Hydrologic Engineering Center

River Analysis System

HEC-RAS

Release Notes
Version 5.0.1
April 2016
Approved for Public Release Distribution Unlimited

Introduction
Version 5.0.1 of the River Analysis System (HEC-RAS) is now available. This
Version supersedes Version 5.0, and all previous versions. Several new
simulation features have been added to the software since that time. Version
5.0.1 of HEC-RAS includes the following new features:
1. Two-dimensional and combined 1D/2D Unsteady Flow Modeling
2. New HEC-RAS Mapper capabilities and enhancements
3. Automated Manning's n value calibration for 1D unsteady Flow
4. Simplified Physical Breaching algorithm for Dam and Levees
5. Breach Width and development time calculator
6. New Hydraulic outlet features for Inline Structures
7. Sediment Transport Modeling Enhancements: Including unsteady flow
sediment transport analyses; Reservoir flushing and sluicing; as well
as channel stability using BSTEM integrated within HEC-RAS
8. Completely new 2D User's manual
9. Several new example applications within the Applications Guide
10. Updates User's Manual, Hydraulic Reference manual, Applications
Guide, and Help System
Other minor enhancements were also added. The development team has also
continued careful and systematic testing of the software since the last
release. The results of that testing in combination with reports from users has
allowed the identification and repair of various problems. Some minor
problems that did not affect results but caused problems in the software
interface have been repaired without being specifically documented.

Installation
The installation program and all documentation are available on the HEC
website at http://www.hec.usace.army.mil . This new release is installed
independently of any previous versions of the program. Users may have the
new version and previous versions of HEC-RAS software installed
simultaneously for parallel use or testing. This new version is fully compatible
with projects developed in any previous version of the program. However,
once a project has been opened in Version 5.0.1 and saved, it may not be
possible to open it with an older version of the software and reproduce the old
results.

The new installation package is designed to be easy to use. It will take you
through the steps of selecting a directory for the program files and making
other settings. Use the following steps to install the program on the Microsoft
Windows operating system:
1. Download the installation package from the HEC website to a
temporary folder on the computer.
2. Run the installation program. In Windows Explorer, double-click
the icon for the installation program. You must have administrator
privileges to run the installer.
3. Follow the on-screen prompts to install the program.

New Capabilities
Two-dimensional and combined 1D/2D Unsteady Flow
Modeling
HEC has added the ability to perform two-dimensional (2D) hydrodynamic
routing within the unsteady flow analysis portion of HEC-RAS. Users can now
perform one-dimensional (1D) unsteady-flow modeling, two-dimensional (2D)
unsteady-flow modeling (Saint Venant equations or Diffusion Wave
equations), as well as combined 1D and 2D unsteady-flow routing. The 2D
flow areas in HEC-RAS can be used in number of ways. The following are
examples of how the 2D flow areas can be used to support modeling with
HEC-RAS:

1. Detailed 2D channel modeling

2. Detailed 2D channel and floodplain modeling
3. Combined 1D channels with 2D floodplain areas
4. Combined 1D channels/floodplains with 2D flow areas behind levees
5. Directly connect 1D reaches into and out of 2D flow areas
6. Directly connect a 2D flow area to 1D Storage Area with a hydraulic
structure
7. Multiple 2D flow areas in the same geometry
8. Directly connect multiple 2D flow areas with hydraulic structures
9. Simplified to very detailed Dam Breach analyses
10. Simplified to very detailed Levee Breach analyses
11. Mixed flow regime. The 2D capability (as well as the 1D) can handle
supercritical and subcritical flow, as well as the flow transitions from

subcritical to super critical and super critical to subcritical (hydraulic

jumps).
For more information about the new 2D modeling capabilities, please review
the new 2D Modeling Users manual.

