Analysis of the Stability of Floating Ice Blocks
Publication: Journal of Hydraulic Engineering
Volume 137, Issue 4
Abstract
Determining the conditions under which an approaching ice floe becomes entrained under an intact ice cover is a fundamental component of any numerical model that attempts to successfully predict ice-jam formation or ice-jam release events. Current stability theory is based on empirical relationships that attempt to characterize stability on the basis of Froude number. This paper seeks to evaluate the stability of floating ice blocks though a force-moment analysis, building on previously published experimental results that measured the dynamic pressures beneath a floating ice block under various thickness-to-depth ratios and flow velocities. The experimental results were extended to measure the dynamic pressures beneath a block that had rotated about its downstream corner until the top upstream corner was at the water surface elevation, giving an indication of how the submerging force and underturning moment changes as the block begins to rotate. The force-moment analyses developed in this paper were compared with previously published observations of block entrainment and were found to match those observations well.
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Acknowledgments
This research is supported by scholarships to the first writer from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERCNSERC) and Alberta Ingenuity, and through NSERC research grants to the other two writers. This support is gratefully acknowledged. The writers thank Perry Fedun and Chris Krath for their assistance in developing the experimental setup and Dr. Mark Loewen for his advice on these experiments. The writers also thank undergraduate students Brett Howard and Kimberly Alcorn for their assistance in the lab.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Hydraulic Engineering
Volume 137 • Issue 4 • April 2011
Pages: 412 - 422
Copyright
© 2011 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jul 28, 2009
Accepted: Aug 23, 2010
Published online: Mar 15, 2011
Published in print: Apr 1, 2011
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