Updated Incident Report from the Santa Cruz Fire Department

At approximately 12:44pm today, a call was received reporting that the end of the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf, where the Dolphin Restaurant and Restroom #3 were located, collapsed into the ocean along with three construction workers. Due to ongoing construction, this area has been closed to the public since January 2024.

Two victims were rescued by Lifeguard Unit 3166, and one victim self-rescued. There are no reports of significant injuries at this time. A drone deployed by the Santa Cruz Police Department confirmed that no additional victims were in the water and assessed the extent of the damage.

The municipal wharf will be closed until further notice.

Due to the high surf advisory and the large amounts of debris, including potential hazardous materials released during the incident, Main Beach and Cowell's Beach are also closed.

Due to life-threatening ocean conditions, please avoid all coastal areas, including overlook areas such as rocks, jetties, or cliffs. Dangerous and powerful waves can sweep across entire beaches unexpectedly. Do not enter the water, and do not cross flooded streets. Conditions will remain dangerous through noon on Tuesday, Dec. 24.

View the Facebook recording of the press conference .

The end of the iconic wharf that draws visitors to Santa Cruz collapsed in high surf on Monday, sending two engineers and a project manager who had been inspecting the structure into the water, the authorities said.

All three were rescued and taken to a hospital, city officials said at a news conference. No one was seriously injured or believed to be missing, Mayor Fred Keeley of Santa Cruz said.

The wharf was built in 1914 and, at 2,745 feet, bills itself on Instagram as the longest fully wooden wharf in the Western Hemisphere. It has recently hosted holiday-themed events, like photo sessions with Santa Claus.

The end of the wharf was closed to the public when the last 150 feet of the structure collapsed into the Pacific Ocean at around 12:45pm, city officials said. The city had already determined that the end of the wharf needed to be taken down and repaired after it was damaged in storms over the past several years, officials said.

Heavy wooden pilings, part of the wharf deck, a restroom and part of a former restaurant were lost in the water, city officials said, as were two pieces of construction equipment, a crane and a skid steer loader.

Keeley urged people not to get near the ocean, warning that pilings that were being pounded by the waves posed a threat to boaters and swimmers.

City Manager Matt Huffaker called the collapse “another testament to the power of our changing climate.”

“Despite all the effort that our staff put in collectively to planning for these potential incidents, each year it’s really blowing through our forecasts,” Huffaker said. “Our coastline is wild. It’s unpredictable. And we continue to see that winter season over winter season.”

The city’s parks and recreation director, Tony Elliot, said city officials were in the midst of a $4 million project to restore the damaged end of the wharf when the portion under repair was destroyed on Monday.

Santa Cruz Fire Chief Robert Oatey said that firefighters were already patrolling the coastline and lifeguards were positioned on a nearby cliff when the wharf collapsed. The firefighters and lifeguards responded and pulled two people from the water, he said. A third person who went into the ocean also made it to safety, he said.

Rose Ann Mazzone, owner of Bonnie’s Gifts, a family-run shop, said it appeared to be business as usual on the wharf on Monday afternoon, even with the high surf warning: People milled about the stores, others watched the ferocious swell and surfers paddled through the water. There were few customers inside the store when an emergency alarm blasted across the pier, Mazzone said.

“We didn’t know what was going on,” Mazzone said. Then she saw wharf crew members running toward the end of the pier and heard the wail of sirens. They quickly learned the end of the pier had collapsed, and the authorities began directing people to evacuate, Mazzone said.

“Everyone was yelling, ‘Get off the wharf.’” She described the evacuation as calm and orderly.

Rob McPherson, an owner of Stagnaro Brothers Seafood, was busy preparing seafood orders for customers to pick up on Christmas Eve morning when members of his staff said the end of the wharf had fallen off. McPherson, whose restaurant is at the farthest end of the pier near the construction, stepped outside and saw a section of the pier float by with a small tractor on it.

McPherson called it a “terrible incident” that “nobody was anticipating.” The swells were big on Monday, but they’ve been bigger, he said.

The collapse came as the National Weather Service issued a high surf warning, cautioning that “dangerously large breaking waves of 30 to 40 feet, with largest wave sets up to 60 feet” were possible. The warning area included San Francisco, the coastal North Bay and Point Reyes National Seashore, the San Francisco Peninsula coast, Monterey Bay and the Big Sur coast.

“Life-threatening swimming and surfing conditions and significant shoreline erosion can be expected,” the Weather Service said.

Gov. Gavin Newsom of California has been briefed on a “previously damaged section of the Santa Cruz pier that broke off due to heavy surf,” his office said on social media. It said that state emergency officials were coordinating with local officials to provide support.

Late Monday afternoon, the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office and Central Fire issued an evacuation order for Rio Del Mar, Beach Drive and Las Olas area, warning of “large swells and high tides” and advising residents in those areas to evacuate immediately.

A barrage of powerful storms ripped through Northern California in January 2023, hitting the Santa Cruz region especially hard. The extreme weather destroyed more than half of the landmark Sea Cliff State Beach pier in Aptos, a town just south of Santa Cruz, and what remained was in danger of imminent collapse. The pier, which connected a World War I-era concrete tanker ship to the beach’s shoreline, was deemed beyond repair and was demolished.

See more images.

View videos of the wharf collapse and aftermath. Video Credit Nic Coury/Associated Press

Michael Levenson and Alexandra E. Petri are reporters with The New York Times. Copyright 2024, The New York Times.