Atlantic City Asking People To Mind Rip Currents After Week Of Rescues
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (CBS) – After a week marked by dozens of rescues lifeguards in Atlantic City are asking swimmers to obey whistles and be mindful of a rip current advisory.
The National Weather Service announced Friday morning that there is a "moderate" risk of rip currents because of several days of on-shore winds. Chief Steve Downey from the Atlantic City Beach Patrol says his guards performed about 60 rescues on Wednesday and Thursday.
Minutes after his interview with Eyewitness News there was a rescue in front of the ACBP headquarters on South Carolina Avenue.
"I almost drowned! The water was pulling me and I'm trying to swim out, and I can swim, but that was crazy," said Natoya Jackson from Philadelphia who was supported by two Good Samaritans as lifeguards rushed into the surf to rescue her.
Rip currents form where the bottom is uneven and water rapidly recedes out to sea. They typically look brownish from the churned up sand, but to the untrained up rip currents can be hard to spot.
Downey says people need to look when they hear a lifeguard whistle because they could be the one about to be pulled into a rip current.
"They think they're perfectly fine, they don't know what we're blowing at. We are actually blowing them out of the rip current areas," says Downey.