Do you ever wonder why there's always 'no swimming' and 'keep away' signs next to structures such as piers, groynes and jetties on beaches?

There are a lot of different types of rip currents out there and this one doesn’t get the attention it deserves, but has possibly contributed to a lot of myths about rip currents.

So while rip currents are dangerous to people, they are also a main cause of beach erosion.

New Zealand has perhaps the most varied coastline of any country in the world, beaches included. There are multiple coastlines, straits, bays, islands, different wave climates….and lots of rips.

Amongst the many rip current related projects I'm involved with, the one that's most fun is helping out Spencer Rogers from the North Carolina Sea Grant and his grad student Cobi Christiansen from the University of North Carolina Wilmington doing rip current experiments using GPS drifters.

I recently visited some Phuket beaches myself during the monsoon season and was amazed to see beaches and surf conditions that, to me, looked just like south-east Australian conditions.

While there are different types of rip currents, rip currents are most definitely NOT undertow. Rip currents do not pull people under, they just take them for a ride.It all begins with an idea.

Most people think of beaches in Thailand as places of calm water bliss and that's what the tourist brochures show.It all begins with an idea.

Pattern recognition. Spotting rip currents is all about seeing patterns in the surf along the beach. What's different about this beach? It all begins with an idea.