New HEC-RAS Mapper capabilities and enhancements

Geospatial capabilities are available in HEC-RAS to assist the hydraulic
engineer to more efficiently create and refine the geometry of the hydraulic
model. Using the RAS Mapper, HEC-RAS users can quickly analyze model
results through the geospatial visualization with geometric data to more
readily identify hydraulic model deficiencies and make model improvements.
Primary visualization datasets are inundation boundary polygons and flood
depth grids determined through evaluation of water surface elevations with a
digital terrain model. The terrain model format support is the GeoTiFF file
format. Raster data can be generated either on-the-fly or stored to disk for
flood depth, velocity, arrival time and many other parameters. Velocity
vector and velocity tracing plots can be generated dynamically through the
interpolation of computed results. Raster results can also be exported for
visualization in web-based mapping.
HEC-RAS 5.0 has also introduced the capability for directly using web imagery
for basemap layers and the ability to reproject and display data using the
GDAL open source library within RAS Mapper. The implementation of the
GDAL tools allows for the visualization of many different file formats in
different projections for analysis with RAS data. Additional geospatial options
in RAS Mapper allow the user to take advantage of the National Levee
Database and National Land Cover Database during model construct.
For more details on RAS Mapper, see Chapter 20 in the main HEC-RAS Users
manual.

Automated Manning's n value calibration for 1D unsteady

Flow
In order to assist engineers in the calibration of unsteady flow models, we
have added an automated Mannings n value calibration feature. This Option
requires observed stage time series data (flow time series is optional) in order
to be used. Mannings n values are calibrated on a reach basis. One or more
reaches can be calibrated within the same run. Hydrographs are broken into
flow zones from low too high in order to allow Mannings n values to vary with
flow rate. The results from using this feature are a set of flow versus
roughness factors for each reach that it is applied too.
This automated calibration feature can be applied in either a Global or
Sequential optimization mode. The Global mode optimizes Mannings n
values for all reaches at the same time. While the Sequential mode
optimizes Mannings n values for one reach at a time, working from upstream
to downstream. Mannings n values are optimized (adjusted) for each flow

zone until the maximum flow zone error is less than a user entered tolerance,
or until a maximum number of iterations is reached.
For details on how to use the new Automated Mannings n value calibration
feature, please review Chapter 16 of the Users Manual.

Simplified Physical Breaching algorithm for Dam and

Levees
The Simplified Physical breaching method allows the user to enter velocity
versus breach down-cutting and breach widening relationships, which are
then used dynamically to figure out the breach progression versus the actual
velocity being computed through the breach, on a time step by time step
basis. This method can be used for overtopping and piping breaches.
For details on how to use the simplified physical breaching option for
unsteady flow modeling in HEC-RAS, please review Chapter 16 of the Users
Manual.

Breach Width and development time calculator

To assist users in estimating the Breach dimensions and development time,
HEC has added a Parameter Calculator to the Breach Data editor. To use
this calculator select the Parameter Calculator Tab from the breach editor.
The Breach Parameter Calculator contains five regression equations
(MacDonald\Langridge-Monopolis); Froehlich 1995; Froehlich 2008; Von Thun
and Gillete; and Xu & Zhang 2009). The user is required to enter several
parameters that describe the Dam and the volume of water behind the
structure at the time of failure. These parameters include: Top of Dam
elevation; Breach Bottom Width; Pool elevation at Failure; Pool Volume at
Failure; Failure Mode; Dam Crest width, upstream and downstream
embankment slopes; Earth Fill Type; Dam Type; and Dam Erodibility factor.
Not all values are used for all regression equations as noted on the editor.
Some of the variables are specific to the MacDonald equation, and the last
two are specific to the Xu & Zhang equation. Once the values are entered the
calculator computes Breach Bottom Width; Side Slopes; and Breach
Development Times from each of the regression equations. The user can
then select the answers from one of the equations to by pressing the Select
button next to the equation results that they would like to use.
For details on how to use the Breach width and development time calculator
option in HEC-RAS, please review Chapter 16 of the Users Manual.

New Hydraulic outlet features for Inline Structure

Several new outlet types have been added to the HEC-RAS Inline Structure
capability. These new outlet types include: culverts; user defined rating
curves; and a time series outlet in which the user can specify a flow release
with time (this is a handy feature for representing hydropower flows through
the penstocks).

For details on the new Inline structure outlet options in HEC-RAS, please
review the section on Inline Structures in Chapter 6 of the Users Manual.

Sediment Transport Modeling Enhancements: Including

unsteady flow sediment transport analyses; Reservoir
flushing and sluicing; as well as channel stability using
BSTEM integrated within HEC-RAS
Previous versions of HEC-RAS modeled sediment transport with the quasiunsteady assumption. HEC-RAS 5.0 integrates the mobile bed, sediment
transport modeling capabilities with unsteady flow. Coupling sediment
transport with unsteady flow makes most of the features native to the HECRAS unsteady flow environment available for sediment transport analysis,
including lateral structures and operational rules. HEC-RAS 5.0 includes new
operational parameters (e.g. sediment concentration and bed elevation) and
options in the Rules editors to operate structures for sediment objectives.
Unsteady sediment transport makes reservoir modeling easier and more
precise, particularly sustainable reservoir sediment alternatives like flushing
and sluicing.
Previous versions of HEC-RAS adjusted cross sections in response to sediment
deficit or surplus by adjusting nodes vertically. Cross sections could not
change laterally. HEC-RAS 5.0 includes the USDA-ARS Bank Stability and Toe
Erosion Model (BSTEM), which couples vertical bed change from classic
sediment computations with lateral processes. Using BSTEM with sediment
transport in HEC-RAS can predict cross section evolution in two dimensions
and simulate the feedbacks between incision, lateral scour, and geotechnical
bank failure processes. The USDA-ARS Bank Stability and Toe Erosion Model
(BSTEM) capabilities are still considered Beta in HEC-RAS 5.0 and have a
separate user manual released with the software.
Other new sediment features include: new HDF 5 output, gradational
hotstarts, specific gage capabilities, the Copeland (Exner 7) bed mixing
methods, the Dietrich fall velocity equation, bed roughness predictors (i.e.
equations that update bed roughness as a function of dynamic sediment
properties), a simplified channel evolution model for dam removal and
flushing erosion, an alternate reservoir deposition option, sediment flow
splits, the integrated Toffaleti-MPM transport function, gradation specific
cohesive parameters and several others.
For details on how to use the Ground Water Interflow Options for river
reaches or storage areas in HEC-RAS, please review the boundary conditions
section of Chapter 8 of the Users Manual.

HEC-RAS Manuals and Help System

The HEC-RAS Users Manuals has been completely updated for the 5.0
software release. All of the chapters have received updated text and

graphics. New information has been added to several of the Chapters. A

completely new 2D Modeling Users Manual has also been developed.
Additionally several new example applications have been added to the
Applications Guide. The HEC-RAS help system has been updated to reflect
the software changes. The new help system directly uses the users manual
PDF file. The software still has context sensitive help, in that, while on any
editor if you select the help menu option or press the F1 key, a help window
will appear with the correct section of the manual displayed.

Problems Repaired
The following is a list of bugs that were found in version 5.0 and fixed for
version 5.0.1:
1. Unsteady Flow with Pumps: A pumping station that is connected
"From" a storage area had a bug that could generate an "access
violation" error.
2. Unsteady flow with rating curves at structures: The rating
curves for: inline structure outlet rating curve, lateral structure outlet
rating curve, and user defined gate rating curves (both inline and
lateral) have been changed so that unsteady will no longer extrapolate
past the top or bottom of the curve. A warning will be generated the
first time this happens.
3. Unsteady flow with an SA/2D Hydraulic Conn between two 2D
areas: There was a bug when a SA/2D connector has a 2D area on
the upstream side. This bug would sometimes show up as an "access
violation" error.
4. Steady Flow Analysis (Encroachments at Bridges): There was a
bug when type 1 encroachments were specified immediately adjacent
to a bridge opening. The encroachment was being set to the opening.
The left encroachment was set to the left side of the bridge opening
and the right encroachment was being set to the right edge of the
opening.
5. Unsteady flow with 2D areas/Internal Hydraulic connector: For
a hydraulic connector inside of a 2D area, the DSS output for
headwater and tailwater had a bug. The reported values were "one
cell" away from the intended values. For a connection that was
entirely inside of a single cell, this resulted in a reported water surface
of "0.0". This was only a reporting issue.
6. 1D Velocity plotting in HEC-RAS Mapper for metric data sets:
1D HEC-RAS Mapper maximum velocity plot was wrong for SI data
sets.
7. Unsteady flow Lateral Structure connected to a 2D flow area:
For a lateral structure connected between a 1D river and a 2D area,
the lateral structure was pulling the water out of the river at the wrong
cross section location. The flow was being removed from the 1D river
upstream of the location it should have been removing it from.
8. User Interface Right Bank of Main channel: If you had a cross
section with a vertical wall at the right bank of the main channel, the
interface was displaying the main channel bank station at the bottom
of the vertical wall. The computations were correct, this was just a
visual problem in the interface.

9. User Interface Storage Area Elevation Volume Curves: A new

option to compute elevation vs volume curves for storage areas was
occasionally coming up with negative volumes.
10. User Interface FIPS Compliance: The interface was using a
routine to compare data that was determined to not be FIPS
compliant. This routine has been removed and we are using one that
is FIPS compliant

The following is a list of bugs that were found in version 4.1 and fixed for
version 5.0:
1. Unsteady (user defined gate curves): User defined gate curves for
storage area connections were not working.
2. Unsteady Flow Post processing (pump): If a pump group had
more than one pump that was on, only the flow from one pump was
being summed. So the total flow of the pump group was wrong as
was the total flow of the pump station. This bug did not affect the
unsteady flow pump computations nor the pump DSS output.
3. Steady flow (bridges/cross sections with lids): For the internal
bridge cross sections (or other cross sections with lids), if there was
more than one Manning's n value in the channel, the program was not
correctly compositing the channel Manning's n value. For bridges, this
would only affect the answers using the energy method (the other
methods, such as pressure/weir were not affected).
4. Unsteady Flow Post processing: The inline structure output was not
showing the breach flow and breach velocity. This has been fixed.
5. Steady flow (bridge/WSPRO): The WSPRO method uses its own
methodology to compute the friction/expansion loss between the exit
cross section and the cross section immediately downstream/outside of
the bridge. This computation was not correct and tended to slightly
over predict the energy losses.
6. Steady flow (bridge/WSPRO): For the WSPRO bridge method, the
energy downstream of the bridge was not being correctly outputted.
(The WSPRO method recomputes the downstream water surface. The
displayed/outputted energy did not reflect the recomputed water
surface.)
7. Unsteady Flow Post processing (overflow gate): For lateral
structures, the flow through an overflow gate was not always being
output.
8. SI Sediment Volume Bug: HEC-RAS 4.1 did not convert sediment
mass into volume correctly in SI units, generally under predicting
deposition volume substantially.
9. Wilcock Transport Function: HEC-RAS 4.1 included a bug in the
Wilcock transport function that generally caused it to substantially
under predict transport.

10. Lateral Structures: A lateral structure that is connected to a point

between two XSs could get a wrong error message that the "the
distance to the upstream cross section is greater than cross section
length".
11. Unsteady (advanced rules): For the advanced rules, using the
"lookback" option (lag, average, etc.) was not working for storage
areas.
12. Steady flow (Inline structures): The program was not allowing the
water surface upstream of an inline structure to be less than water
surface downstream. In rare cases, it is possible that the hydraulic
computations should give an answer where the upstream energy is
higher than the downstream energy, but the upstream water surface is
lower than the downstream. This can happen for a weir that is highly
submerged but still has a high enough velocity that the upstream
velocity head is significantly larger than the downstream velocity head.
13. Steady flow (Bridges): If the edge of the bridge opening is a
vertical wall, and the water surface is within this vertical wall (that is,
the water surface is above the bottom of the wall and below the top of
the wall), the wetted perimeter of this wall was not being included in
the computations).
14. Steady flow (Weir): For highly submerged, sharp crested weirs the
program was computing slightly too much flow.
15. Steady flow (lateral structures): A lateral structure that only has a
rating curve (no weir, culvert, no gates) had an output problem that
could cause the output for the next cross section downstream to be
wrong.
16. Steady flow (culvert): If the elevation of the road/weir dropped
below the bottom/invert of the lowest culvert, the program could not
converge on a "weir only" solution.
17. Unsteady flow HTAB (culvert): If the elevation of the road/weir
dropped below the bottom/invert of the lowest culvert, the curves
were not correct.
18. Steady flow (culvert storage connector): For a storage area
connector where the water surface in the two storage areas was less
than 0.5 feet and there were at least two culverts with an invert
(minimum elevation for flow) greater 0.5 feet, the program could lock
up.
19. Steady flow (blocked obstruction with bridge/lid): If a cross
section with a lid (or a bridge cross section) had a blocked obstruction
that "poked through" the lid, the wetted perimeter was not being
computed correctly.
20. Unsteady flow (junctions): The "Energy Balance Method" for a
junction flow split (the flow splits into multiple reaches in the
downstream direction), was not always working correctly.

10

21. Unsteady flow (roughness factors): The flow roughness factor and
the seasonal roughness factor associated with geometric data had a
bug that caused them to be applied to the wrong range of cross
sections. This bug did not affect the roughness factors that were
entered as part of the Plan data, only those entered in the geometric
editor.
22. Unsteady flow (Modpuls/Hydrologic routing): Having both
multiple Modpuls regions and lateral inflows in the same reach was
causing a bug that was screwing up the lateral inflows.
23. Unsteady flow (Navigation Dams): For navigation dams, the
starting gate open was being set to the minimum which usually caused
a very high starting water surface behind the dam. The gate setting is
now being determined based on the target water surface.
24. Unsteady flow (Advanced Rules): If an advanced rule operation
had been used to set a desired flow (for a given gate group) and then
a later rule operation set a specific gate opening height (for that gate
group) the program was continuing to use the desired flow operation
instead of overwriting it with the designated gate opening height.
25. Steady flow (culvert): For a steep culvert, where the flow at the
inlet starts out supercritical (and the inlet is not submerged) but the
flow has a hydraulic jump (and the outlet is submerged) the program
was using the outlet answer (and reporting outlet control) when it
should have been using the inlet control answer.
26. Steady flow (culvert): For a steep culvert, where the outlet is
submerged and the original, subcritical outlet answer, shows that the
inlet is not submerged, but the inlet answer shows a submerged inlet
and "drowned" hydraulic jump, the program was not reporting the
correct, full flowing outlet answer.
27. Unsteady flow (hydraulic curves): For the hydraulic bridge curves
and hydraulic rating curves, the program was sometimes incorrectly
reporting a, "extrapolated above rating curves" when in fact it had not
had to extrapolate.
28. Sediment (Long Cum Mass Change): minor bug when erosion
punched through the cover layer and eroded down into the surface
layer during a single computation increment.
29. All (rating curve/bridges): If a cross section immediately upstream
of a bridge has a rating curve, it was causing the program to crash.
30. Sediment (overbank deposition): Material that was being
deposited in the overbank, outside of the moveable limit, was not
being removed from the sediment going to the next cross section. It
was being double accounted.
31. Sediment (dredging/cumulative out): The longitudinal cumulative
mass output was not correctly including dredged output. Output bug
only.
32. Sediment (Exner7): the Exner7 bed mixing option had several bugs.

