed for safety evacuation. For an Eco-DRR approach, the management of coastal forests or other natural systems needs to be discussed in relation to the sustainable development goals.

(2) Aim of the Special Issue and how the subject relates to the journal scope.

The goal of this Special Issue is to collect papers (original research articles and review papers) to provide insights into coastal and/or flood disaster mitigation for strengthening Eco-DRR and/or HDA methods through mitigating damage created by fluid force and erosion in urban or urban fringe areas.

(3) Suggested themes and article types for submissions.

This Special Issue will welcome manuscripts that link the following themes:

1. The functional limitations of coastal defense systems and hybrid defense/mitigation systems under mega-tsunamis or river floods due to the destruction of structures by fluid force and/or by the local scour of substrates;
2. Experimental/numerical studies on mitigating erosion around disaster prevention/mitigation structures;
3. The erosion of levees composed of cohesive/non-cohesive material and levee breaching phenomena.

We look forward to receiving your original research articles and reviews.

Prof. Dr. Norio Tanaka
Guest Editor

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• natural hazards
• scour countermeasures for levees and disaster mitigation systems
• levee breaching
• hybrid defense systems
• infrastructure resilience
• vegetation management for increasing tsunami mitigation function in coastal zones
• ecosystem-based disaster risk reduction (Eco-DRR)
• green infrastructure