Comparison of coastal morphology and associated grain sizes distribution at Bidong Island, Terengganu

Abstract

This study was carried out at Bidong Island, Terengganu in order to study on comparison of costal morphology and associated of grain size distribution. The Island was located at off coast of Terengganu in South China Sea. The study was carried out in July 2011 in order to determine the recent beach slope and sediment characteristic and their relationship. Sampling was done in four stations which conducted at UMT Beach and Vietnam Beach which were two stations between the two beaches. Total Station TOPCON GPT-3000 had been used to measure beach profile. Meanwhile, moment method was used to calculate the sedimentological parameters. Based on the beach profile analysis, Vietnam Beach has a steeper and scatters slope compared to UMT Beach which has smoothly slope. However, for the sediment characteristic, the mean value shows the beaches were covered mostly medium, coarse and very coarse sand. When the mean values decrease, the grains sizes were getting coarser. Other than that, the sediment sorting was composed with moderately well sorted, moderately sorted and poorly sorted. As the value sorting increase, the beaches were generated poorly sorted of sediments. As a result, the direction of Net Shore Drift (NSD) was also affected based on the sedimentological characteristic and beach profile. Overall, the Vietnam Beach has much coarser grain sand with poorly sorted due to the changes of physical parameters compared to last year study on 20 I 0.