---
title: "Ten-Foot Surf Along 700 Miles of Coast, on the Weekend Everyone Wants to Be at the Beach"
description: "A swell from Hurricane Genevieve is pushing waves to about 10 feet along roughly 700 miles of California coastline, and Los Angeles County says every lifeguard on duty is averaging two to three rescues a shift. The extreme heat warning inland runs through Sunday evening."
category: "California"
category_url: https://herald.la/category/california
author: "Gabriela Soto"
published: 2026-07-31T19:55:10.000Z
updated: 2026-07-31T19:55:10.000Z
canonical: https://herald.la/article/ten-foot-surf-along-700-miles-of-coast-on-the-weekend-everyone-wants-to-be-at-th
tags: ["high-surf", "beach-safety", "heat", "lifeguards", "california-coast"]
---
# Ten-Foot Surf Along 700 Miles of Coast, on the Weekend Everyone Wants to Be at the Beach

A swell from Hurricane Genevieve is pushing waves to about 10 feet along roughly 700 miles of California coastline, and Los Angeles County says every lifeguard on duty is averaging two to three rescues a shift. The extreme heat warning inland runs through Sunday evening.

The two forecasts this weekend point in opposite directions, and the collision
between them is the story.

Inland, an extreme heat warning runs from Friday morning through Sunday evening,
with valleys and the Inland Empire well past 100 degrees. At the coast, a swell
generated by Hurricane Genevieve is driving
[waves to about 10 feet along roughly 700 miles of California coastline](https://abc7.com/post/high-surf-southern-california-waves-10-feet-affecting-roughly-700-miles-coastline/19607282/),
from Ventura County through Los Angeles County and into Orange County.

One forecast sends people to the water. The other makes the water dangerous.

## What the lifeguards are seeing

Los Angeles County officials say that this week, every lifeguard on duty has been
averaging two to three water rescues per shift, with hundreds of rescues across
the county daily. That is before a weekend in which the inland temperature gives
several million people a reason to drive to the beach.

The hazard in a swell like this is not mainly the height of the wave. It is the
rip current: a narrow channel of water moving fast back out to sea, usually
between two zones of breaking surf, often invisible from the sand. It carries
strong swimmers as easily as weak ones, and the danger comes from the instinct to
swim straight back toward the beach, which means swimming directly against it
until you are exhausted.

The county's guidance is the standard one and it works: swim parallel to the
shoreline until you are out of the current, then angle back toward shore.

## The other things a big swell does

Two hazards that catch people who never intended to swim.

The first is being swept off rocks and jetties. A set wave arriving larger than
the ones before it will reach places that have been dry all afternoon, and people
standing on a jetty to take a photograph are standing exactly where that happens.

The second is the sneaker wave, which is the same phenomenon on a beach: a wave
that runs much further up the sand than its predecessors, takes an adult off their
feet, and pulls them back down the slope. Small children playing at the waterline
are the ones this reaches first.

South and southwest-facing beaches take the brunt of a southern swell, which in
this region means much of the Malibu coast, the South Bay and the Orange County
beaches.

## The practical version

If you are going to the coast this weekend, swim near a staffed lifeguard tower
and nowhere else, keep children within arm's reach at the waterline, stay off wet
rocks and jetties, and do not turn your back on the water.

If the point of the trip is to escape the heat rather than to swim, the county's
cooling centers, libraries and pools are open and are not being run by the Pacific.
Details are at
[ready.lacounty.gov/heat](https://ready.lacounty.gov/heat/), or by calling 2-1-1.

## Sources

- [Waves as high as 10 feet affecting roughly 700 miles of California coastline](https://abc7.com/post/high-surf-southern-california-waves-10-feet-affecting-roughly-700-miles-coastline/19607282/)
- [One of the hottest weekends of the year (so far) is on tap for Southern California](https://laist.com/news/climate-environment/august-first-weekend-heat-wave)