It has been a hot summer and there's a good chance you might be taking a trip to the beach, whether that's the ocean, one of the Great Lakes, or a smaller body of water.
So we've brought in ocean and coastal safety expert Bruckner Chase, who talks about how to stay safe while swimming in waves and water temperatures where hypothermia could become a concern — and it's not as cold as you might think.
Chase works with lifeguards, government agencies, and organizations from all across the globe. He is the host of NOAA's Wave Safe video series and has been featured on the Weather Channel many times.
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About the Across the Sky podcast
The weekly weather podcast is hosted on a rotation by the Lee Weather team:
Matt Holiner of Lee Enterprises' Midwest group in Chicago, Kirsten Lang of the Tulsa World in Oklahoma, Joe Martucci of the Press of Atlantic City, N.J., and Sean Sublette of the Richmond Times-Dispatch in Virginia.
Episode preview
About the Across the Sky podcast. The weekly weather podcast is hosted on a rotation by the Lee Weather team: Matt Holiner of Lee Enterprises' Midwest group in Chicago, Kirsten Lang of the Tulsa World in Oklahoma, Joe Martucci of the Press of Atlantic City, N.J., and Sean Sublette of the Richmond Times-Dispatch in Virginia.
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Past episodes
Episode transcript
Note: The following transcript was created by Adobe Premiere and may contain misspellings and other inaccuracies as it was generated automatically:
Welcome, everybody to the Across the Sky podcast, our Lee Enterprises National Weather Podcast. I'm meteorologist Joe Martucci based at the Jersey Shore here. Summer, of course, in full swing, although fall is creeping around the corner. But we're talking about wave safety. We have Bruckner Chase. He is a coastal and ocean safety expert. I know him personally. He is fantastic.
AC really loves his craft. But let me ask you guys, Sean and Matt, have you guys been to beaches here?
You know, I have not been to the beach this year. I think I've told you all I'm saving my pennies and going to Italy in September. So I have not done the beach this year. But nonetheless, I do love the beach. I love the Outer Banks in North Carolina. And I really liked what Bruckner had to say about the differences between some of the hazards on the East Coast versus the West Coast, not having been really spent a lot of time at the West Coast beaches.
It's nice to see this this broader, broader scope that he was able to do to bring us in on.
And I have not made a beach trip either this summer. Of course, I am in Chicago now. We do have beaches in Chicago. There does lake beaches. And if you've never been on the Great Lakes, never been to Chicago, when you are standing on Lake Michigan, you think you're at the ocean or somebody just dropped you down, Maybe like I'm at the ocean, right on it.
No, the lake is just that big. It is the ocean. You get wave action on it. So I have been to a Chicago Lake Beach, but not an ocean beach this summer. I've always been a little bit nervous. I got to be honest about going to the beach. And I feel like oftentimes I think, well, if I just want to swim, I'm just going to get in a pool because there is the uncertainty about the ocean course.
There's the everything that gets overblown about sharks, and I'm not worried about that. But there is the unknown about, you know, what is in the water. Are there rip currents out there? What are other things? You know, this is this is the wild. You're not in a controlled situation. You're exposed to the elements and everything that's out in the ocean.
So talking about beach safety and the hazards at the beach again most of time is going to be fine. But it is always in the back of your mind, like, I just like one more thing to be concerned about. So I think that's why it was just great to bring him on. A guy, talk about all the different things you do need to keep him out.
You can definitely have a great time at the beach, but things to keep in mind to make sure you stay safe.
Absolutely. And without further ado, we'll jump into it. Let's talk to Mr. Chase about ocean and water safety. And now we welcome on Bruckner Chase. He is an ocean and coastal safety expert who works with lifeguards, government agencies and organizations from all across the globe. He is the host of NOAA's Wave Safe Video series. He's been featured on the Weather Channel many times.
That's how we first got to knowing each other a little bit here. He's also an ocean adventure athlete who has weight for this, swam 25 miles across Monterey Bay, across Lake Tahoe for 22 miles. And maybe the most impressive part has the world record for swimming without a wetsuit in Alaska. Bruckner is also a chief in an American Samoa village.
