I recall ‘India’ flags being used on Southern California beaches. I think they might have been used to warn against rip tides, but I don’t remember.
What did the India flag mean in this context?
From here:
Out of curiosity, what’s an “India flag”? Googling is a little tough on this one. Is that like “indicator flag” or something?
It represents the letter I in the maritime signal flag system
Well, I know what it looks like from your first link. Acsenray’s explanation is what I was looking for.
Surfers call them Black Ball flags. They are flown from lifeguard towers during peak season. They usually don’t go up until close to noon, so surfers can use the area when the wind is lightest. They usually come down at 4 or 5 pm. I’ve spent many a summer afternoon sitting on the beach impotently watching the most perfect waves wasted on waders, bodysurfers, and boogie boarders, hoping conditions don’t deteriorate before the lifeguard lowers the black ball.
…Because “India” is the word used to represent the letter I in the NATO radio alphabet (Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, etc.).
Thank you, Chronos and Acsenray. I was looking at the “Flag of India” wikipage and couldn’t figure out why it was called the India Flag in the OP.
Follow-up question: why is the flag for I in the alphabet used for surfing warnings?
I suspect the flag was just chosen among those available for its visibility and perhaps because the black ball represents exclusion. I believe it was Newport Beach, CA that first raised it over a lifeguard tower in the 1960s. There are several yacht clubs in Newport, and some lifeguard probably just rifled through one of many flag lockers to find one that would get people’s attention.
Sorry for the confusion. I thought everyone knew the phonetic alphabet, and I thought the description and picture of the flag, and bolding the ‘I’ would be sufficient.
Thanks for the answers. Seems to be a ‘No Surfing’ flag (except for boogie boards), rather than a rip tide flag. So… The rip tide flag is the Bravo (solid red) flag?
Inappropriate dadism:
If a woman is menstruating, she’s ‘flying Baker’, ‘Baker’ being the older phonetic word for ‘B’, and the Baker/Bravo flag being red.
The red flag is for any surf that might be dangerous for all but the most experienced swimmers. Yellow is a more moderate warning and green requires the least amount of caution. Except for rip tides, the flags mostly correspond to the size of the waves.