Don’t Get Swept Up by Beach Fun

If winter will ever give spring its due, we’ll be hitting the beaches in big numbers again. That means acting crazy, for some of us.

It’s always unnerving to me to read those lifeguard reports showing “150 rescues today.” Were 150 people out there doing something stupid?

Some days, yes, according to the lifeguards up and down the Orange County coast. But mostly, they emphasize, people are simply unaware.

“Normal common sense doesn’t always apply at the beach,” said Eric Ching, a lifeguard at Huntington City Beach for 13 years.

You think you’re a good swimmer, but you hit a riptide--or side current--that’s stronger than your ability to get away from it. So suddenly, he said, you find yourself swept toward the pier pilings.

“Those are dangerous because they all have sharp barnacles,” Ching said.

Some fail to consider environmental conditions, said Lt. John Blauer, a marine safety officer at the Newport Beach city beach: “Right now our water is really, really cold. But some are determined to get in this big bathtub. Suddenly they are so cold they suffer hypothermia. They become disoriented and need to be rescued.”

During peak summer months, Blauer said, it’s not uncommon for Newport Beach lifeguards to make 500 rescues daily.

“A more impressive number to me, though,” Blauer said, “is not the 7,000 rescues we might make a year but the 115,000 preventive contacts we’ve made, where we help people avoid problems by just talking to them.”

One precaution: Know the peculiarities of each beach. For example, at the city beach in Seal Beach, lifeguards recommend that you shuffle your feet when you enter the water.

“We have a lot of stingray problems,” said Jeff Aldinger, a lifeguard there since 1986. “You step on them, they’ll sting you for sure. You shuffle toward them, they’ll sense your presence and dart away.”

Too often, said Ching of Huntington Beach, “most people think of the beach as a big pool, where you go from the shallow end to the deep end with steady gradation. The ocean floor just isn’t like that. You think you’re waist deep, then the next step you’re over your head.”

Blauer of Newport Beach warns about people who take running headfirst dives into the water, unaware that they might be diving into rocks or a shallow stretch that could break their necks. Always check before diving.

I asked Ching what the dumbest thing is he’s ever seen on the beach.

“How about jumping off the pier?” he said.

That pier jump is at least 45 feet--and dangerous. You can land wrong, be swept into the pilings, be swept out to sea. Ching says all those things have happened.

Here’s another thing that makes pier jumping stupid: the $100 fine.

Keep in mind these tips when you hit the beaches this spring:

1. First learn how to swim, or swim better.

“People laugh when we say that,” Ching said. “But people overestimate their swimming abilities in the ocean.”

2. Never swim out of sight of a lifeguard tower.

3. Never swim alone.

By the way, here’s the best tip I heard, from Aldinger of Seal Beach: “If you’re in a riptide, don’t swim to shore--you’re just fighting the current. Swim parallel to the beach at least 20 feet, then swim to shore. You can usually swim out of it that way.”