In many countries, the determination of the parameters of the wave, likely
to be produced after the failure of a dam, is required by law, and systemat
ic studies are mandatory. There is a necessity to develop adequate numerica
l solvers which are able to reproduce situations originated from the irregu
larities of a non-prismatic bed and to model the complete equations that pr
ogress despite the irregular character of the data. Many hydraulic situatio
ns can be described by means of a one-dimensional (1D) model, either becaus
e a more detailed resolution is unnecessary or because the flow is markedly
ID. Many techniques have been developed recently for systems of conservati
on laws in 1D tin the context of gas dynamics). Some years after their adop
tion for solving problems in gas dynamics, upwind and total variation dimin
ishing (TVD) numerical schemes have been successfully used for the solution
of the shallow water equations, with similar advantages. Their use is neve
rtheless only gradually gaining acceptance in this sector. The performance
of some of these techniques for practical applications in river flow is rep
orted in this work. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.