He's from Memphis, Tennessee, and lives in my home state, the great Garden State of New Jersey. Bruckner, thanks for being on the Across the Sky podcast. We appreciate it.
It is great to be here. And I would suggest taking a boat across Monterey Bay is probably far easier if you check the weather first than swimming across it.
I could imagine. And I do want to get into some of those adventures that you have taken, but I just want to say, you know, I'm glad just personally what we've done over the past couple of weeks with you being so close to being along the Jersey Shore and promoting wave safety here. My first question for you is, you know, I know you're not a meteorologist, but what interest do you have and weather and how did that start?
You know, I've got a lot of interest in weather right now and really involved with the American Meteorological Society as well. I've spoken at their last two conferences for broadcasters and communicators. And I think one of the things when I began originally my career with NOAA's started working with Natural Sanctuaries, which oversees the country's marine protected areas, when over the last several years I've been working with National Weather Service on coastal safety and the near-shore environment, as all of you know, is so impacted by weather, whether it's wind gradient portraits and waves and small craft advisories.
If you're going to be in on or near the water or on the shore, the weather is really going to impact your experience there. It's going to make it a great day. It's going to make it a safe, Danny, or it can make it a dangerous day. And you need to be aware of all those changing conditions are going to impact where you are and what you're planning on doing.
So tell us about the The Waves Safe series that you've been doing. If you're listening through one of our newsroom websites, you can see Bruckner's videos on there. We have them up. But what is waves safe? And tell me about the process of making it because you are talking about the whole country with this, but you're making it a little regionalized, which I think is makes you different here.
When I came in with National Weather Service, you know, we had released The Ripcord Survival Guide, which focused on one specific beach hazard, which was rip currents. And we recognized, though, that rip currents were not prevalent in all of the shorelines around the U.S. in U.S. territories. And we also realized that there were a lot of other households that impacted people at the shore, not necessarily fatal impacts, but non-fatal life changing impacts as well.
So National Weather Service and I, we got together saying we need to kind of expand the narrative about what people need to look for on the shore. So Wave Safe was meant to take kind of a social science approach added to the oceanographic meteorological approach of what is the science of the shore. And we wanted to take a demographic and geographic specific look at hazards.
So I was charged with writing the series and then became the host of the actual video content and had the opportunity to speak to weather forecasting off to those within National Weather Service all over the country. We knew we wanted to target five main areas the East Coast, the Pacific Northwest, Southern California, Hawaii, in in American Samoa. And we wanted to look at the hazards that those forecasting meteorologists needed to communicate to that group specifically in, say, the Pacific Northwest.
So here we'll talk a lot about, you know, hurricanes and how they impact the coastal environment. But you sit at Northwest, you had log rolled, you had sneaker waves, you had cold water immersion, you had pocket beaches that were, you know, could become more dangerous as tides changed significantly. So the Wave Safe series was we spent two or three years really looking at what are the hazards in specific areas, how do we communicate those not just so that people would watch the videos, but so how could we convey actions in awareness that would actually help protect individuals and communities?
Because it wasn't just about impressions, it was about changing behavior to have a positive impact on fatal and nonfatal incidences out the shore. Yeah. Rutger I think that's real interesting how your really dive in and looking at differences and really across the planet, but just looking at the U.S. as well, because I think it's oftentimes does get oversimplified.
And you just talk about beach safety in general, but there actually are regional differences. And I'm curious about that because you talked about the threat of rip currents. Are there certain areas that are more prone to rip currents and where we see more rip currents in other locations? Yes, as you guys know, rip currents are very determined. And now National Weather Service has a forecasting model so they can predict where it's more likely or higher risk for rip currents.
It a record is a very localized event, 25, 50 years Y and really depends upon both wave action, idle action and limit what's going on underneath there. And so when you've got sand beaches like you have along much of the East Coast or around the panhandle of Florida or the Gulf Coast, they're going to be more prevalent to high out rip currents kind of forming because of the way that bottom can be shaped.
