Huge Crowd Paddles Out for Jack O’Neill

The surfing community has one of of the most communal and joyous rituals to honor the lives of those who have passed with the ‘paddle out’.

On Sunday in Santa Cruz, an estimated 6,000 people took to their surfboards (and other craft), paddled beyond the surf, joined hands, cheered and splashed the water to pay their respects to the late Jack O’Neill, who passed away in early June at the age of 94. 

Surfer Magazine called it the "largest such event in Santa Cruz’s history," which saw platoons of surfers, a few dozen kayaks and a small flotilla of sailboats in the waters off Pleasure Point, where O’Neill had an oceanfront home and loved to surf.

"Thousands more paddled out for Jack across the world, with ceremonies in the U.K. and Canada, and forthcoming paddle outs in South Africa and Australia," Surfer said. 

The O’Neill company also recently put together a short, poetic documentary titled I Knew Jack O’Neill, which highlights some of the late wetsuit pioneer’s lesser known sailing antics. "An adventurer who charted his own course," the narrator recited, "like those Wednesday night sailing races in Santa Cruz where he cut across the kelp beds off Black Point, looking for that edge."