A massive search for a swimmer missing off Ninth Street Beach was temporarily called off as darkness set in on Sunday night.
The Ocean Beach Patrol’s Rapid Response Team was deployed at 6:45 p.m. Sunday (June 29) after receiving a call about multiple swimmers in distress near the Ninth Street jetty, according to Ocean City Fire Chief Chris Breunig, who oversees the beach patrol.
Responding on personal watercraft and from the beach, OCBP lifeguards rescued 14 of 15 swimmers, Breunig said.
According to unconfirmed reports, a Philadelphia family of two parents and two children were among the rescued. A third child, a 14-year-old boy, did not return to the beach.
The search for the boy will resume at dawn, Breunig said.
The U.S. Coast Guard, the Ocean City Fire Department, and the marine units of the Ocean City Police Department and New Jersey State Police assisted in the search on Sunday evening.
A jetty at Ninth Street forms a strong rip current that pulls swimmers into deeper water, and the beach has been the site of drownings and near-drownings when the Ocean City Beach Patrol is off-duty.
The dangerous conditions there were part of the reason the OCBP formed its Rapid Response Team in 2012. The team is a mobile unit that does not patrol individual beaches but is able to travel by Waverunner or ATV to conduct rescues. The patrol also guards Ninth Street and other downtown beaches for extended hours on Fridays and Saturdays.
On Sundays, the beach patrol leaves work at 5:30 p.m., and witnesses reported hearing the lifeguards issue their customary warning to bathers to stay out of the water when the beach is unpatrolled.
The Ocean City Beach Patrol boasts that nobody has ever drowned on a patrolled beach in its 116-year history.
Breunig said several of the swimmers rescued on Sunday evening got in trouble after slipping on rocks while playing on the jetty.
A light southeast wind created some small waves and chop on Sunday afternoon and evening. Witnesses said bathers had been able to reach a sandbar for much of the day, but low tide passed at about 3:30 p.m. on Sunday.
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