February 2017 (ROTM#98) Watipinga Beach, South Australia

As I live in New South Wales, my pictures tend to be from...well, New South Wales. However, rip currents are fairly prevalent in Australia from Fraser Island on the east coast down and around to just north of Perth on the west coast. At the bottom is South Australia, which as you can tell from the colours in this photo, has some stunning beaches thanks to limestone sediments. Watipinga Beach is a long exposed beach situated about 75 km south of Adelaide. It provides the best 'closest' surfing to Adelaide, but is also a very dangerous beach as it is easily accessible and is characterised by numerous rip currents. 

 The best example of a rip in this picture is the beautiful and slightly curved, dark gap heading offshore just past the parking lot. In the absence of flags, where do you think people would swim when they walk down the stairs to the beach? Probably in the rip. There are several other rip currents present along the beach....see if you can spot them.

 Thanks to Shane Daw for this photo. Shane is the Coastal Risk & Safety Manager at Surf Life Saving Australia and is a bit of a legend in the Surf Life Saving world in South Australia. He has also spent a lot of time in rescue helicopters (where he took this from) and I have the pleasure of working with him on collaborative research and education projects.

Is that a car park behind the rip current?