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Glossary
ABrASIoN The wearing away of a cliff by the scouring action of sand and pebbles carried in the surf.
Arch A natural tunnel cut through a headland, usually by the growth of a cave. An example of an arch is Durdle Dor, Dorset (see its picture on page 1).
BAckwASh The flow of surf back down a beach.
BAr A ridge of sand that forms across an estuary, blocking off a river from the sea. Some wide bars are called barriers, and if a bar is split by channels into islands, each island is called a barrier island. An example of a bar is at Slapton Sands, Devon.
BArrIEr ISlAND A long ridge of sand that has been driven ashore
by waves and which forms long, thin islands offshore. They are uncommon in the UK, but very common in the eastern and southern United States, where they are sites for holiday resorts like Miami Beach, Florida.
BAy A natural, smoothly-curved inlet in the coast. Bays are formed in softer rocks and are bounded by headlands. Many bays have wide, sandy beaches.
BEAch A thin sheet of sand or pebbles that lies between the high and low-tide parts of a coast.
BrEAkEr A wave that reaches the coast and then rises steeply, so that the leading edge of the wave develops foam.
cAvE A natural hollow in a cliff, formed as a result of breaking waves crashing against the rocks. Most caves form where lines of weak rock are eroded by waves.
clIff A steep slope at the coast, often with a face of bare rock.
coAST The place where the land meets the sea.
covE A very small bay, usually less than a kilometre or so across.
Coves tend to occur within hard rock coasts. Cornwall is noted for its many “smugglers’ coves”.
DElTA The fan-shaped area of land that builds up where a river enters the sea and the sand and silt it is carrying settle out. The Mississippi Delta is an example of a large delta.
DEPoSIT The settling out of material, such as sand, carried by waves or currents.
EroSIoN The wearing away and removal of land.
ESTuAry A drowned valley in a low lying coast. Estuaries were formed during the Ice Age when sea levels
fell and rivers cut into their beds. At the end of the Ice Age the sea levels rose again and flooded the ends of the deepened valleys. The estuaries of the Thames, Wye, Severn and Humber are all examples of drowned valleys.
fjorD An inlet created by a glacier during the Ice Age and now flooded by the sea. The world’s longest fjord is the Sogne fjord, which stretches 204km inland from the coast
of Norway.
floTSAm Rubbish that people have dumped in the sea and which has floated onto the beach.
groyNE A fence built out onto a beach to stop the natural drift of sand along the beach.
hEADlAND The parts of the coast that stand out into the sea. Most headlands are formed in hard rock.
IcE AgE The time when glaciers and ice sheets spread over the land. The water locked up in the ice caused the sea levels to fall, so that rivers and glaciers cut down into their former beds. When the Ice Age was over
and sea levels rose once more, these valleys became flooded to make estuaries (river valleys) and fjords, sea lochs and sounds (glacial valleys).
landslide A rapid movement of rock and soil down a cliff. This occurs more commonly in soft rocks, and especially after heavy rainfall.
loNgShorE DrIfT The natural sawtooth movement of sand along a beach. It is caused by the different directions in which the swash and backwash moved. Longshore drift causes the formation of sand spits.
muD The finest size of material carried by water. Mud will only settle out when conditions are calm, such as in an estuary. Mud builds up in estuaries to form mudflats.
muDflow The rapid movement, as a flow of soil, rock and water, down a cliff.
oIl SlIck The trail of oil that is produced on the surface of the sea after an oil spill.
oIl SPIll The accidental or deliberate release of oil from a ship or storage tank. It is one of the most devastating forms of beach pollution.
PolluTE To contaminate a healthy environment, such as a beach, and so threaten wildlife and people.
rIPPlE Small waves in sand that are seen on sandy beaches close to the low tide level.
SAND DuNE Mounds of sand that build up at the back of some wide beaches as a result of sand being blown inland off the beaches at low tide.
SAND SPIT A long, often curved, deposit of sand formed where the coast turns sharply, or where there is an estuary. Spits are formed because waves push material along the beach and do not change direction quickly. As a result, they continue to send material in the same direction as the beach, and this gradually builds up in the sea as a long beach. Large sand spits in the UK include Borth sands