But when you've got really steep drop offs close to shore like you may have in the Pacific Northwest, or you've got a rigid reef bottom that doesn't contour the way our sands do, rip currents may not be as much of a risk. And we often look at our surf Lifesaving Australia, which is kind of the gold standard around the country, or not just protecting the beaches, but really gathering information about beach growing communities and putting that towards actionable stuff that their surf lifesaving clubs can implement to keep people safe and what their research ground and what they push out in their annual reports.
Up to 80% all when we start waiting. Answers are not rip currents. It's a lot of the other hazards that happen along the coastline. And I think that and just talking about rip currents are leading me to believe that rip currents are the only dangerous birds we miss the opportunity to protect people, say, in the Pacific Northwest or it might be something very different.
Yeah, to that point, we hear about rip currents all the time here and and I have my eastern bias as well with that. But what are some of the other you know, once you go after rip currents, what are some of those other those other risk factors? And obviously they're going to be greater in some locations than others.
But what are two or three of these things that do come to mind right after the rip currents?
Well, I'll tell you, one of the biggest risk factors, because in looking at risk, you need to look at both the people involved and then the physical element that you're discussing and a risk factor. And one of the things that we're trying to address in this next phase of work with National Weather Service is people that aren't from the shore missing, interpreting their swimming ability with the conditions in front of them too often.
And you see this in the early drownings in Panama City, Florida, where you've got people coming from anyone say Memphis, Tennessee. I used to come from coming down to the shore, not understanding that even though they know how to swim in a backyard pool or country club pool, the conditions near shore could be completely different. And often the risk factor that's really high is how do we teach people to understand what a two or three foot wave really means for them, or perhaps their seven or eight year old child?
And I think as far as just hazards, which can be dangerous, is breaking waves and understanding that even a 2 to 3 foot wave packs a really strong punch if you're not prepared for it. And often what can happen is if you look at some of the nonfatal and fatal drownings, combinations of wind direction, wind strength, wave direction and wave size, knocking people over what an immediate condition in a near-shore environment.
That's not what they expect deeper than they expect. And then realizing that, according to Surf Life Saving in Australia, 48% of people that visited the beach said they could not swim at least 50 meters in the ocean without touching the bottom. So if we talk about surviving a rip current, if you pulled out, if you take numbers like that, where 50% of the people cannot even swim 30 meters in the ocean, then it doesn't take much as far as wave and wing box to really make even swimming out of a rip really dangerous and difficult.
So I think that really kind of turbulent, unpredictable conditions in a car or near shore or swagger become as deadly or more so than rip current because they can lead to catastrophic events warming. From there.
So frightening. So with all of this, you know, we've said it before, you you want to make this a positive experience when you're talking about wave safety, it's not to scare people. It's to empower people. So in these videos. Right, right, right. That mindset instead says saying, hey, like, don't do this, you know, say in a way that empowers you to, you know, tackle the ocean appropriately.
Keep in mind, I started working with Noah, talking about our marine sanctuaries, these amazing, beautiful places that are really kind of the place where we kind of protect our wildlife and our our shore environments, our coastal environments, our coral, our marine heritage. And every one of the Waves Safe series, we wrap it up because we want people to have a lifetime of positive experiences that the shore you know, we live at the shore here and and that's an important part of both our culture, our community and even the economy.
And I think that we can make any of these dangerous elements like rips or waves a positive experience. And we focused on three main right wanted people to respect the ocean, which really means kind of respect that it's dynamic and changing and it may be stronger than our swimming ability that we can wear. The second is situational awareness.
Be aware that things are always changing tides, currents, weather, wear, whitening. It's always evolving and changing, and often you can keep it positive by recognizing that, hey, it was really glassy and calm this morning. Lunch time you come back, the winds are switched. Now it's a little bit more dangerous. So that positive experience this afternoon, we need to stay on the beach or this is the day to go up to the boardwalk and recognizing those changing conditions can impact how safe things are.
And finally, you know, take ten. We want to give people the skill set and take ten is focused on rebounding second victim drownings and getting people the skills that it may wind up in. Almost a loved one who is in trouble when they see someone trouble while we give them the tools so that they can live to be the hero, that they'd all become a tragic second victim.
