Abstract:
Wind has the capability of causing large quantities of snow to drift from one place to another, resulting in significant change of snow distribution. Snowdrift has a great influence on building structures, traffic and environment, etc. Snow drift transport is commonly classified as creep, saltation, suspension and impact on the ground. A comprehensive survey is presented from the aspects of field observations, wind tunnel tests, and numerical simulation. Through field observation, the threshold friction velocity has been analyzed, and the theoretical model for calculating the deposition or erosive snow flux has been established, which is the foundation for wind tunnel test and numerical simulation. Characteristics of similarity criteria in simulating snowdrift are summarize, in which some dimensionless parameters can be relaxed in wind tunnel tests. Numerical simulations generally are based on an Eulerian reference frame, and more and more factors could be considered in numerical simulations. In the end, some suggestions are made for further research.