From the botanic garden across the street, we're are moving further to the coastline. Our next speaker to my topic, I DO from the College of Engineering in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. We'll be talking about engineering solutions for protecting us shorelines for, from the consequences of past human activities. Please welcome to me. Hello everyone. My name is Tammy takeaway from a third year PhD student from the from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. My talk today is gonna be about how we are protecting our shorelines from the consequences of past human activities using engineering solutions. Now, think about times when you decide to visit a place or move to a new place or probably relocate. Now, there are questions you're going to be asking yourselves. First, is, This is the place safe? Is it is it okay for me to visit? Another question you might want to ask is, is a place conducive for my health? And the answers, the answers to those questions might determine if you're gonna be going to those places or not. So for instance, this was in for 2021. I took this picture, by the way. So this is myself and my friends. We decided to visit the coastline and let's say we are having a good time. And it thousand feet away you see an explosion and everywhere is going Awire and you're wondering what exactly is happening. Now, the question, I mean, the question is going to be on your mind is what's exactly happened? And then you start hearing this buzzword, munitions, munitions, munitions. The first question, I mean, after finding a safe place to stay, right? The first question you're going to ask is, what exactly are these munitions? So the rest of my talk is going to be centered around these munitions. Their relationships with our coastlines and y, as coastal researchers were interested in these munitions. Now, in layman's terms, this munitions are defective or abandoned explosives from past wars and conflict zones. So talk, think of World War One, World War Two, and the likes. And this munitions, they come in different shapes and sizes. So we have the projectiles, the motors. So never mind. I mean this basically the whole munitions and the biggest one here, as you can see, this military guy, please take note of this picture because you're going to come across it again as the presentation proceeds. Now, this munitions, um, they, I'll break them into two components. So you have the casing and then you have the exclusive components. And these two forms, what you call the munitions. Right here with me is so don't worry, this is not we're not going to blow up this place. Alright, so right here with me is what we call a surrogate munition. So basically, it's the way built for research purposes. And so the explosive companies are not there, so please be rest assured we are safe. So any other thing you see in this presentation is going to be a surrogates munition, not the actual one, so we are safe. So what I'm holding right here is default. Similarly, the surrogate of the 40 millimeter projector that you see this 40? Yeah. The smallest one you are saying. So this is a surrogate for the fourth Simulink time in the ammunition. Now for the longest time. When the cleanup needs to be done. This many times where the normal practice was, was for them to dump this munitions in our oceans and in our marine environment. And this took place for over 100 years from the late 1800s. So the 1970s when they put on hand to the practice. And of course the question then was, we don't live in oceans anyway. Globally, in, in that period, about 1.6 million metric tons of these munitions were dumped in our ocean. And those are what? Those maps are actually the known munitions we initials dumping sites. Unfortunately, there are several or non-malicious job besides that, we do not have any records of them. So this node munitions I by 1.6 metric tons. Think of your I felt, I felt OR so if we add two, if this munitions were to be construction materials and we are to use the tonnage that was used to build isotope. We're going to be getting at least 161. I was just using these munitions materials and coming down to the United States over 400 and theta3 munitions dumping sites, I've been discovered or unknown. So here is the challenge. We said, who cares? But actually modernity I saying, I care. What's you're beginning to experience. Some of these mutations are finding their ways. Our coastlines, and sometimes we're not even aware. So for instance, I go with my family to the coastline and then I see what I call a buoy. And then we decided to take a real cool shot only to discover they are actually whether bombs. So just think about that. Unfortunately, this is also happening as we are beginning to have more and more storm events. So for instance, this was discovered in North Carolina after Hurricane Maria, and also this way also discovered a new Jersey five years after Hurricane Sandy. And these are the questions we are beginning to ask ourselves. And so as as environmentalists and as researchers, this obviously pose health and environmental risks. So our communities, as we all know, the larger part of the United States, the population of the United States resides in coastal communities. And it's been found that the chemical components of these munitions courses different complications. And of course, when, if this munitions finally away onshore, there's still the risk of explosions. If estimates, global, global climate change estimates is anything to go by, we are likely to be having more and more and more of these storm events, which may likely engender the migration of these miniature. So as coastal researchers, we are asking ourselves a question. So this is your typical beach. This is like your typical profile. And since this munitions come in different shapes and sizes. So we are asking ourselves questions like, what roles do the weight and the shifts are these munitions play in the migration of these munitions onshore or offshore even getting buried. Secondly, we understand that wave conditions and the wave conditions impact this I'll dismiss as migrate. So we're also asking ourselves