Storm Hydrograph / Flood Hydrograph / Hydrograph - single peaked skew distribution of Basin lag (lag time) – most important
me) – most important characteristic of a basin affecting hydrograph sue to a
discharge
Hydrograph – response of given catchment to a rainfall input
Three phases of Runoff- Viz. surface run-off, interflow & base flow
FACTORS AFFECTING HYDROGRAPH
Physiographic factors
a. Basin Characteristics – size, shape, slope, nature of valley, drainage density
b. Infiltration characteristics – land use and cover, soil type and geological
conditions, lakes, swamps and other storage
c. Channel characteristics – cross-section, roughness, storage capacity
Climatic factors
a. Storm characteristics – precipitation, intensity, duration, magnitude, movement of
storm’
b. Initial loss
c. Evapotranspiration
Shape of the basin - influences the time taken for the water from the remote parts of the
catchment to arrive at the outlet
Fan-shaped - give high peak and narrow hydrographs
Elongated catchments – give broad and low-peaked hydrographs
Small catchment - overland flow phased is predominant over the channel flow
Peak flood - land use and intensity of rainfall have important role on it.
Time base - of the hydrograph from larger basins will be larger than those of corresponding
hydrograph of smaller basins
Slope of the main stream - Controls the velocity of flow in the channel
Basin slope - is important in small catchments where the overland flow is relatively more important
Drainage density - ratio of the total channel length to the total drainage area
Vegetation and forests - increase the infiltration and the storage capacities of soil
Vegetal cover - reduces the peak flow (area less than 150 km²
Duration of storm - of given intensity also has a direct proportional effect on the volume of runoff
Peaked hydrograph - quicker concentration of flow at the basin outlet
COMPONENTS OF HYDROGRAPH
a. Rising limb/concentration curve – increase in storage due to gradual building up of
storage and channels and over the catchment surface (basin and storm
characteristics control its shape)
b. Crest segment – one of the most important parts n hydrographs as it contains peak
flow
c. Recession limb – represents the withdrawal of water from the storage built up in the
basin (Barnes 1940)
Peak flow - occurs when runoff from various parts of the catchment simultaneously contribute
amounts to achieve the maximum amount of flow at the basin outlet
Multiple-peaked complex hydrograph - when two or more storms occur in succession
STORAGE OF WATER IN BASIN EXISTS AS
a. Surface storage – surface detention and channel storage
b. Interflow storage
c. Groundwater storage – base- flow storage
Surface-flow hydrograph - obtained from the total storm hydrograph by separating the quick-
response flow from the slow response runoff
Direct runoff hydrograph - surface runoff hydrograph obtained after the base-flow separation
Effective rainfall (excess rainfall) - part of the rainfall that becomes direct runoff at the outlet of
the watershed
Hyetograph of the rainfall - pruned by deducting the losses
Effective Rainfall Hyetograph (excess rainfall hyetograph) – initial loss and infiltration losses
Unit-hydrograph method (Sherman 1932) - most popular method in predicting the flood
hydrograph
Unit hydrograph - hydrograph of direct runoff resulting from one unit depth (1cm) of rainfall
excess occurring uniformly over the basin and at a uniform rate for a specified duration
Time-invariant - direct runoff response to a given effective rainfall in a catchment
Direct-runoff response - to the rainfall excess is assumed to be linear
Unit hydrograph – calculation f flood hydrographs through digital computers
TWO METHODS IN UNIT HYDROGRAPHS
a. Method of superposition
b. The S-curve (S-hydrograph) – hydrograph produce by a continuous effective
rainfall at a constant rate for an infinite period
Oscillation of S-curve – errors in interpolation of unit hydrograph
Unit hydrograph – assumes uniform distribution rainfall over the catchment (lower limit of 200
ha)
Distribution graph (Bernard 1935) – variation of the unit hydrograph
Synthetic unit hydrographs - unit hydrographs derived from empirical eq. which relate the
salient hydrograph
Snyder 1938 – developed empirical equations for synthetic unit hydrographs
Snyder’s synthetic-unit hydrograph – with some modifications
storm
Dimensionless unit hydrographs - recommended by various agencies to facilitate construction
of synthetic unit hydrographs
Short-term plan - quick method for estimating design flood peak has been developed
Long-term plan - separate regional methodology has been developed by CWC
Divided into 26 hydro meteorologically homogeneous subzones (India)
Instantaneous unit hydrograph – limiting case of a unit hydrograph of zero duration
Convolution integral / Duhamel integral
Flood - nusually high stage in a river, the level at which the river overflows its banks and
inundates the adjoining area
Hydrologic design – hydrograph of extreme floods and stages corresponding to flood peaks
provide valuable data for it
Flood peak - most important and widely used parameter in flood hydrograph
Rational formula – only applicable for small-size catchment (<50km²)
Unit-hydrograph method – normally restricted to moderate-size catchments with areas less
than 5000 km²
Coefficient C - represents the integrated effect of the catchment losses and hence depends
upon the nature of the surface, surface slope and rainfall intensity
Empirical formulae - used for the estimation of flood peak are essentially regional formulae
based on statistical correlation of the observed peak and important catchment properties.
Kanwarsain and karpov 1967- have presented enveloping curves representing the relationship
between the peak flood flow and catchment area
Unit hydrograph technique – can be used to predict the peak-flood hydrograph if the rainfall
producing the flood, infiltration characteristics of the catchment and the appropriate unit
hydrograph are available
Extreme rainfall situations – used to obtain the design storm viscosity, the hydrograph of rainfall
excess causing extreme floods
Hydrologic process – such as floods are exceedingly complex natural events
Annual series – values for the annual maximum flood from the given catchment area for large
number of successive years constitute a hydrologic data series
Chow 1951 – shown that most frequency distribution functions applicable in hydrologic studies
can be express by the eq. known as general equation of hydrologic frequency analysis
Commonly used frequency distribution functions for the predication of extreme flood values
are:
a. Gumbel’s extreme-value distribution
b. Log-Pearson type III distribution
c. Log normal distribution
Gumbel 1941- introduced the extreme value distribution (known as Gumbel’s distribution)
Gumbel’s distribution – one of the most widely used probability distribution functions for
extreme values in hydrologic and meteorologic studies for prediction of flood peaks, maximum
rainfalls, maximum wind speed, etc.
Mean annual flood – flood with T = 2.33 years
Estimate of the confidence limits – desirable because Gumbel’s method can have errors due
to limited sample data used.
Log normal distribution – when the skew is zero, the log pearson type distribution reduces to it
In annual hydrologic data series of floods, only one maximum value of flood per year is
selected as the data point
Partial-duration series – a flood magnitude larger than an arbitrary selected base value
Regional analysis – adopted when the available data at a catchment is too short to conduct
frequency analysis
Flood frequency studies – most reliable in climates that are uniform from year to year
Small structures (culverts, storm drainages) – can be designed for less severe floods
Design flood – flood adopted for the design of the structure
Spillway design flood – design flood used for the specific purpose of designing the spillway of a
storage structure
Standard project flood (SPF) – flood that would result from a severe combination of
meteorological and hydrological factors
Probable maximum flood (PMF) – the extreme flood that is physically possible in a region as a
result of severe most combinations.
- Used in situations where the failure of the structure would result in the loss of life and
catastrophic damage (SPF is about 40-60% of PMF)
Hydraulic head – defined as the difference between the maximum water level on the
upstream and normal annual average flood level on the downstream
Intermediate size dam – dam with gross storage of 5 mm³ and hydraulic head of 15 m
Design storm – to estimate the design flood for a project by the use of unit hydrograph