Singapore is a sunny island set in the sea. It has everything you could ask of such an island - bright tropical sunshine which is great for tanning, swaying palm trees, a whole palette of tasty titbits to suit every palate, young attractive specimens of the opposite sex - you name it, Singapore has it.

Except for one thing which every self-respecting tropical island should have. Yes, you guessed it. We don't have any surf (no wonder we're a nation of Internet-surfers - it's because we can't find the real thing). In fact, both Swan (1971) and Chew (1974) have observed that the average breaker height is less than twenty centimetres!

Why will the Television Corporation of Singapore never be able to film a local version of 'High Tide'? Why do you think the closest they came to such a series was called 'Troubled Waters'? This chapter sets out to answer these, and similar, questions. We shall proceed by visiting four distinctly different coastal environments.

The energy of a wave is directly dependent on windspeed and the size of the fetch (which is the distance of water over which the wind blows). Both of these factors conspire against would-be surfers in Singapore to produce what are known as low-energy environments along most of Singapore's coastline.

The only exception to this is at Labrador Park in the south, where there is a stretch of rocky shoreline too inhospitable for most fun-seekers. Not only that, but wave energy there is still not high enough for surfing, and that area will be extensively reclaimed for port infrastructure within the next four decades anyway.

The reclamation would be indeed unfortunate because it would probably destroy all evidence of one of Singapore's greatest mysteries: whether there is an underwater tunnel linking Sentosa to mainland Singapore. A local specialist engineering and environmental services company - AL Technologies - believes that it may have found evidence of a six-hundred-metre-long tunnel linking the former military fortification of Fort Siloso on Sentosa to the Battery at Labrador Park.

The Labrador Battery was built in 1939, at around the same time as the fort. It consists of gun emplacements, bunkers and pillboxes. The bunkers were sealed in the fifties.

So far, investigations have only proceeded at the Labrador Battery, but using electromagnetic pulses, some evidence of a collapsed tunnel about twenty metres underground has already been found. This tunnel may only be one of an entire nest which would have once provided easy access for British troops to Connaught and Serapong on Sentosa and Fort Silinsing on Pulau Brani.

If the tunnel is indeed there, it is interesting because its orientation echoes that of the folds of the Jurong Formation which we read about in Chapter One. Presently, when one stands at the Labrador Battery and looks towards the wave-cut platforms beneath Fort Siloso, it is patently obvious that the island of Sentosa is simply a continuation of these folds, and was itself once joined to mainland Singapore. The sandstone ridge was probably breached by rising sea-levels, which we read about in the previous chapter.

Virtually There at Labrador Battery - a 231 k QuickTime VR panorama.

Apart from these historical reasons, Labrador Park is significant because of its rocky shoreline, which presents rich fieldtrip opportunities for students of geography. For biology students too, the ecosystems [?] present at Labrador Park are not found anywhere else in Singapore. The reasons for the rocky shoreline are first that it is the only stretch of coast where the resistant sandstones of the Jurong Formation (which we learnt about in Chapter One) directly abuts the energy of the waves.

Second, waves here are potentially erosive (also known as destructive) because the fetch is longest here, when compared to any other stretch of coastline in Singapore. This is because the stretch of open water directly facing the Labrador coast is not interrupted by any islands, as other parts of the Singapore coastline are (most notably the northern shores).

However, it should be noted that just because fetch is at its maximum at Labrador, it does not necessarily follow that winds are strongest from the southwest. Indeed, as can be seen below, this is distinctly not the case!

Source: Longman (1994)

One of the greatest possible contrasts to the rocky beach at Labrador Park is the shoreline on the north-western and northern coasts of Singapore, from Sarimbun to Loyang. The natural vegetation here is called mangrove, and like the natural vegetation practically everywhere else on the island, has been fighting a losing battle against the advance of man. Currently, there are about five hundred hectares of mangrove forest in Singapore.

Wave energy here is at its weakest of any shore in Singapore, simply because the fetch is so small - on average, it is only less than two kilometres. This small fetch does not present a great deal of surface area of water for the wind to blow over and to agitate into large, destructive waves. As a result, waves along this coast are termed constructive, because they help to build up, or 'construct', a beach, through the deposition of sediments.

What marks out the north shore environment even apart from other low energy environments like the east coast, however, is that at the north shore, wave energy is often so low that the waters immediately at the shore are practically stagnant. Not only that, but the waters there are turbid with fine-grained sediment.

This sediment originated from the weathering and erosion of the continental shelf [?], which was exposed during periods of lower sea level [?] immediately post-Flood. This unique situation gives rise to certain problems for the natural vegetation growing along this shoreline.

Foremost among these is that the near stagnant water means that the concentration of oxygen in the water is very low. The water is described as being anaerobic. The mangrove forest therefore has special adaptations to allow it to survive in these harsh conditions.

For example, many of the species, such as avicennia, have roots which protrude upward through the mud to directly absorb oxygen from the air during low tide. These breathing roots are also known as pneumatophores.

Another problem which the mangrove species face is that of lack of support from the soft mud. Species like the rhizophora have roots which grow from their trunk to help prop up the tree.

The bruguiera has fruit which germinate while still attached to the tree so that when the fruit eventually falls, its long tap root helps to anchor it upright.

As if conditions were not inhospitable enough, mangrove species still have to contend with the problem of salty water. They have developed a whole host of adaptations, from having thick, leathery leaves, to actively being able to secrete the salt, to deal with the excessive salinity. Plants which are thus adapted are called halophytes.

If you would like to experience for yourself what it's like to simultaneously suffocate and sink into salty slime, good examples of mangrove forest still exist at Sungei Buloh and Pasir Ris.

Virtually There in the mangrove swamp at Sungei Buloh - a 319 k QuickTime VR panorama.