BEACH NOURISHMENT BY RAINBOWING FOR THE VISAKHAPATNAM PORT TRUST BY DCI

摘要

The coastal city of Visakhapatnam had a long wide beach. Over past three decades, this beach has progressively eroded leaving only a strip of what was once a fairly wide beach. As the continental shelf is fairly steep the erosion has exposed the rock formations which makes the beach highly dangerous for tourists / swimmers. In an effort to arrest this erosion and to protect the coast, the beach has been nourished by pumping sand from the sand trap area. Since mid 1970, this pumping of sand was carried out via a shore pipeline between the months of April to September by the dredgers of the Port and from 1990 by DCI. However, since the year 2003 the beach is being nourished by Rainbowing sand directly onto the beach front by the DCI's Trailer Suction Dredgers. This paper will highlight three important points / aspects: a. The efforts of Visakhapatnam Port over the year to battle with the natural phenomenon called the Littoral drift silting up the Port approaches and its channels.b. The adaptation of Rainbowing technique that has resulted in the pumping of sand precisely in the zones with maximum erosion thereby making this technique effective and also reducing the time frame of the Project.c. This cost saving technique can be adapted at other locations, depending upon the requirement, so that the need to lay and maintain a fixed pipeline can be dispensed with.