Heavy Surf Brings In Surprise Gift of Sand

It seemed like a sure bet for disaster.

One end of the Port Hueneme beach had already eroded to within 40 feet of Surfrider Drive, and on Wednesday and Thursday it took the brunt of the heaviest summertime surf to hit Ventura County in memory.

“We were expecting to see losing the road with waves like this,” lifeguard John Rowe said Thursday. “But it just didn’t materialize.”

Instead of ripping out the last of the sand, the unusual south swell that hit Southern California this week may have eased Port Hueneme’s problem a bit. The big waves are rolling in from almost the opposite direction of the northwest currents that usually scour out the beach.

“This has been actually bringing sand and dumping it here,” said lifeguard Caleb Fisher. When Fisher went out for a swim in the surf on Wednesday, he said, he couldn’t touch bottom. The same spot a day later was only 5 feet deep, he said.

“It’s dangerous because it’s shallower,” Fisher said, explaining that the unusually big waves could pound an inexperienced surfer into the turf.

Except for escorting four thrill seekers away from a rock jetty, the beach’s lifeguards had made no rescues by midday Thursday.

The heavy surf hit harder to the south, where the Point Mugu Navy base saw a 12-foot sea wall cut down by half at one point, with giant waves tossing two-ton chunks of rock like beach balls.

Base spokesman Alan Alpers said work crews Wednesday and Thursday put sandbags around staff buildings and dug a drainage ditch into Mugu Lagoon to relieve flooding in a parking lot. A crane worked to rebuild the sea wall, he said, and the waves caused no permanent damage.

Port Hueneme officials, who have been struggling to get the Navy to commit to a permanent program of sand replenishment, had expected that kind of damage from the heavy swell before it petered out today.

“So far, so good,” community development director Tom Figg said. Two factors worked in the beach’s favor, he said: The southerly swell tends to replenish sand, and old riprap uncovered by previous erosion is protecting what’s left of the beach.

The Army Corps of Engineers has rejected the city’s request to conduct an emergency sand replenishment, Figg said, and will hew to the usual schedule of depositing sand in November.

The City Council decided earlier this month not to conduct its own beach-saving effort, which could have cost $250,000, Figg said. Instead, the council is working to get Congress to pressure the Navy and the Army Corps of Engineers to act.

The two agencies have dredged the Port of Hueneme every two years since the 1950s and used the sand to replenish the beach.

The arrangement has been informal, though, and the city--faced with a worsening erosion problem that could threaten 420 coastal homes--wants a permanent agreement.