The 7.5 km-long Cua Dai Beach, a famous tourist destination in Hoi An Town in the central province of Quang Nam, has suffered severe further erosion for several days now with strong waves demolishing an embankment supported by large sacks of sand. Dozens of restaurants and resorts have seen seawater intrusion.

More than 10 coconut trees at a seafood restaurant were uprooted. “A concrete embankment had been broken earlier by the waves,” said a caretaker of the restaurant.

The beach had been closed to the public for three years since 2014 after it was badly eroded by tropical storms and strong waves. It reopened in 2017.
Cua Dai is a popular beach tourism hotspot in central Vietnam, attracting many European tourists during the peak travel season towards the year-end.

Waves four meters high lash the shore.
“Since early October until now, prolonged torrential downpours, tropical depressions combined with a cold spell have triggered high, big waves,” said the owner of a restaurant on the beach.

A section of a wall made of stone, brick, and cement knocked down by the waves.
To avoid inward encroachment, business owners used hundreds of sandbags to reinforce the local embankment.

The employees of a local restaurant throw sand bags.
“Everyday, about 500 bags are washed away, then we use new bags,” said Luong Tan Loc, a restaurant owner.

Restaurants along Cua Dai Beach used canvas to cover the erosion area and then put sandbags overlapping it.
“This is a temporary solution to prevent seawater intrusion, if not, tens of meters of land will be washed away and restaurants and resorts collapsed,” said a local resident.

On Tuesday morning, the Hoi An administration mobilized more than 100 people, including soldiers, to use sacks of sand to check erosion along Cua Dai Beach. The work is expected to last three days.

Authorities have installed a net nearly two meters high to prevent residents and tourists from entering dangerous areas.

A resort in the south of Cua Dai Beach destroyed by waves.
To prevent further erosion, the investor is constructing a concrete embankment.
The ancient town of Hoi An is one of Vietnam’s top tourist attractions. However, it has suffered from serious erosion for many years now. Much of the town is at two meters or less above the sea level, making it vulnerable to rising sea levels and storm surges, according to a joint report by the United Nations Environment Program, UNESCO and the Union of Concerned Scientists.
The town’s Cua Dai Beach has been losing between 10 and 20 meters of land to erosion annually for several years now.