Weekend High Tides Take Some by Surprise in Newport Beach

The worst may be over for beachfront communities pummeled by exceptionally high weekend tides and waves up to 20 feet, forecasters say.

The National Weather Service calls for decreasing surf of three to four feet and 15 to 25 m.p.h. winds with temperatures in the high 70s and low 80s today and Wednesday. That warming trend is attributed to mild Santa Ana winds coming from the desert.

While some Orange County residents enjoyed the awesome display of surf during the weekend, others fought the ocean for their lives, and at least one Newport Beach resident is bemoaning his flooded house.

Newport Beach lifeguards rescued several people Sunday from rough surf and riptides, Marine Safety Lt. Jim Turner said. One of them had ignored lifeguards’ warnings and gone bodysurfing without fins, he said.

Lifeguards also rescued two 14-year-old boys trapped on Ladder Rock in Corona del Mar on Sunday morning by the rising tides.

“Our guards swam out to the rocks, removed the young men, and swam them to the state lifeguard boat,” Turner said.

Another fisherman, Ando Shinji, 33, of San Diego, was knocked off the main jetty at Dana Point Harbor by a huge wave Sunday morning, said Sgt. Howard Mol of the Orange County Harbor Patrol. Shinji suffered cuts and bruises. The jetty had been closed since Wednesday morning because of high tides, Mol said.

The tide calmed considerably by Monday. But not before it had flooded at least one Newport Beach home.

Ron Kent stood in the living room of his home Monday in the 2100 block of East Ocean Front pointing to a warped wooden floor he estimated will cost $5,000 to replace.

“We had a little lagoon right out front of the house,” he said, gesturing out the window toward the beach.

Mel Fuchs, who lives on Kent’s block, said he had never seen the tide so high.

“It was exciting for a change. The waves were just tremendous,” he said.

Fuchs said Newport Beach lifeguards built a sand berm in front of the homes Saturday to protect them from flooding.

“But later that afternoon some idiot drove through the berm,” Fuchs said.

The Newport Pier parking lot was flooded Friday night and lay under a foot of water Sunday, Turner said.

“You could see all the seaweed, kelp and mussels in the parking lot,” lot attendant Heather Flaherty said.

On Saturday, lifeguards erected sand berms to shield the lot from further flooding, Turner said.

The beach was back to normal on Monday, with sunbathers lounging against the warm, sandy berms.

“It looked like a comfy place to suntan,” said Anne O’Connor, a Canadian tourist who came to Anaheim to visit her brother-in-law, Miles O’Connor, a defenseman for the Mighty Ducks hockey team.

“I think it’s a great beach day, because we’d never get weather like this in October in Calgary,” she said.

Ian Hills, a tourist from London, said the weather was “lovely,” but he found the water “a bit rough” when he tried to bodysurf, and opted to lie on the beach instead.