Because again, a lifetime of positive experiences at the shore is our number one goal. And brother, I want to shift gears a little bit, but I kind of want to still, I think, is relevant for people who are not boaters. But I do want to talk about boating a little bit because one of the most common things I see get issued by the National Weather Service are small craft advisories.
And often the question I get is what exactly does that mean? What does it take to get a small craft advisory and what do they mean by small craft? So for boaters, but I think there are also just a lot of people that will see that on their boat. A small craft advisory and they're not boating. They just want to go to the beach and swim.
But like is there, that's something I should be concerned about, that there's a small craft advisory. Does that impact swimmers as well? Absolutely. I think it's a really important question. And some people we we've talked about that, you know, a weather forecast will kind of tell you what is going to happen across a general area. Often before we head to the beach will shop for small craft advisories, will also look at surf reports and surf reports.
Often if you look at somewhere like surf Line, where they drill down and beach specific or small craft advisories, it'll be drilled down to a specific county or area. A swimmer or someone going into the water is pretty much a small craft. You know, there's a a small entity that's in the water. And what delineate it's a small craft advisory or triggers that is really is something that probably is is set by National Weather Service, accepted by the weather forecasting offices and has templates that they follow.
And I would encourage everyone to look what up to know what triggers that warning were your area. Well, what it often will mean is turbulent, disorganized conditions near shore, driven by wind and swell, and a combination of how they interact that make it not, you know, hard to navigate or control if you're running a small boating craft, a motorized boat.
But imagine if it's hard to control or dangerous for someone in a motorized watercraft. How much worse that could be if you're on a stand up or or on a kayak or your swimming, that impact on you in those situations can be much, much worse. Even if you just look at offshore winds, that often would be a component in a small craft advisory pushing someone further away from the beach into dangerous situations in which they cannot get themselves bound for.
All right. Well, we're going to take a brief break. And on the other side, we're going to have more with Proctor Chase. You're listening to the Across the Sky podcast. And we are back with the Across the Sky podcast. New episodes come out every Monday where ever you get your podcast or on your favorite newsroom website. We are back here with Brock near Chase.
Well, we were talking a lot about wave safety. He is the host of the Wave Safe Program with Noah here. I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about yourself. BRAWNER Here. So, you know, when I was writing your biography, the first thing I had to ask you about was your swim in Alaska, your record setting, no wetsuit swim first.
Why did you want to do that? And then secondly, how do you how cold was the water when you were swimming?
So so the well, we'll start with the water Temperature of the water temperature was 54 degrees. Okay. Which I think that time was slightly warmer than the air temperature. So you probably got in. There were snow on the mountains back lined up. I you know, I grew up in Memphis, Tennessee, and got rescued from drowning twice before I was ten.
I learned to swim in a country club pool and I I moved to Santa Cruz, California, several years ago, and I guess I just fell in with the wrong crowd. You know, They go, yeah, we're going out to swim in Monterey Bay. And I was like, Wasn't that where all the great white sharks research and they grew? Yeah, yeah.
But, you know, we're fine with them. It's, it's a symbiotic relationship. And I'm like, what? You give them your first warning. That's a symbiotic part of it. So I, I started I had been a swimmer in college and found that swimming in cold water in the ocean was something that for some reason I was really a well-adjusted to and had done some some long swims and kind of pushed the envelope a little.
But I'd been an endurance athlete on land for four decades, and I heard about a eight and a half mile swim around Pennock Island in Alaska, and I had never been up there before and going up to Alaska to do a swim around the island at the time sounded like a really kind of unique challenge and ended up just fell in love with the place and had one of the best swims I've ever had.
My wife was on a kayak supporting me around. We had a orca swim past while we were on the back side of the island and ended up winning the race, beating all the relays and setting a course record that I think still stands today. Incredible.
Wow.
What kind of background precautions in a situation like that? I mean, I know there's you know, you're not probably tied to a kayak or anything like that, but I mean, are there any kind of background safety things in place and what are they in a situation like that?
