Report on exposed elements and historical impacts in Cala Millor

Deliverable D3.3. In this report we provide a comprehensive description of the upper beach as an exposed element in front of wave climate at Cala Millor beach, including its mean and extreme regimes, using all available in-situ and modeled data. Our main focus is on extreme wave events, and on the quantification of the impact of these episodes on the beach response, in terms of erosion patterns measured as changes in the shoreline position. We also characterize the regional synoptic patterns that generate the different types of wave extremes observed in the beach. Cala Millor has been extensively monitored since 2011, making this spot one of the best monitored beaches worldwide. Additionally, we have used numerical model outputs that have been recently generated with a coupled hydrodynamic-wave model covering all the Mediterranean basin with unprecedented spatial resolution, reaching 200 m in coastal regions. The modeled data set spans the period 1950-2022, allowing to extend the observational period several decades. The model has been forced with surface mean sea level pressure and wind fields from the state-of-the-art ERA5 atmospheric reanalysis, and these data have also been used to describe the atmospheric conditions over the western Mediterranean basin during extreme episodes.