Did you know that an ocean cyclone touched down right here in SoCal?
In 1939– an El Nino year– a hurricane-turned-tropical-storm touched down in Long Beach, sending waves throughout Southern California so strong that it actually destroyed the Newport Pier, washing away an entire 500 foot stretch of the 1050 ft structure.
Cool fact: Handrails were added sometime in the 1980s– pretty recent! In 2002, the pier was completely refurbished.
Here is some of the video footage from that very storm: