On Wednesday, two men were pulled from the ocean at San Francisco’s Ocean Beach. The victims, a father and his son, were both unconscious at the time. After performing CPR, they were rushed to the hospital, where the father was pronounced dead.
According to the San Francisco Fire Department, the father and son were wading in the water before they were caught by large waves near Stairwell 20. Witnesses said one wore underwear and the other wore basketball shorts. When rescuers arrived, they found one man unconscious on the beach. He had already been pulled from the water, while the other man was still in the ocean, unresponsive.
While KTVU-TV reported that the father died, officials at the San Francisco medical examiner’s office told the SF Gate that they could not confirm the report.
This week has seen a number of rescues from big surf at Ocean Beach. After a storm system slammed into the Bay Area on Wednesday, 15-20 foot waves filled in at one of California’s heaviest beach breaks. On Wednesday evening, Coast Guard crews pulled a 24-year-old surfer from the water. He was suffering from hypothermia and a broken finger. Earlier in the afternoon, the Coast Guard was called to Mussel Point, just north of Bodega Bay, where two men were struggling on a Jet Ski and drifting towards large waves. Both were shaken but unhurt.
“There are big, strong waves out there,” Larry Smith, a beach safety leader for the National Weather Service, told the SF Gate. “You have to worry about rip currents, but the waves are big enough and strong enough, they could wash people on the beach out into the water.” The first big swell of the season started out as a large storm system off the coast of British Columbia, Canada, and brought nearly an inch of rain to San Francisco. Dangerous conditions at Ocean Beach are supposed to remain until Friday, when the system begins to weaken.
