Quantification of beach changes caused by Hurricane Floyd along Florida's Atlantic coast using airborne laser surveys

Quantitative data on beach changes caused by coastal storms is critical to the understanding of coastal morphodynamics and mitigation of coastal erosion hazards. Recent advances in airborne LIDAR technology allow large-scale mapping of beach erosion, dune scarping, and overwash deposition with incredible detail. By comparing 40 km of beaches along the central Florida Atlantic coast surveyed before and after Hurricane Floyd in 1999, we found that most beaches experienced erosion; about -18 to + 1 m(3)/m of sediment per unit shoreline length were removed or deposited. Beach erosion is not spatially uniform, and variations in magnitude occur three dimensionally. The high-density LIDAR data provided accurate information about shore changes both at small and large scales.