Abstract
Due to a lack of appropriate modelling tools, the atmospheric source
mechanisms triggering the potentially destructive meteotsunami waves –
occurring at periods from a few minutes to a few hours – have remained
partially unstudied till recently. In this numerical work we thus
investigate and quantify the impacts of orography and extreme climate
changes on the generation and propagation of the atmospheric pressure
disturbances occurring during six different historical meteotsunami
events in the Adriatic Sea. Additionally, the impact of the bathymetry,
and hence the Proudman resonance, on the propagation of the meteotsunami
waves is also assessed for the same ensemble of events. Our main
findings can be summarized as follow: (1) removing the mountains does
not strongly affect the generation nor the propagation of the
meteotsunamigenic disturbances but can slightly increase their intensity
particularly over the land, (2) climate warming under extreme scenario
has the potential to increase the intensity of both atmospheric
disturbances and meteotsunami waves in the vicinity of the sensitive
coastal areas while (3) flattening the bathymetry of the deepest
Adriatic Sea tends to divert the meteotsunami waves from the sensitive
harbour locations. Such sensitivity studies, if generalized to other
geographical locations with a higher number of events, may provide new
insights concerning the still unknown physics of the meteotsunami
genesis and, consequently, help to better mitigate meteotsunami hazards
worldwide.