A man was skinny dipping with friends in the water off Ocean Beach in San Diego early Wednesday morning when he was caught in a rip tide.
The 27-year-old was reportedly
swimming with four friends at approximately 4 a.m., just north of the pier and
Ocean Beach Park when the incident happened.
According to his friends, the victim
went a bit further than the rest of the group and that was when they couldn't
find him and called 911. They said that just prior to the incident, the man
appeared to be struggling in the water.
San Diego Fire Rescue Lt. Andy Lerum
said they found the man quickly, but he was unconscious with no steady
heartbeat.
Reportedly emergency personnel
performed CPR on the man and he was rushed to UCSD, where he was pronounced
dead some hours later.
Lerum explained how dangerous it was
to swim in that area, especially late at night. He said the swimmer may have gotten
caught in a rip current and couldn’t get back to shore.
"In that area we make a lot of
rescues there during the day," he said.
"There's a rip current there
just next to the jetty and we suspect he struggled in the water and was caught
in that rip current," Lerum added.
The victim has not been named, but
officials did say he was a Mexicali resident.
Lerum went on to warn that while the
water temperatures are currently in the mid-70s, it might be tempting to swim
at night, but officials advise against swimming at night without lifeguards on
duty.
Source: NBC
Photo by Nathan Rupert/CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
Source: NBC
Photo by Nathan Rupert/CC BY-NC-ND 2.0