Excerpt:
Massive swells created by Hurricane Genevieve earlier this month have caused huge changes to the California coastline. An entire beach near San Diego nearly disappeared, and access to one of Malibu’s most scenic beaches remains closed indefinitely due to severe erosion. And at the Wedge in Newport Beach, a celebrated surf spot on the Balboa Peninsula, not only has the sandy area shrunk dramatically — the change has also unearthed decaying infrastructure that hasn’t been visible in decades.
Sand began washing out to sea at the popular surf break during the first week of August, as hurricane swells ramped up. Narrowing of the beach due to summer storms isn’t unusual for this area, said U.S. Geological Survey Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center scientist Jonathan Warrick; typically, the beach will broaden again in the winter. But this year was different, he said, with hurricane-generated waves and strong storms in the South Pacific shoveling out sand faster than is typical.
“It’s something that happens every year, but this year it’s amplified. It’s just a lot bigger than normal,” Warrick told SFGATE by phone.
The rapid erosion has exposed rocks, pipes and rusty metal fixtures that could make surfing at an already dangerous wave even more dangerous. Surfer Jeremy Wiegman documented the area in a series of videos where he points out the newly unearthed pipes and other infrastructure. He told SFGATE the waves accelerated exposure of two previously buried groins, structures made of rock or concrete built to trap sand, the second of which even most frequent visitors didn’t realize existed.
It isn’t making most surfers stay away, Wiegman said, but it’s still concerning. “Having those rocks become exposed, it creates a whole other level of danger at an already super dangerous wave…”