When I first started working at National Marine Sanctuary, I was working with them as an extreme endurance athlete and swimmer that was doing these kind of unique swims across parts of the sanctuaries. Monterrey Bay is one of the National marine sanctuaries. I did a swim between a couple of islands in American Samoa. I did a swim from the underwater research lab, El Dorado, back to the to the land, the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.
And so, you know, the base in Alaska was a race. So there was protocol and safety boats throughout the course. And there were young and old people. Not a lot of people apparently line up to go and do swims in Alaska. Go figure. But there are people quolls on there on an aquatic estimate. And then most of people don't even they're more remote on of adventure swims.
I've done we have a pretty extensive support crew. We've done a lot of our own work. We know the waters. I've done an extensive amount of training to prepare. And then we we talk to a researcher who's in weather and wildlife and water to kind of as best as possible learn what to expect. So, you know, kind of look at the risks of some of these things no one had done before.
And we kind of address each of those points and we get to a point where we feel, you know, this is safe and we can do this. And then it's just up to me and my training and the crew to see if we get all the way across.
Real quick before I turn this one over to Matt, is there we hear a lot about hypothermia for for people who are boating, especially in the spring. The water's too cold. I'm imagining there's not like a magic number, but is there a range for people who aren't acclimated or where you are? Sure. Like a water temperature that's like, wow, this this is this is legit, too cold.
If I fall into this, I'm going to you know, I could go into shock, hypothermia or something like that.
Absolutely. In fact, I work with National Weather Service and I would encourage people to go to the cold water safety segment in National Weather Service on on post on beach Hazards. And we have some standards of what to expect. But there are examples of a warm water, hypothermia. Even someone who falls off a boat in Florida in the water, that's 76, 77 degrees, they can eventually become hypothermic.
They can lose function or they can, you know, die and drown people that aren't operated. In my estimation, once you get water below 70 degrees or so, it causes a physiological kind of shock to the system. And often in that one minute to minute window where you're trying to get your breathing under control, you kind of been kind of shocked into kind of a frantic respiratory rate.
People often get into trouble just with that immediate response and then the hypothermia. You know, they say that you've got a handful of minutes to kind of get your breathing under control. And then with most people through acclimated, you've got maybe 10 to 15 minutes of functional motion control where you could get yourself out of a dangerous situation.
Many times, obviously, if you fall through a frozen lake and get really cold water, that's 30 to 33 degrees. The effect is going to be even faster. But even in 55, 58 degree water in the Pacific Northwest, someone who gets knocked off of a say by a wave fall into that water bay, don't have a lot of time, get out of that water and self-rescue before they end up becoming a victim.
And that's you know, I spent some time working with the Customer Rescue SA program. And really what they try to do is some of them can stay calm and afloat. It gives rescuers time to get to them and sadly, cold water really cuts down on that, that time that someone can keep themselves above water and safe and kind of sticking with the time theme, even when we're not talking about water temperatures, they're a recommended amount of time.
And I think this is especially important when it comes to, you know, parents and their kids because they see their kids having a fun time at the beach, playing in the water, you know, everything looks good. But at some point you don't want to interrupt the fun. But is there a time amount that the kids should be in the water before they need to come out and at least take a break?
Like what kind of a time window should parents be keeping an eye on? Like now? Maybe my kid's been out there a little bit too long, might be getting a little bit too tired, might become more susceptible to the waves or, you know, you know, just, you know, reaching that point of exhaustion, what is kind of like a time window.
People should kind of keep in mind when they're in the water before they need to come out and at least take a break for a while. Really. The question for asking really draws on some of my training as a wilderness first responder and just hypothermia set up, whether it's water or air and looking for the early warning sign of that, which is, you know, uncontrolled, shivering, loss of motor control, you know, a discoloration and lips and fingertips and stuff.
So parents watching those early signs in the hypothermia continuum and getting your kids out of the water and warming them up so that that doesn't, you know, it kind of progressed. But that's also, you know, the same with surfers. I mean, you can get to the point where you can lose control and maybe not be able to paddle back.
