Plane plunge pool scour with protection structures

Plunge pool scour is an important research topic in hydraulic engineering. An experimental study was carried out at the Hydraulic laboratory of the University of Pisa (Italy) to understand the hydraulics of plane plunge pool scour in presence of basin protection structures. It is known that the scour hole due to the jet impact depends on several parameters (i.e. jet discharge, jet angle, tailwater, densimetric Froude number and granulometric properties of the basin material); in presence of structures other parameters are involved, such as permeability and geometrical location of the protection structure. More than 400 experiments were carried out in order to develop relations that predict different geometrical parameters of the scour hole: the maximum scour depth, the scour length and the dynamic scour volume.