Rip tides fact or overblown danger?

[slackercruster]

Rip tides fact or overblown danger?

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Was talking with a guy that said he had to be rescued at the outer banks NC after being pulled out with a rip tide.

My experience is limited to the West Coast ~ Santa Monica area.

Been to the beach hundreds of times and never got pulled out.

Sure sometimes my feet got buried in the sand as the waves sucked most everything else past me.

Yes, it took some effort to fight the wave actions, but never close to being rippled off my feet.

Only problem I had was being pile drived by waves when body boarding. I almost broke my neck a couple of times, when the waves suck it all out and all you see the bare sea bottom in front of you that your crash into.

Do people get ripped due to their own inadequacies as swimmers and water skills?

Or will rip tides get the best of them if conditions are right?

(Not referring to the giants Laird surfs in my posts...just average 6 to 8 foot waves. http://www.lairdhamilton.com/)


Thanks

 

[Peter_C]

Rip tides are very real, and something you need to always pay attention too. My brother was surfing in San Diego, which he did all the time, and spent an hour trying to get back to the beach after taking a ride out to sea. Up here on the North Coast I have seen them so strong we could not swim against the current.

Remember if caught in a rip, do not swim against it, but swim sideways for a hundred yards, then try coming back in.

 

[Rick Murchison]

I never saw a classic rip current on the west coast. They may exist, but I never saw one - that's because the bottom's different than the multibar, gently sloping sand that creates the classic rip, which can easily flow at speeds greater than any swimmer can swim. They're no big deal, however, so long as you keep your head, because they are not very wide and easy to get out of by swimming at right angles to the flow.
If you don't swim across it, however, you're going with it. May as well relax and enjoy the ride.
Note: we also call any exceptionally strong tidal current a "rip tide" - and the worst I've ever seen anywhere were in the Pacific northwest. Those rips are a different matter entirely - avoidance is the best (only sane, in come cases) policy.
Rick

 

[Lead_carrier]

I haven't seen the west coast ones. I've been caught in an east coast one. I do not want to do that again. Fortunately I was able to get some assistance and get out without a long swim out, around and back. Believe everyone when they say they are real.

 

[Thalassamania]

They exist on the California coast, tend to be a dash weaker and not as broad as out on the banks.

 

[erparamedic]

I was snorkelling with my kiddos and hubby off of Shell Key last June. We were warned by the boat captain that the rip was strong, and to be careful. The kids were 6 and 8 at the time... they snorkelled while we held onto them tightly, hubby and I kept feet planted in the sand, and didn't go over chest deep in the water. The bottom was a very gentle slope... so chest deep was about 100 feet from shore. If we let go of the kids, the current pulled them right away... so no letting go. There was NO WAY that we could swim against the current (and it was travelling around the tip of the island... not necessarily out to deeper areas... it was a classic rip). Even keeping our feet planted in the sand and leaning against the current to walk the shore line was tough. We would walk, and walk, and walk... and though the sandy bottom was changing, when we looked at the shore, we were in the same place. The kids were finding sand dollars and shells and in order for Rod to get to them, he had to hold onto my legs so that he wasn't taken by the rip.

Rips are very real... one must know how to handle themselves in one. People do die in rip currents.

 

[RonFrank]

Rip Tides are very real, and I've experienced them swimming off the outer banks.

The best thing to do when you get caught by a rip tide is to not fight it. You can't fight it, and most run parallel to shore. If you just go with it, you will likely end up down current, but not much farther from shore than you started.

People who freak out and try to swim against it can tire easily, and then the trouble begins. Just float on your back, or swim across the tide, and you will generally be OK.

If you are not a good swimmer, or are not comfortable in the water wearing a life jacket is smart. If you are diving, then you have a BC, so that can substitute even if most agencies will tell you a BC is not a life preserver.

 

[diverdan214]

The trouble is that if handled correctly like ^ they're not THAT big a deal. However in trying to inform people about how to react properly to them some people will overblow them or react to the warning in an overblown way.

 

[Charlie99]

I was snorkelling with my kiddos and hubby off of Shell Key last June. We were warned by the boat captain that the rip was strong, and to be careful. The kids were 6 and 8 at the time... they snorkelled while we held onto them tightly, hubby and I kept feet planted in the sand, and didn't go over chest deep in the water. The bottom was a very gentle slope... so chest deep was about 100 feet from shore. If we let go of the kids, the current pulled them right away... so no letting go. There was NO WAY that we could swim against the current (and it was travelling around the tip of the island... not necessarily out to deeper areas... it was a classic rip). Even keeping our feet planted in the sand and leaning against the current to walk the shore line was tough. We would walk, and walk, and walk... and though the sandy bottom was changing, when we looked at the shore, we were in the same place. The kids were finding sand dollars and shells and in order for Rod to get to them, he had to hold onto my legs so that he wasn't taken by the rip.

Rips are very real... one must know how to handle themselves in one. People do die in rip currents.

Was this a longshore current, or a current going seaward from every point along the coast? If it was going seaward all the time, where was the water coming from?

I think there is a lot of confusion between the normal undertow of a wave swept beach; the rip currents which are water from wave action over a wide area returning seaward funneled or concentrated in a narrow zone; tidal currents; and longshore currents.

edit: just did a google on "undertow" and found that it isn't always defined the way I do. I consider undertow to the that strong seaward movement of water near the bottom caused by water flowing back out from breakers moving up the beach. Using this definition, undertow is found all along a beach with waves. Rip tides are where the undertow is concentrated by the contours of the bottom, and the surface of the water is also going seaward.

By "longshore currents" I mean those currents that run more or less parallel to the beach. Causes include swells coming in at an angle to the beach, wind, or tides. Longshore currents can be a problem if you are trying to return to a specific exit point after a dive.

 

[muddiver]

Rip currents are way cool because you can use them to get through the surf zone quickly when beach diving. You just have to remember to exit either side of the rip current trough so as not to wear yourself out returning to shore.