Coasts

Question 1

What is a coast?

Answer 1

The border between land and sea

Question 2

How are coasts used?

Answer 2

Tourism, sport, fishing, oil and gas reserves, transport, housing

Question 3

Why are coasts under threat?

Answer 3

Sea levels rising, pollution, litter, overfishing, erosion, natural disasters

Question 4

How are waves formed

Answer 4

Due to the friction between the wind and the sea

Question 5

What does the size of the wave depend on?

Answer 5

Duration of wind, strength of wind, fetch

Question 6

What is the crest of a wave?

Answer 6

The top

Question 7

What is the trough of a wave

Answer 7

The low area between 2 waves

Question 8

What is the wavelength?

Answer 8

Distance between 2 crests or 2 troughs

Question 9

What is the wave height?

Answer 9

The distance between the crest and trough

Question 10

What is the swash?

Answer 10

The movement of water and load up the beach

Question 11

What is the backwash?

Answer 11

The movement of water and load down the beach

Question 12

What are the properties of a destructive wave?

Answer 12

Weak swash and strong backwash, wave breaks almost vertically, very erosive

Question 13

What are properties of a constructive wave?

Answer 13

Strong swash and weak backwash, wave breaks shallowly, and they build beaches

Question 14

What is hydraulic pressure?

Answer 14

When the pressure of water and air between a crack causes it to break

Question 15

What is corrasion/abrasion

Answer 15

Rocks being thrown at cliffs by waves

Question 16

What is corrosion/solution?

Answer 16

The slight acidity of sea water causing bits of the cliff to dissolve

Question 17

What is attrition?

Answer 17

Rocks, sand and stones being thrown at each other by waves

Question 18

What is wave pounding?

Answer 18

The power of waves crashing into cliffs causing them to weaken

Question 19

What is sub aerial weathering

Answer 19

The top of cliffs being attacked by the weather making cliffs weaker and less stable

Question 20

How are bays and headlands formed?

Answer 20

When you get alternate layers of soft and hard rock and the soft rock erodes much quicker making a bay. The hard rock forms a headland

Question 21

What is a bay?

Answer 21

An area of land found between 2 headlands. Usually more sheltered so there is less erosion

Question 22

What is a headland?

Answer 22

A piece of land that sticks out into the sea. Undergo a lot of erosion

Question 23

What is a blowhole?

Answer 23

When the sea erodes through the top of the headland

Question 24

What is longshore drift?

Answer 24

The movement of load along a coastline

Question 25

What has to be specific about the waves for longshore drift to occur?

Answer 25

The waves have to hit the beach at an angle

Question 26

What is the prevailing wind?

Answer 26

The direction that the wind usually hits the coastline

Question 27

What are groynes?

Answer 27

Wooden or concrete fences designed to stop longshore drift

Question 28

What is the tidal range?

Answer 28

The difference of area between high and low tide

Question 29

What is a spit?

Answer 29

A long thin stretch of land which stretches out into the sea

Question 30

What is a salt marsh?

Answer 30

A salty marsh which has developed behind a spit

Question 31

What process forms a spit and where are they usually found?

Answer 31

Longshore drift. Usually found at mouths of rivers

Question 32

What is a tombolo?

Answer 32

A spit that joins the mainland

Question 33

What is the mainland?

Answer 33

The main land mass of the area

Question 34

What is a bar?

Answer 34

A spit that connects 2 headlands to form a cove

Question 35

What is a lagoon?

Answer 35

The salt water lake that develops behind a bar

Question 36

What is a eustatic change?

Answer 36

Global changes when the whole level of the sea either rises or falls

Question 37

What is a isostatic change?

Answer 37

Local changes when the level of land changes relative to the level of the sea

Question 38

What is a berm?

Answer 38

A long thin hill that forms at the top of the ebach

Question 39

What is a strand line?

Answer 39

The material that is deposited by the sea at the furthest point of the high tide

Question 40

What is an embryo dune?

Answer 40

The starting of a sand dune

Question 41

What is a foredune?

Answer 41

Small embryo dunes that join together

Question 42

What is a blowout?

Answer 42

A depression or hole in the dune caused by the wind

Question 43

What is humus?

Answer 43

A layer of decaying plant and animal matter that adds nutrients to the ground

Question 44

What are some examples of hard engineering on the coastline?

Answer 44

Rip-rap, gabion, groynes, sea wall, breakwater, revetments

Question 45

What are some examples of soft engineering on the coastline?

Answer 45

Dune stabilisation, cliff regrading, beach nourishment, beach drainage, managed retreat

Question 46

What conditions do coral reefs need to form?

Answer 46

Tropical sea conditions, warm waters, clear water, no pollution, sunlight, relatively shallow water

Question 47

What is a fringing reef?

Answer 47

They circle the coastline or islands . They often are protected by barrier reefs

Question 48

What is a barrier reef?

Answer 48

Older and wider than a fringing reef, commonly separated from mainland or island by a deep lagoon

Question 49

What is an atoll?

Answer 49

Rise from submerged volcanoes. Similar to barrier reefs

Question 50

What are benefits of coral reefs?

Answer 50

Support 25% of marine species, protect coastlines from erosion, natural barriers, recycling agent for CO2, source of raw material, benefit tourism

Question 51

How are coral reefs being damaged?

Answer 51

Rising sea levels, natural disasters, destructive fishing, deforestation, pollution, overfishing, marine trade

Question 52

How are coral reefs being protected?

Answer 52

Banning destructive fishing, conservation zones, sewage outlets moved, banning of anchoring, reduce fertilisers, education