Extreme heat brings more people to the Santa Cruz beaches to cool off 

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. (KION-TV) — Many areas are bracing themselves for excessive heat starting today Tuesday and lasting throughout Friday. In order for people to find relief many headed down to the Santa Cruz beaches.

"It's supposed to be in the 80s and over 100s over the hill, but yeah, it’s pretty wild," Emmett Thompson from Santa Cruz said.

Scorching temperatures likely to be the norm for a few days on the central coast.

Zia Callamy is one of dozens of people finding comfort at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk.

"Yesterday, I think it was like 86 or 90 degrees and yeah it's really hot here especially like when you live in an apartment with no ac," Callamy said.

Throughout the day more and more people could be seen visiting the beach from other parts of the region.

This includes people from the San Jose and Santa Cruz mountains.

“There is traffic on the commuter lane on highway 85 and 17, it was more than usual for a weekday, but not backed up," Lori Paul from San Jose said.

Other areas did see traffic, but beating the traffic and the heat meant turning to public transportation.

“We use public Amtrak and on highway 17, we kind of avoided a lot like that San Jose traffic because we caught the Amtrak from Hayward to San Jose," Callamy said.

The National Weather service says heat is the number one weather related killer in the U.S.

The NWS says it's very likely we'll add to that statistic with this event so people should take every precaution necessary.

“Drinking a lot of water going to the beach on my days off for sure, which is really nice," Thompson said.

According to County of Santa Cruz people should also wear sunscreen and never leave your children or pets in the car.