questions on how wave forces and even the beach profile changes impact the migrations of these munitions either onshore or how that gets buried. And unfortunately, this is complicated because even these two factors impact each other. And so it's a really complicated problem. So ultimately, the questions we are trying to establish, what you're trying to establish is when we have this munitions with different shapes and sizes and we have the environmental conditions around these munitions. So what are the possible interrelationships amongst these munitions? And so answer these questions. We set out to carry out some experiments where we picked real-life conditions. In this case, we picked a beach in New Jersey. So we picked, we picked or you can sign d as the wave condition. Then we scaled it down into what we call a wave flume. So basically, a wave flume is an, is a channel for recreating an artificial beach. And the reason why we are using waveforms is that we are, it's easy to control the environment. I know we are also able to put our sensors. Anyhow, wanted to place sensors for ease of data collection. To achieve that. Last summer we traveled up notes to Quebec, Canada. So the houses that has the minutiae of the biggest mutation of its kind in North America here. So this was in, INRs in Quebec. And this mutation is about 01:20 meters long, 5 m wide and 5 m deep. And so put that in perspective, this is actually longer than a typical football pitch. And so we carried out different experiments. So I'm going to spell out the details, but take us through the overall steps. So we had munitions that we started. Then we place them at different cross shore locations on the beach. And of course remember they have different shapes, sizes, and weights. And then we saw this was me and my colleagues carrying one of the big munitions. And you remember this guy? So what took a single military man to carry through three of us, bloody civilians to carry one of them. So please, if you see military men or you see veterans, please give them the respect. So this was where the mutations have been placed. And then we had different sensors along the channel. So we had all this. Ions and salts that we place for measuring all those wave characteristics on how the beach profile was changing. And then afterwards we field of the fluid which water depths we wanted. And so we add different whether that's different with conditions and the likes. So then we went ahead and run the waves in the flume. So the next, the next is a video that I would like us to see this just a snippet of. Okay, so that was a snippet of one of the experiments. So basically you have the waves coming in and we have several of them that was just this single wave event. And so after the Wave events and everything, then we go back to the ammunitions and we'd see what their conditions or afterwards. And so basically we quantify how these munitions have migrated out. They've gotten buried and the likes. And from there, we try to create, establish empirical relationships. And so the two green parts are the parts I'm currently working on at this stage of my PhD research. So and that's what's giving me the sleepless night and weekend hours during the day, and hopefully we'll get there. So basically we look at how these conditions are, the impacts, the migration and the barrel of the munitions. And remember, this is, this condition is also impacts one another. So it's not something, it's not a linear relationship. So that's what makes it even more complicated. But at the end of the day, we add two. I'm going to be coming up with empirical models. So don't be faced by the math or anything. So those are empirical models that we're gonna, I'm gonna be coming up with that will establish relationships between the munitions migration and those properties like how big or how so how does munitions are? And the idea behind these empirical models is, so if we have a particular beach say in New Jersey or in Hawaii, we know the conditions in those places that we can be able to use this empirical models to give us an idea that elimination was dumped, let's say, 50 years ago, about 1 km offshore. What is the likelihood that this mission might end up onshore if a particular wave events or Oregon happens. So those are the kind of use that we are going to be having. Also, data can also act as validation for models, for empirical mode, for predictive models by other research groups. So ultimately, be, the whole idea of this study is we want a world where you are not scared of visiting a coastline. All you're all having fun with your family or deciding you want to go to a place and you're scared or we saw the news yesterday that something blew up. We do not want that, so we are trying to create healthier and of course, safer coastlines for everyone. Thank you very much. Hey, very interesting presentation. Thank you. The wave flume is a really cool way of looking at it. I guess one of my questions is, how do you control for sand obviously in different locations has very different composition. Are you thinking about how the behavior of the munitions might change depending on location and the composition of the sand. So the question is asking is, if we're considering the fact that different locations have different sound properties. Yes, so proud to traveling to Canada for these experiments. We also did a small sum in the summer of 2021. We did small experiments where we use different sand properties and observed how they, how they behave. So those are the, those feed into the empirical models. So those equations I showed you earlier. So there is a company, those, some of those components are dependent on the sand property. And so we're able to factor in the fact that if we have a beach with coarse sand, this is how it's going to go into the model. And so it factors in those properties. Yes. So you're talking about So the m mod, okay, so if you're in engineering Basically, that's the shields property for the, for the, for diminishes. So it's got objects, shields property. So the mode is, we're actually taking into account what the initial barrier was. Was it 50% buried? Was it