Extreme heat forecast forces Rip to River to be postponed

OCEAN Grove will be without two of its annual events tomorrow, with the Rip to River and Tranquility Fair cancelled due to extreme heat.

A forecast top temperature of 42C forced organisers of the 38th annual Rip to River to postpone until next month.

The event, in which participants walk or run from Point Lonsdale to Ocean Grove, was scheduled to start tomorrow morning but will instead be held on February 18.

The Ocean Grove Surf Life Saving Club said all entries to the popular 10km event, which usually attracts about 1500 runners, would be automatically carried over to the new date.

Club president David Pavia said organisers had been monitoring the weather and explored numerous contingency plans, explaining that the tides had prohibited an earlier starting time tomorrow.

“As the forecast temperature has become more extreme with strong northerly winds predicted, it has became apparent that the race could not go ahead even in a modified form,” he said.

“In these conditions, our fun run would be fun for no one.”

Mr Pavia said the club considered running the event this Sunday “but after careful investigation of personnel and logistics, the club could not ensure that we could deliver a quality event with a change of dates on such short notice”.

Organisers said holding a beach run in the extreme heat would be inconsistent with the club’s mission to keep the beach safe.

The Rip to River is one of the club’s biggest annual fundraisers, with previous events generating up to $25,000.

The fun run was to mark the start of a new era for the Surf Life Saving Club, with work on the multi-million dollar clubroom redevelopment set to begin early this year.

Money raised at the event would have contributed to a $500,000 funding shortfall for the newly designed club rooms, which haven’t had a significant upgrade since being built in 1994.

Meanwhile, the town’s annual Tranquility Fair at Ocean Grove Park has also been cancelled because of the heat.

The fair was set to take place between 4pm and 9pm. No decision has been made about rescheduling it to another date.

Ocean Grove Park Association president Don Pietraper- tosa said cancelling the twilight event was a difficult decision.

“We had to take into account the health and welfare of the public, stallholders and the workers setting up for the fair,” he said.

“The Bureau (of Meteorology) is forecasting temperatures up to 42C and wind gusts up to 45km/h. Those conditions would potentially place people at risk of heat exhaustion and create injury risks from flying objects.”