11

33. Sediment (hydraulic averaging): the hydraulic averaging between

cross sections was improved so as to not allow hydraulic average over
cross sections with big flow changes.
34. Steady flow (Culverts): For a culvert that was partially filled in with
sediment, the reported depths for critical depth and normal depths
were not correct. The depths included the filled in depth. This was
only a reporting error, not a computation error.
35. Sediment (scour bottom): If a cross section had a large amount of
scour in a single computation interval, and this scour exceeded the
scour bottom (maximum allowable scour) the extra scour was not
being handled correctly (it was being allowed to "overshoot").
36. Unsteady (Modified Puls): If a model has multiple modified puls
regions and the different modpuls regions have not been entered from
upstream to downstream, this could have caused an error in RAS.
37. Sediment (mass correction): Didn't work correctly if xsec was
scouring and depositing at the same time (overbank deposition,
channel scour).
38. Sediment Hydraulic Design: The hydraulic design computations for
sediment transport capacity had a problem with transport through
bridges.
39. Sediment (retention option): This option did not work at junctions.
40. Unsteady (Levee Breaching and User Specified XS): There was a
bug if the user had entered a levee breach at a lateral structure that
also had user specified cross sections on the tailwater side.
41. Sediment (active method/krone): The Krone deposition method
was not working correctly for the sediment active layer method.
42. Geometry (Lateral Structure): If the Lateral Structure was set up
to have multiple cross sections on the Tailwater side, and it was set to
use Default computed intersections (on the TW side), and the LS
extended past the end of the reach, RAS was reporting the wrong
error message.
43. Unsteady (Levee and Dam breach): For the levee and dam
breach, the right side slope was being ignored. The left side slope was
being applied to both the left and right sides.
44. Unsteady (Navigation Dam): If the user had selected to use a gate
change time increment (e.g. only operate the gates every four hours),
the gate(s) were incorrectly limited to moving only for a single time
step. For instance, if the gate open rate was 0.5 feet/minute and the
time step was set to one minute, when it came time to operate the
gate, the gate would only raise a maximum of 0.5 feet. If the time
step was thirty seconds, the gate would only raise a maximum of 0.25
feet (until the next time increment for the gate operations).
45. Unsteady (Junctions): For unsteady flow at junctions, if the user
selected the energy balance method, RAS was computing the energy

12

losses based on the downstream reach lengths entered in the cross

section editor. This has been fixed so that it is now using the reach
lengths entered in the junction editor.
46. Unsteady (Dam/Levee breach): The default growth shape was
changed so that the vertical erosion rate is equal to the horizontal
erosion rate for version 5.0. Version 4.1 used different erosion rates
for vertical vs horizontal grown, and was computed to get to the
maximum depth and with at the same time. This change can make a
big difference to the computed peak flow vs the HEC-RAS 4.1 version.
If you need to reproduce the 4.1 results, you can specify the
vertical/horizontal growth rate ratio.
47. Steady flow (Supercritical/Mixed flow): For supercritical flow, the
reported friction loss was the friction loss between the current cross
section and the upstream cross section (instead of the current and the
downstream). This same issue also applied to reported headloss,
friction slope and contraction and expansion losses. This was an
output problem, and not a computational issue
48. Sediment (Exner5/Partheniades): For the Exner5 bed mixing
option, when using the Krone/Partheniades option, if the given cross
section has more than 10% clay that was a bug that could artificially
limit the amount of erosion or prevent erosion altogether.
49. Unsteady (Post Processor): Setting the Detailed Output Interval to
"Max Only" did not work correctly. (Post processor would not run.)
50. Unsteady (Warmup): The program previously did at least one
warmup time step (even if number of warmup time steps was set to
zero). This is no longer the case. If the number of warmup time steps
is set to zero, the initial results/output (at time zero) are from the
initial steady flow backwater.
51. Unsteady (Flow vs. roughness): The flow roughness factors for
negative flows (reverse flows) was not correct. The program will now
take the absolute value of the flow before performing the roughness
lookup.
52. Unsteady (Flow roughness): If the flow was smaller than the first
value in the table (the first value was not zero) then the program was
transitioning the roughness to 1.0 (no change) as the flow went to
zero. Instead, it now uses the bottom value in the table, and not
transitioning.
53. Steady/Unsteady (Rating curve on Lateral Structure): The
distance field on the lateral rating curve (for a lateral structure) was
not being used correctly. It is now being used (and the value is based
on the lateral structure stationing not the distance to the upstream
cross section.
54. Unsteady (SA Connector with Breach): If a Storage Area
Connection had a breach and the SA connector was set to "Compute
Using Curves" the breach was being ignored.

