An Improved Prediction for Wave Runup on a Circular Cylinder

Previous studies have applied various methods to analyze the wave runup on fixed columns, including linear and higher order diffraction theories and semi-empirical correlations. However, none of them seems to be adequate to accurately predict the wave runup over a full range of wave steepness and cylinder sizes when further compared with experimental data from the literature. The focus of this study is on a better semi-empirical formula for wave runup on a circular cylinder. We: (i) report on a set of experimental results obtained for a circular cylinder with various diameters in regular waves; (ii) evaluate the performance of existing theories or empirical equations using a full data set comprising new experimental results and results reported in the literature; and (iii) propose a new equation for predicting the wave runup on a fixed circular cylinder in regular waves. The proposed semi-empirical equation considers both the effects of wave scattering and wave nonlinearity and is able to estimate the runup of regular waves on a circular cylinder with significantly improved accuracy when tested with the full experimental data set.