Flow Near Wells in a Partially Saturated Geologic Media

Reliable prediction of fate and transport of contaminants in subsurface requires the knowledge of hydraulic properties of subsurface in saturated and unsaturated zone.  Pumping tests are commonly used to estimate field scale properties of subsurface. The conceptualization of groundwater flow during unconfined pumping tests has been a challenging task that has spurred substantial theoretical research in the field hydrogeology for decades. In the last decade, research into developing unconfined aquifer test solutions has mostly focused on explicitly coupling the aquifer with the linearized vadose zone. Here we discuss recent work on coupled saturated-unsaturated analytical models for flow near pumping wells.