Evaluation of Extreme Sea Levels and Their Impacts — An Overview of Indian Coastal Regions

Coastlines all across the globe are home to emerging and ancient cities and are vulnerable to extreme events like cyclones and tsunamis as well as global warming induced sea-level rise. For the appropriate management of such coastal regions, these extreme events should be addressed for better preparedness. In this chapter, some important characteristics of Indian coastal regions and various issues related to modeling and simulation of these extreme events in the context of the Indian Ocean are presented. A brief account of the sea-level rise issue in the Indian Ocean region is also presented. Numerical models are powerful tools for managing these events in the modern era. In this chapter, modeling of tsunamis and cyclones in the Indian Ocean is discussed and demonstrated using Delft3D, which is a popular and robust open source coastal hydrodynamic modeling software package suitable for addressing hydrodynamics, sediment transport and morphology, and water quality in coastal regions. Two events, the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami and the 2009 Arabian Sea cyclone Phyan, are simulated using Delft3D and results are presented. Further, the major challenges faced by Indian coastal regions due to extreme sea-level rise are also briefly discussed.