Spatial size of waves

Journal article, 2016

Measures of three-dimensional spatial wave size are proposed and expressed in terms of properly defined characteristics: the crest-height, the length, and the wave front location. Their statistical distributions are presented in explicit integral forms for the deep water seas modeled as Gaussian fields. The proposed approach allows for investigation of the effect that shape and directionality of the sea spectrum have on the joint distributions of the size characteristics. The method is validated by comparing numerical evaluations of the distributions with observed frequencies extracted from simulated sea surfaces. Thecomparisons demonstrate high accuracy of the evaluations.