February 2015 (ROTM#74) Huntington State Beach, California

In the 'rip current world' this picture by Tom Cozad is famous. It was taken as part of a set for Surfline to capture a massive swell hitting the Californian Coast near Los Angeles several years ago. The pictures in the set are truly phenomenal.  This picture shows some massive rips, full of churning sand, heading offshore and spiralling around like a vortex. Definitely impressive rips.

However, this picture really bothers me. Why? Well, it gets used a LOT in beach safety and rip current education material to show people what a rip current looks like. The problem is, it's a very rare kind of rip. Something like this only forms during big, long period swell waves that approach and break on the beach at a strong angle. This creates a really strong and unstable longshore current that has a tendency to spin offshore as these eddy-like rips. The rip looks horrible, but it's probably not that fast and not dangerous. You wouldn't be swimming on days like this anyway!

I'll say it again - it's really unusual to get such a large and ferocious looking rip. So the fact that it's being used to tell people 'this is what rips look like' is very misleading and wrong. Sorry....these sort of things bug me! Check out the rest of the photos on this page to get a real sense of what most rips that you will encounter at a beach under normal conditions will look like.

One of the most amazing rip pics you’ll ever see.