Author(s)

Endicott M. Fay^1*, Andrew Gunderson², Arden Anderson²

¹Cotty Fay Marine Design Inc., Bainbridge Island, WA, USA.
²Mercury Marine, Fond du Lac, WI, USA.

In many areas around the world, wake surfing has been cited as one of the major causes of lakeshore erosion and turbidity. This paper quantifies the impact related to turbidity and erosion with the use of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) of boat wakes in shallow water and the build-up of wind driven waves. The energy, type and direction of the boat’s wake are described quantitatively and a table for predicting wind driven waves over varying fetches, depth and wind speeds is provided. The CFD simulation shows that if a wake surf boat is operated 200 ft from shore and in at least 10 ft of water, the environmental impact is minimal.

CFD, Erosion, Waves, Wakes, Wind Driven Waves

Fay, E. , Gunderson, A. and Anderson, A. (2022) Numerical Study of the Impact of Wake Surfing on Inland Bodies of Water. Journal of Water Resource and Protection, 14, 238-272. doi: 10.4236/jwarp.2022.143012.