Abstract

Along the southwestern coast of Portugal, a high-energy, swelldominated environment with a markedly seasonal wave climate, morphologicchange in three embayed beaches was regularly monitored over a two year period.While a general seasonal pattern was identified, the occurrence of a storm groupinduced dramatic beach response, producing marked interannual variability.Significant spatial variations in behaviour emerged during the monitoring period,inducing alongshore non-uniform beach change within each embayment. Megaripswere the prevailing mechanism responsible for the extreme erosion experienced inall three beaches, and their specific location (controlled by topography) contributesto the variability observed within each beach. Despite severe beach erosion, duneswere unaffected, which suggests long-term stability of these high-energy,dissipative, embayed coastlines.Introduction