on the surface, was it's deeply buried. So that's what it's basically modified, modified object shields parameter. So the mode is modified. Oh, yeah, it's North Carolina. Yes. Nc is this yes. That's one that's kind of Lyon Hall, Yes. So you talked about some of the hazardous effects of TNT getting to the environment, etc. So I'm kinda curious about as anyone in modeled how long these mutations day explosive in saltwater. I mean, I would imagine that once that all gets wet, it it's not as explosive but not as dangerous, but so are all these things that wash up on shore actually potentially explosive or has the has the explosive agent been neutralized by the saltwater? Okay, So the question is asking is the chemical components of the munitions, if anyone has modelled how they impacted the marine environment and also if there has been explosions, right? Well, if depending on the age of this munition, is it do you have to work? Can you just look at it and say, Well, this is no longer explosive because it's so old, it's from the Civil War or something. Okay. I mean, can we do as anyone evaluated, if we need to worry about some of these that have been dumped long ago. Okay? So we have a whole bunch of an area of, of our founders or assertive that I showed in the last slide. So there is this group of researchers who focus majorly on those chem two components, how they decompose. And so for some of us who are familiar with the civil engineering department, so we have some like Professor P2 will looks at those chemical companies. But we are constantly ask costal engineers are more interested in the physics of the munitions and how they don't end up on our coastlines. And only if that answers the question. Yeah. Thank you. Great. I'm just curious about targeted cleanup approach and policies Towards munitions in our coastlines. Do you have any idea of DOS established? And my second question goes along with what I said. I'm sorry. You you are dealing with the physical part, but I'm just wondering the materials of those munitions I would expect deteriorated hundreds of years later. Okay. So I I'm pretty sure we got the questions. So the first question is on coming in. Like pickup. Okay. So for the pickups, yeah. It's a all departments should we say there is a whole program for cleanups of these munitions? And actually that's part of what informs our research. Because they want, they just, they don't just want to be beating, just doing the clean-ups aimlessly. They want to know where to focus resources on life. So there are, there are clean-ups and for the chemical parts like like like like you said, I don't know. It's it's it's it's it's we're just a tiny bits of the whole of the full picture. Hey, sorry, I have a question about the change in the case through time as it looked like some were rusted and the shapes didn't hold through time. I'm just wondering if you're accounting for that or if this is kinda like an idealized situation. Okay? Yes, So we actually account for that. I didn't include those in the slide, but we also add this experiment in a lab where we depicted the fact that shells can attach themselves and then they could also be corrosion. And all of those things will impact the weights. We call it bulk density is going to impact the behavior of the militia. So we, we consider them in our experiment also. And I actually we have, we also as a side project, we have some of these dummy munitions down at Louis where we put them we put those malicious inside the water and then I've been taking readings since 2020 every two months or thereabouts to see how change what changes is happening. And hopefully, maybe at the end of four years, would muscle come up with a possible way of quantifying how these changes occur in overtime. Thank you. Okay. Would you be able to quantify how many of these munitions lie off the Delaware coast. And then when one of these is uncovered, what happens next Two takes care of that. The Department of Defense. And for the quantification. So I think they are records. And that's why based on the records, there are some part of the coastlines that they might restrict people from gaining access to. So if they know that there's probably, there's a probability of munitions getting washed up in those places. They are going to restrict people. What are the researcher? So the Department of Defense takes care of all that. So I had a question about, I know in Delaware beaches to improve basically to make it make them viable for tourism. They'll drag and constantly be artificially changing the profile of the beach. Does your model get messed up by that kind of rapid artificial change? Okay, So the way I find these come in is, so we go to, let's say we have the Delaware beach. And then if there are records of diminished sounds way they maybe don't somewhere 50 years ago, maybe at a particular spot. Now, if there is a dredging and actually there has happened a couple of times where dredging activities actually picks some of these mutations that have been dumped. So if there's a dredging activity, then they say, no. We know that these munitions line out there, it's possible for the dredges to bring some of them traditional line. And so what we, what our model is doing, basically, it's can be able to give us an idea of how far off show this this might be. And so because of that, we are able to inform dredges not to, for instance, not to go to that point. But if the changes if there have been changes on the beach because of the dredging activities and the consistency of the Sun has changed. So it's just a matter of accounting for that new change in the consistent consistency for us to be able to now tell ourselves if we have an origin of the magnitude of Hurricane Sandy taking place and this is the current condition of the beach. Now, what is the likelihood that's such? An arcane can get a can wash off some munitions to the coastline based on the current condition of the coastline. So our models now account for all of that. Yeah. Thank you very much.
Spring 2023 Spark! Symposium featuring Temitope Idowu
From Jason Felton May 16, 2023
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