REGIONAL REPORT : Lifeguards Warn of Perilous Season : Beaches: As warmer water draws more people to the ocean, strong rip currents pose a threat to unwary swimmers.

With the number of rescues already running far ahead of normal, Southern California lifeguards say they are bracing for what may be a dangerous season of crowded beaches, perilous rip currents and fewer guards surviving the budget ax.

Warmer-than-usual temperatures--such as highs in the low 90s forecast for Los Angeles this weekend--have prompted thousands of residents to head to the coast earlier in the year than they might normally, and lifeguards say they have seen bigger crowds from Ventura to San Diego.

“Without question, we are in the midst of potentially the biggest spring and summer in terms of (attendance) and aquatic rescue activity that we have seen in many years,” said Stephen Long, president of the 400-member California State Lifeguard Assn.

Last year in Los Angeles County, an estimated 46 million people visited beaches and about 6,000 got into serious trouble in the ocean’s waves and currents, county officials said.

Judging from the pace of rescues so far in 1992, county Lifeguard Capt. Robert Buchanan predicted that more than 12,000 swimmers will need help out of the water before year’s end.

“We’re well on our way past last year’s figures,” said Buchanan, citing about 1,500 rescues on county beaches from Jan. 1 to April 19. During the same period in 1991, 1,297 swimmers were pulled from the water. Most of the activity is occurring in the South Bay, he said, especially in Manhattan Beach and Hermosa Beach.

Buchanan said he expects a surge in beach attendance--up to 78 million--this year because ocean waters will be warmed by the El Nino effect, a weather phenomenon near the Equator in the Pacific that raises ocean and atmospheric temperature.

Many swimmers flocking to the beach are apparently unaware that this is the season for hazardous rip currents. Known also as riptides, these currents can entrap swimmers and tug them along, causing panic and the risk of drowning.

An informal survey of lifeguard stations shows that water rescues peaked in the recent Easter break, during which thousands of school-and college-age youths spent their holidays relaxing at the beach.

In the San Diego region, where winter storms pounded west-facing beaches, the violent surf created underwater valleys and troughs where rip currents have developed.

“The bottom of our ocean is torn up,” said Del Mar Lifeguard Lt. John Schooler. “We had a lot of inshore holes and that is encouraging the rip currents.”

Schooler and other lifeguards said gentle waves and seemingly smooth ocean surfaces are deceiving and can conceal “very rough conditions for swimming.”

On Wednesday in Orange County, for example, an 18-year-old Anaheim man drifted out to sea off Newport Beach. Lifeguards said strong undercurrents separated him from friends who were unable to save him, and he has not been found.

Lifeguards note that as the weather heats up and summer arrives, they will find themselves caught in a budgetary undertow. Proposed reductions, especially for the state beaches, could mean fewer lifeguards and cutbacks in lifeguard hours and services.

Long, one of three supervising lifeguards in Southern California, said the state will be hit with a 30% reduction in lifeguard services as early as July 1, the start of the new fiscal year.

At San Clemente State Beach, for example, Long had to help identify some of the cuts that will contribute the lifeguards’ share of $9 million in “efficiency” reductions statewide. Instead of six permanent lifeguards, his staff will be cut to three. And his part-time budget will be slashed.

“It means I’ll have three bodies to cover, seven days a week,” he said.

Farther north, at Huntington and Bolsa Chica state beaches, lifeguards have proposed closing half of the beaches on some weekdays in order to reduce spending as early as next month, said supervising lifeguard David Pryor.

“We hope the governor may come up with $10 million in discretionary funds which can help,” Long said. “But we’ve had a hiring freeze, and we’re looking at a potentially very hazardous situation.”

Rip currents are by definition tides opposing other tides, producing violently disturbed water. The currents get their force from winds or other sea turbulence and an eroded sea bottom along a scalloped coastline.

For swimmers, identifying rip currents is almost as important as knowing what to do if they find themselves swimming in one, water safety experts say.

Rip currents are frightening and swimmers can run into trouble by fighting them, Schooler said. Strong swimmers can sometimes escape them by moving parallel to the shore. But lifeguards warn that swimmers who find themselves in a current that is taking them out to sea should stay calm, ride it out and then swim back to shore.

“We’re talking to people on the beach and telling them of the danger” of rip currents, Schooler said. “The danger is to panic. (To) a lifeguard, it’s pretty obvious who’s in trouble. They’re the ones going by fast, with their eyes wide open in terror.”