Thursday August 13, 2026
Independent —
Within an hour of heading into the ocean with a board, Jake Hemann found himself sitting alongside four other injured beachgoers at a lifeguard station, soaking his foot in a pail of hot water.
It has become a common scene across Bolsa Chica State Beach and other popular stretches in Southern California, where the number of people struck by the sharp, serrated caudal barbs on stingray tails has risen.
A marine heatwave is currently drawing both stingrays and people closer to the shore.
Mr Hemann, a 31-year-old tourist visiting from New Mexico, explained that he was learning to surf when he dismounted his board and landed on what he believed was a sharp stick. “It hurt pretty bad,” he said, while dipping his throbbing foot into the hottest water he could tolerate to ease the pain. “It was radiating up to my ankle.”
Bolsa Chica and Huntington State Beaches have reported more than 3,100 incidents so far this year, twice the total for the whole of 2025. The city of Huntington Beach’s 3.5-mile (5.6 kilometre) stretch of shoreline has recorded over 2,000 cases so far this year, exceeding its full-year total from last year, while more than 900 stings were recorded on San Diego’s beaches during the first half of 2026—higher than any six-month period in the last five years, lifeguard data shows.