CIV E 632-COMPUTATIONAL HYDRAULICS AND HYDROLOGY
SPRING 2009
MIDTERM EXAM
MARCH 23, 2009, 1730-1845

Name: ______________________ S.S. No. ________________ Grade: _______

Instructions: Closed book, closed notes. Answer only ten (10) questions. Use engineering paper. When you are finished, staple your work in sequence, and return this sheet with your work.

  1. Compare the celerity and attenuation properties of kinematic, diffusion, dynamic, and inertial (gravity) waves.

  2. What do overland flow and slow-rising flood waves have in common that they lend themselves to description by kinematic and diffusion wave models?

  3. What is the main message of Cunge's paper on the Muskingum method?

  4. What is the Courant number? What definition of Courant number would you use in flood routing computations?

  5. What is grid independence in the context of numerical modeling?

  6. What is the basis of the controversy regarding the kinematic wave model?

  7. Compare the unit hydrograph and the overland flow methods in terms of their ability to simulate watershed rainfall-runoff.

  8. How do the Hayami, Dooge, and Ponce hydraulic diffusivities differ from each other?

  9. Under what four physical conditions is the kinematic shock more likely to develop?

  10. Why do kinematic shock not likely to happen in a river like the Upper Paraguay?

  11. Why is the Li method of solving the kinematic wave equation likely to be more diffusive than the Schaake (HEC-HMS) method?