Yeah. And then so really kind of intervening, recognizing the early stages of hypothermia, if it's because you're at the shore in the water or just along the shore and the wind and cold temperatures are kind of impacting you or recognizing those early signs that hypothermia and intervening before it progresses to a dangerous point.
Hey, Bruckner, I'm going to turn to lifeguarding a little bit. I know you do a little bit of lifeguarding work here at the Jersey Shore. And, you know, you said you're someone you've done a lot of work with Australia. I'm kind of curious, like you compare lifeguarding here in the United States to Australia, like what are some best practices that we're doing?
What are best practices that people in Australia are doing? And have you been able to bring over some, you know, concepts from Australia to the U.S. and vice versa?
Well, I've been really lucky and with the upper township Beach Patrol and Strap here in South Jersey, I'm also with the Mooloolaba Surf Lifesaving Club in Australia. I've worked with Surf Lifesaving Australian Surf Lifesaving Queensland, all on a larger level on some programs. I've also spent some time in Poland working with their lifesaving community, so I've been able to kind of absorb and look at how people protect the community and help people some very diverse shorelines with very varying resources.
And I think that the main thing is lifeguards need to do a good job of educating the community, clearly, indicating where there are dangerous, that people should be aware out. And then hypothetically, the bus case is intervening so that, you know, lifeguards don't need to get wet, but a preventative approach to guarding some of these areas will keep everyone safe.
I mean, there are instances of lifeguards being injured or passing away tragically during rescues. I've spent some time in Hawaii, and while we were filming waves safe, we actually had a rescue, a patron that was visiting from Minnesota that got into trouble. And I help one of the lifeguards bring them in at Waikiki. But I think the best practice is really communicating to the community what the dangers are for that specific beach are being consistent with how you communicate.
And I think one of the best practices that I really appreciate, Australia is their national organization that sets the standard for all the surf lifesaving clubs. So you have a very uniform process of communicating beach hazards, uniform behavior and operations across each surf lifesaving pop. And I find that it's a little bit different in the U.S. because it's not as mandated across the entire country.
So there are a lot of regional differences, which often falls to the beachgoer to recognize and look for. What do I need to know and how is it communicated at this specific agency and at this location? Yeah, and before we wrap up here, I just kind of want to go with your big takeaway. I mean, if you have that one message that you want to get out to people when you're talking about safety at the beach, what is what is that big takeaway message?
You know, I spent a lot of time working on it for the Wave Stage series and knowing that lifeguards are going to go off duty after Labor Day, you're going to see a lot your ramen there. The takeaway three things respect the ocean, and that is respecting the dynamic environment that may be stronger, more powerful than what you've experienced.
It can change from day to day, from year to year, the kind you visited last year on your vacation may be different this year because of the way storms of the winter reshaped the beach. Respect the ocean. It changes. It can be dynamic and can be dangerous. It can't be situationally aware of the weather of the water, of the people around you or the people in your party that are there with you.
Be aware of changing conditions. You can buoy dangerous situations and finally take tent, which is really kind of our call to action. Protect yourself first to save others. We want to prevent both primary drownings. And too often when someone charges in to see someone in trouble and we end up with two backups. So those two the three things respect the Ocean state situationally aware hey ten to protect yourself and save others.
Awesome. Very helpful stuff. Brockmire, as always, tremendous resource of what you're doing with Noah and with other organizations, bringing forth, you know, safety and, you know, communications and beachgoers who are going all across not only the Jersey Shore but all across America this summer year. So appreciate you coming on, Bruckner and we'll talk to you soon. Thanks again.
Looking beyond the atmosphere, here's Tony Rice with your astronomy outlook. The Perseid meteor shower peaks this weekend, and it's one of the three most active meteor showers of the year. But this one has the benefit over December's Geminids or January's Quadrantids, peaking at a time where you don't have to bundle up to see them. Nearly every article on the Perseus mentions the number 100 when discussing how many meteors might be seen.
