FPGA-based modelling of the tsunami wave propagation at South Japan water area

In this paper, we continue the discussion about fast numerical simulation of tsunami wave propagation. In case of an offshore seismic event near a coast of Japan, a tsunami wave approaches the nearest shore in approximately 20 minutes. The calculation of tsunami wave propagation is normally a part of any tsunami warning system. Speeding up this process improves the system performance. Implementation of the Mac-Cormack scheme to solve the shallow water system, earlier proposed by the authors, is used here. To accelerate the code execution, we use the advantages of such modern computer architectures as the field programmable gates array (FPGA) microchip. As most of professionals in tsunami simulation are not well acquainted with this architecture, comparisons with regular PC-based computing and the use of Graphic processing unit (GPU) are provided. Performance results of numerical simulation of tsunami, caused by the realistic shape artificial source at the southern part of Japan, are presented.