August 2024 (ROTM#188) Mckenzies Beach, Sydney, NSW Australia

Mystery beach, but the rip is real.

Mackenzies Beach in Sydney’s Eastern suburbs has been getting some media attention* recently – just because it’s there. It’s a small pocket beach that is very susceptible to erosion by large storm waves and, as a result, comes and goes. It was there for about 6 months from late 2023 to early 2024, but it’s gone again. Sometimes it disappears for ten years or more…but I digress.

Brad Fleming, a student of mine (who runs a food truck Crèpe & Coffee Co. www.crepeandcoffeeco.com), took this picture while on his morning surf check in Mackenzies dying days and while he took it to show me how much sand was on the beach, I also couldn’t help noticing the boundary rip flowing out along the rocks on the left side of the beach (photo). It’s that darker area of green water squeezed in a deeper channel between the sand bar and the rocks. If you look even closer you can sort of see that the texture of the water in the boundary rip is a bit bumpy and rippled. This is another common visual clue of rip currents because rips carry water offshore while waves bring it onshore and this creates some surface disturbance.

In case you’re wondering, Mackenzies beach is long gone and so is the rip. Who knows when it will appear again?

 *They used my pictures for the slider comparison!