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ARS Home » Midwest Area » West Lafayette, Indiana » National Soil Erosion Research Laboratory » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #172589
Title: THE COMBINED EFFECT OF WIND AND RAIN ON THE INTERRILL EROSION PROCESSES

Author
item ERPUL, G - ANKARA UNIVERSITY
item GABRIELS, D - GHENT UNIVERSITY
item Norton, Lloyd

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 1/1/2000
Publication Date: 3/3/2003
Citation: Erpul, G., Gabriels, D., Norton, L.D. 2003. The combined effect of wind and rain on the interrill erosion processes. In: (Eds) D. Gabriels, G. Ghirardi, D.R. Nielsen, I. Pla Sentis, E.L. Skidmore. 'ICTP Lecture Notes 18. Invited presentations College on Soil Physics 2003', The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics. March 3-21, 2003, Trieste, Italy. P. 173-182.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Wind-driven rain is described as raindrops falling through a wind field at an angle from vertical under the effects of both gravitational and drag forces. Wind-driven raindrops gain some degree of horizontal velocity and strike the soil surface with an angle deviated from vertical. Additionally, the distribution and intensity of rainfall on sloping surfaces differs depending on wind direction and velocity. Schematic representation of wind-driven rain incidental on a sloping soil surface is given in Figure 1. The changes in raindrop trajectory and frequency with wind velocity and direction can have significant effects on rainsplash detachment process. The resultant impact velocity, impact angle, and impact frequency of raindrops determine the magnitude of rainsplash detachment by wind-driven rain. This differs from the detachment process by windless rain, in which a straight-line trajectory of raindrops and accordingly greatest rainfall intensity for a given rain are implicitly assumed. Wind, as well as slope and overland flow, is another possible factor capable of transporting detached particles by raindrop impact. Once soil particles are entrained in the splash droplets that have risen into the air by raindrop impact, wind velocity gradient will transport these particles. Obviously, in addition to its role in the rainsplash detachment process, the wind accompanying rain is an important consideration in the rainsplash transport process, which can cause a net transportation in wind direction. In wind-driven rains, wind velocity and direction is expected to affect not only rainsplash detachment and transport processes but also shallow flow sediment transport induced by raindrop impacts with an angle on flow and the rainsplash trajectories of soil particles within flow. Under wind-driven rain, the interrill transport process is a combined work of both rainsplash sediment transport and raindrop-impacted shallow flow sediment transport. The rainsplash process acts alone until runoff occurs, and net soil transport is caused by wind. As soon as runoff starts, the flow-driven process begins to transport the detached soil particles. This is different from the approach of recent interrill erosion models that soil detached by the rainsplash will be subsequently transported by overland flow.