Some use the only slightly more accurate phrase up to 100. The reality is most of us won't see nearly that many. That century number comes from the zenith hourly rate or is the h.r. This is a handicapping system of sorts used to correlate reports of meteor activity from around the world. That zenith part means it's being calculated on the radiant or point in the sky where the meteors appear to be coming from being directly overhead, something that's only possible to happen at one latitude and only for a brief time.
Z are also mathematically eliminates light pollution and clouds the real enemy of seeing the most meteors. All that being said, though, the Perseus are definitely worth going out to see. And to see the most look to the darkest part of the sky. And meteors can appear anywhere, not just around that radiant point and those hours before sunrise. Those are the best because the radiant point is in the highest point in the sky and that hides the fewest meteors below the horizon.
But above all, be patient. The longer you look, the more you'll see. You'll also be amazed how many more stars you'll see just after 15 minutes of letting your eyes adjust to the darkness. And on that, leave that phone inside. Each time you look to a light, the 15 minute timer starts over. That's your astronomy outlook. Follow me at RTP hockey for more space.
Stuff like this.
Thank you again, Bruckner for hopping on the podcast. 54 degrees Ocean waters and Alaska. Not my cup of tea, but it's definitely Bruckner's and I'm glad it is for him. But on a serious note, lots of good stuff in there. I mean, we say that every podcast, lots of good stuff. I think what what Bruckner Or what separates Bruckner here is that he actually goes out to these places and actually does talk about the weather hazards in those locations.
He is an expert not just for, you know, the East Coast, but the West Coast, Gulf of Mexico. He's been to American Samoa many times. So he really has all of the United States, you know, in terms of the shore and what hazards that can bring on lock and how to empower all of us as we go, you know, to the beach, to the bays for the rest of the summer here.
Yeah, I mean, it's funny because I can't imagine swimming in 50 degree water. I mean, I would just lock up in a hurry once it gets below 70. I'm just not a very happy, happy dude. I've swam in some sixties upper sixties, you know, when I've gone to the beach and I'm stubborn, I'm just going to wait in it, maybe ride a couple of waves, and then that's done.
But, you know, you've got to acclimate to that stuff. And the idea that that you could go, you know, hypothermia could set in at 74, 75 degree water, that's a little shocking to me, to be honest.
I think Bruckner is a candidate for our most interesting man in the world. Right? This lady is that that bio you read, Joe, at the start? It's like that raises that raises your eyebrows. Like this guy has some stories to tell. It stirred up. I mean, we barely got into it with him. But I think, you know, you know, he's using that hash of all these things on the water that he's done to spread it.
I mean, clearly, they're going to be people that haven't done nearly as much as what he's done and maybe have no desire to. But for someone who's been in the water that long, I mean, you learn a lot about it and the fact that he's you know, now his main mission is spreading safety and awareness. I think there are a lot of good tips that he's spread there out there.
And I really like, you know, when you go to the beach, he talks about how excited you get. And, you know, you're especially when you have kids with you. And so sometimes you you know, you're just focused like get in the water. But like, you know, I think what he mentioned was that take ten like just take a quick pause.
Look at your surroundings. You know, look, are there any signs of rip currents in front of you before you run into the water? So as much as the emotions can get the best of you when you're having a fun day at the beach. Keep in mind that safety in taking some pause is taking a break, even just getting out of the water to take a break and looking at the water before you get in.
Like that's real good advice.
Respect the ocean.
Yes, respect the ocean. The ocean will respect you. All right. And we are going to wrap it up here for another episode of the Across the Sky podcast. But we have many more episodes lined up for you here. Next Monday, you're going to hear from Zeke Hoare's father about warm ocean waters. You might have heard about that 101 degree ocean water temp off the coast of Florida and one of the bays we're going to talk about the warm ocean waters we've seen.
We have Douglas Cossa coming on August 21st talking about heat and football. By the time you listen to this. The NFL's Hall of Fame game will have already happened, kicking off the preseason. So that is coming up. And then on Labor Day weekend, we're going to Sally Warner talking about warming the deep oceans from hurricanes. And that is very important as well.
So we have a number of episodes lined up here.