Rip Channel

A rip channel is an incised trough cut through a longshore bar by the concentrated seaward return flow of a rip current. Water piled shoreward by breaking waves drains back through these low spots, scouring a deeper channel where waves break less, which gives the channel its calmer, darker surface signature. Rip channels space rhythmically along the surf zone, often tens to a couple hundred meters apart, and they migrate with the bar. They route sand offshore and are the main cross-shore sediment escape from the beach. They are a recognized swimmer hazard and a marker of the rip-current circulation cell.