Compare methods

	Tsunami Inundation Modeling	Tsunami Shallow Water Model
Field	Disaster Studies	Oceanography
Family	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Year of origin	1998	1995
Originator	Vasily Titov & Costas Synolakis (MOST model and benchmarking)	Kenji Satake
Type	Shallow-water numerical simulation pipeline (generation-propagation-inundation)	numerical-model
Seminal source	Titov, V. V., & Synolakis, C. E. (1998). Numerical Modeling of Tidal Wave Runup. Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering, 124(4), 157-171.	Satake, K. (1995). Linear and nonlinear computations of the 1992 Nicaragua earthquake tsunami. Pure and Applied Geophysics, 144(3-4), 455-470.
Aliases	Tsunami Runup Modeling, Tsunami Flooding Simulation, Shallow-Water Tsunami Inundation, Tsunami Hazard Simulation	Shallow Water Tsunami Propagation, SRTM
Related	3	3
Summary	Tsunami inundation modeling simulates the entire life of a tsunami — its generation by seafloor displacement, its propagation across the ocean, and its runup and flooding of the coast — by numerically solving the equations of shallow-water hydrodynamics. The shallow-water approximation holds because a tsunami's wavelength vastly exceeds the ocean depth, so the wave behaves as a long wave whose speed depends on water depth, refracting and shoaling as it approaches shore. Titov and Synolakis's 1998 work on numerical modeling of long-wave runup established the Method of Splitting Tsunami (MOST), a finite-difference solver that became the operational standard for tsunami forecasting and inundation mapping. Because such models drive emergency planning, Synolakis and colleagues' 2008 paper set out the analytical, laboratory, and field benchmarks every tsunami model must pass to be trusted. The defining technical challenge is the moving shoreline — the wetting and drying of land as the wave advances and retreats. The output is a map of maximum inundation depth, extent, and runup elevation along the coast.	The tsunami shallow water model is a numerical method based on shallow water equations that simulates tsunami wave propagation from earthquake source regions to coastal areas. Developed by Kenji Satake and colleagues in the 1990s, this approach provides rapid estimates of tsunami arrival times, wave amplitudes, and inundation extents for operational early warning systems. The model forms the computational backbone of tsunami warning centers worldwide.