OCEAN CITY, Md. — The aftereffects of Hurricane Idalia caused dangerous beach conditions over Labor Day weekend in Ocean City.
Throughout the extended three-day weekend an already thin lifeguard crew rescued 472 swimmers, according to Ocean City Beach Patrol Captain, Butch Arbin.
At one point rip currents got so strong and the waves so high, that Arbin was forced to issue a cellular alert to beach visitors.
"Extremely Dangerous Ocean Conditions with High Rip current activity," the alert stated. "Do not go past knee-deep and only in front of a lifeguard. Keep you and your family safe."
Despite the conditions, the beach remained busy. Saturday there were 152 rescues with 230 on Sunday, and another 90 on Labor Day.
A few beach goers sustained injuries as result.
"Mostly impact injury from shore break," Arbin told WMAR-2 News. "Waves that break on the beach with force and cause injuries such as dislocated shoulders."
Currently ocean safety risk levels are elevated in large part due to low lifeguard staffing.
"We are always seeing a decrease in staff at this time of year due to our staff returning to other obligations, mostly college," Arbin said.
The town of Ocean City is offering certain benefits to retain guards through the last week of September.
"A travel stipend of $140.00 and a $1.00 [per] hour loyalty bonus for working after August 13th to encourage those who left to return on weekends," said Arbin. "We have fewer stands today than yesterday and will have guards on til September 24th."
