Abstract:
In coastal science and offshore engineering estimating the return values of significant extreme sea wave heights plays a vital
role. This paper discusses two methods, Block Maxima (BM) approach and Peak-Over- Threshold (POT) method to estimate
the 50 and 100 year return levels of extreme sea wave heights in Colombo. Generalized Extreme Value (GEV) distribution and
Generalized Pareto (GP) distribution were fitted to the BM data and POT data respectively. Parameters of GEV and GPD were
estimated with Maximum Likelihood estimation method. Gumbel distribution fitted well with the BM approach and GP
distribution fitted well with the POT approach.BM method and POT method gives much more comparable results on
estimating return values.
