South-west beach & offshore sediment dynamics study – NERC – Gerd Masselink

Cornishman  ‘The beaches of the Westcountry have still not fully recovered after they were battered by the ferocious storms of 2013 and 2014. Now a new research project is setting out to discover why much of the sand on Devon and Cornwall’s chief tourist asset has not returned, even after three calm summers. The shrunken beaches leave coastal properties at even more risk, Professor Gerd Masselink, who is leading the Plymouth University project, said. “The hit during the 2013-14 winter was big; hence, we expect a few more years before we are back to the beach levels of summer 2013, unless we get more severe winters,” he said.

“If the coast does not recover fully, it leaves the coasts vulnerable to subsequent storms or stormy periods.” A succession of Atlantic storms from December 2013 to February 2014 left a trail of damage along the coasts of Cornwall, Devon and Dorset. Perranporth lost about a million tonnes of sand. The new beach study, part of a £4million project funded by the Natural Environment Research Council, will aim to assess why many beaches that were severely eroded have still not recovered.

The project was launched officially at Perranporth yesterday. A graph of beach sand volume over time at Perranporth shows a regular winter dip, followed by a summer recovery. So much sand was washed away in 2013-14, that the beach has not yet bounced back to its previous winter lows. Speaking from Perranporth beach, Professor Masselink said the sand did not disappear, but was either washed offshore or blown into dunes behind the beach. The offshore sand can be carried back to the beach, but sand in the dunes is likely to be lost from the beach permanently. “On windy days at Perranporth sand is blown into the dunes. That sand is never going to come back,” Professor Masselink said. “We want sand on the beaches – that’s where we value it most.” The peninsula’s north coast is at the mercy of south-westerly winds blowing in off the Atlantic. South Coast beaches can also be affected by localised easterly storms.

The first two years of the project will see extensive measurements at the sandy beach and dune system of Perranporth on the north coast and the gravel beaches of Start Bay on the south coast of Devon. The second two years will then focus on developing new and improving existing computer models of coastal change, which can then be used to investigate the impact of different climate change scenarios and address issues of coastal vulnerability. Professor Masselink said: “A very exciting aspect of this project is that we aim to put together the total sediment budget of the beaches we study, so we also study dunes and the underwater part of the beach, up to 20m water depth. Click here to read more.