Rivers & Floods Flashcards
Floodplain
Flat topography adjacent to a stream in a river valley, produced by the combination of overbank flow and lateral migration of meander bends.
Channel Pattern
The shape of a river channel as viewed from above (“bird’s-eye view”); patterns include straight, meandering, and braided.
Channelization
An engineering technique to straighten, widen, deepen, or otherwise modify a natural stream channel.
continuity equation
With respect to hydrology of rivers, refers to the equation that the discharge of flow is equal to the product of the cross-sectional area of flow times the velocity of the flow.
discharge
The quantity of water flowing past a particular point on a stream, usually measured in cubic feet per second (cfs) or cubic meters per second (cms).
downstream flood
Floods produced by storms of long duration that saturate the soil and produce increased runoff over a relatively wide area. Often are of regional extent.
drainage basin
Area that contributes surface water to a particular steam network.
flash flood
A type of upstream flood in which the floodwaters rise quickly.
flooding
From an environmental perspective, refers to overbank flow of rivers causing potential damage to human facilities; as a natural process, refers to overbank flows that may lead to the construction of floodplains adjacent to the river channel.
floodplain regulation
A process of delineating floodplains and regulating land uses on them.
Levee
Natural levees result from overbanked flows of rivers; human-constructed levees are earthen embankments along a river channel to protect land adjacent to the river from flooding.
Runoff
Water moving over the surface of Earth as overland flow on slopes or stream flow; that part of the hydrologic cycle represented by precipitation or snowmelt that results in stream flow.
