12.05.2014: FB1-Seminar

11:00 h, Hörsaal, Düsternbrooker Weg 20

Abstract:

Australia’s climate is one of the driest in the world. It is characterised by significant year-to-year rainfall variability and frequent extreme climate events such as droughts and floods impact on estuarine and coastal marine environments. The continental-wide evaporation-precipitation balance indicates that most of Australia’s coastal estuaries and bays could be defined as low inflow systems. These are often characterised by hypersalinity and potentially exhibit inverse circulations. Large low-inflow systems in Australia include Spencer Gulf, the Great Australian Bight, Shark Bay, many northern Australian tropical estuaries, the hypersaline coastal waters of the Great Barrier Reef and those of Hervey Bay off the southeast coast of Queensland. Hervey Bay’s classification as a low-inflow intermittent hypersaline and inverse system is based on hydrographic surveys conducted since 2004, an analysis of the historical water balance, and the application of a hierarchy of ocean circulation models. A review of these Australian systems is presented with a particular focus upon the hydrographic characteristics of Hervey Bay and the southeast coast of Queensland.

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