Jones Inlet
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The principal entrance from the Great South Bay and Atlantic Ocean to the inside passages and towns in Hempstead Bay.
The inlet, which is used mostly by pleasure craft and fishermen, is relatively shallow and somewhat dangerous because of the way its depths and channel shape constantly change. The "controlling depth" of the channel is about seven feet from Point Lookout to the Loop Parkway Bridge over Long Creek.
The jetty on the east side of the entrance to Jones Inlet has a light and fog signal at its far end, and a radiobeacon at its inner end. A Coast Guard station formerly stood inside the inlet on the north side of Short Beach, but has recently been relocated to the boat basin at Jones Beach. There is an unmarked wreck (covered by about eight feet of water) some 320 yards west of the jetty light.
Because of its location close to Freeport and other major South Shore towns, the Inlet lets a lot of polluted water out into the Bay. In TWD, Nita and Kit have a serious disagreement about the construction of a spell to clean up the water in this area, and Nita angrily teleports off the jetty without particularly caring who might possibly see. (DW, TWD)
Link to live webcam image looking east from Point Lookout Beach toward Jones Inlet