13

55. Unsteady (pump rules): For the advanced pump rules (these are
the rules specific to pumps, not the general Advanced Rules), there
was a bug if a day of month was entered as a single digit. For
example, "1Jan2012" would not work, but "01Jan2012" was ok.
56. Sediment (Concentration): The sediment concentration output was
wrong. This has been fixed.
57. Unsteady (navigation dam): The option to use both hinge control
and pool control was sometimes not working.
58. Steady and Geometric PreProcess (bridges/cuverts): Cross sections
with ineffective flow areas can have multiple critical depths. The
program was sometimes not using the best answer. The most likely
situation that this bug would show up is for the unsteady flow
preprocess internal boundary curves where the curve suddenly "shot
up" for no apparent reason.
59. Unsteady (IB Stage/Flow at Inline Structure with elev
controlled gates): When using the IB Stage/Flow option at an inline
structure to force a known stage or known flow, the program will now
operate the gates in order to match the gate opening to the forced
stage or flow. When the user entered IB Stage/Flow "runs out", the
program will revert to "normal" gate flow for the inline structure. For
the case where the inline structure is using elevation controlled gates
(as opposed to time series gates), the gate openings should match the
flow condition when the IB runs out.
60. Preprocess/Unsteady (HTAB points): The number of allowable
points in the cross section lookup tables has been increased to 500.
61. Converting bridge to cross sections with lids is no longer
supported. This option was causing stability problems in some
unsteady flow models. We felt that computing the bridge curves was a
much better option.
62. Unsteady (Inline culvert flag gates): For culverts in an inline
structure, the positive flap gate option was not working correctly.
63. Unsteady/steady (lateral structure crossing bridge): A lateral
structure that crossed a bridge showed flow leaving the river between
the bridge sections when in fact flow was not being removed from the
river. No lateral structure flow is removed between the bridge sections
and the output now reflects this.
64. Unsteady (culvert/encroachments): For unsteady flow,
encroachments adjacent to culverts were not working correctly causing
the internal boundary curves to be incorrect.
65. Unsteady flow (ungaged area computations): If the preprocessor
was run by itself, and then unsteady was run by itself, and that
unsteady plan had ungaged areas, the ungaged option may not work
correctly.

14

66. Unsteady flow (ungaged area computations): If the gage for an

ungaged area was next to a lateral structure that had user specified
intersections, there was a problem.
67. Unsteady flow (Lateral Structures): The computations
(derivatives) for highly submerged lateral structures was adjusted for
speed and stability. This may cause differences in answers for some
data sets.
68. Unsteady flow (ungaged area computations): If the ungaged
area option was used with a data set that had time slicing (and this
includes the "Flow Monitor" on hydrographs) a bug would result.

69. Unsteady flow (IB Stage/flow): The internal boundary flow (IB
stage/flow hydrograph) option was not using the user specified flow
during the initial backwater.
70. Unsteady flow (SA to SA connector): The interpolation
methodology was changed from a horizontal to a vertical method.
71. Unsteady flow (Htab): A bug in how the curves transitioned from
open flow to pressure flow. (Subroutine HBS_LIM3)
72. Unsteady flow (Lateral Structure): The user specified cross
section intersections did not work for some data sets.
73. Unsteady flow (SA connector with culvert): There was a bug for
when the invert of a culvert was higher than the low point in the weir.
74. Unsteady flow (DSS hydrograph output): Monthly DSS
hydrograph output was not being output correctly to DSS.

15

Support Policy
Technical support for program users within the Corps of Engineers is provided
through an annual subscription service. Subscribing offices can expect full
support from HEC staff in the routine application of the program. Users are
strongly urged to consult with HEC staff on the technical feasibility of using
the program before beginning a project with unique requirements. Extended
support for large or complex projects can be arranged under a separate
reimbursable project agreement.
Reporting of suspected program errors is unrestricted and we will reply to all
correspondence concerning such errors. We are continuously working to
improve the program and possible bugs should always be reported. Reports
should include a written description of the steps that lead to the problem and
the effects that result from it. If we cannot reproduce the reported problem,
we may ask you to send a copy of your project.
Report program errors through the following channels:

Go to our web site at www.hec.usace.army.mil then go to the HECRAS support page.

Send email to hec.ras@usace.army.mil on the internet.

Write to:
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Hydrologic Engineering Center
609 Second Street
Davis, CA 95616 USA.

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