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Tourists nearly swept out to sea by ‘sneaker waves’ as they posed for photo on Iceland’s most dangerous beach: Watch
As the waves stretched up towards the tourists, they tried to run away, but in vain, due to the wave’s strong grip
A group of tourists were caught on camera almost getting swept out to sea while trying to click a photo on Iceland’s most dangerous beach – Black Sand Beach. A man and a woman were seen walking towards the shoreline and holding their hands above their heads to get a photo clicked.
Shortly after, a small wave crashed against the store. As it stretched up towards the tourists, they tried to run away, but in vain, due to the wave’s strong grip. Both of them fell, but the man managed to grab the woman and save her, and himself.
‘There are literal signs on that beach warning you’
The video was shared to TikTok by the user kelseystarlight, who captioned it, “This is what happens when you’re a cocky tourist and don’t listen the rules whyyyy are people like this?!”
“Black Sand Beach is Icelands Most Dangerous Beaches (and one of the most dangerous beaches in the world) due to “sneaker waves” that look calm and small, but are in fact so powerful, they drag people out to the ocean and people have died here. The number 1 rule at this beach is: “Never turn your back on the waves” and to not go where you can’t see orher footprints,” the user added.
Other users commented, with one of them saying, “Who walks on obviously saturated sand and doesn’t think the waves go up that far?” “Is it just me or is it obvious from the size of waves and Slant of the shore this would happen. You can see where the wet sand is,” said another user, while one wrote, “there are literal signs on that beach warning you about sneaker waves”.
“To get to this exact spot you pass a sign with a picture of the last person swept out to sea by sneaker waves and yet here they are,” one user wrote, while another said, “You can tell by just how far smooth the sand goes. Like why go in that deep?” they're laughing but they're clueless how close they were to a life or death situation,” one user wrote.
According to the Visit Iceland website, “Sneaker waves (also known as sleeper, king, or rouge waves) are huge coastal waves that can suddenly appear in a train of smaller waves. The sneaker waves are much larger than those in between and reach way further.”
“The time between the giant waves can vary, sometimes, one comes right after the other, or there can be up to tens of smaller waves in between. The waves can rise very fast just before hitting the shore. This happens because the ocean floor deepens rapidly away from the coast. In addition, the ocean currents are very powerful and add to the danger,” the website adds.
