Alerts and notifications
Sunset Beach, NC can notify you about tides, a full moon rising over the ocean, visible rocket launches, and — if you opt in — conditions changing for the worse, a sunset worth walking down for and a sunrise worth getting up for. Open the bell in the top-right corner of the Today, Water or Events tab, or tap the Alerts row on the Info tab, to reach the Alerts screen. The tide, moon and launch alerts are scheduled on your phone from the last conditions the app loaded and fire with no signal; the three “When conditions change” alerts are the only ones sent from the server, and they are off by default. Nothing is scheduled until you allow notifications, and iOS asks only once.
Where the Alerts screen is
Section titled “Where the Alerts screen is”Tap the bell in the top-right of Today, Water or Events, or
tap the Alerts row near the top of the Info tab (its value summarises
what is on — for example “Tides · Full moon · Launches · Push”, “Nothing
on”, “Not set up” or “Off in iOS Settings”). The screen is titled
Alerts and has four sections, in this order: Tides, Worth a special
trip, When conditions change and Queued. Tap Done to close it. You can also say “Alerts in Sunset Beach” to Siri, open
sunsetbeach://alerts, or search for “alerts” inside the app — all three open
the same screen (see Siri, Spotlight and Shortcuts).
The Tides section header carries an ⓘ note titled How alerts work; it explains the on-phone scheduling described below.
Two kinds of alert
Section titled “Two kinds of alert”| Scheduled on this phone | Pushed from the server | |
|---|---|---|
| Which alerts | Tides · Full moon over the ocean · Visible rocket launches | When the water gets worse · A sunset worth walking down for · A sunrise worth getting up for |
| Default | On (tides: Lows, 45 min before; moon: on; launches: on, 30 min before) | Off |
| Needs a connection to fire | No — fires with the app closed and the phone offline | Yes — sent by the Sunset Beach Worker through Apple’s push service |
| Leaves the device | Nothing | Your device token and the topics you opted into |
| Why this way | Tide times, moonrise and launch times are knowable in advance | Rip risk, advisories, spills, weather alerts and tonight’s cloud are not |
The Alerts screen’s own footer puts it this way: “These are the only alerts that need a connection. Everything above is scheduled on this phone and fires even with no signal — but nothing on a phone can know in advance that the rip risk will be raised this afternoon, so these are sent from the Worker instead.”
Notify me about — a segmented control with Off / Lows / Highs / Both. The default is Lows: low water is what the app’s scoring rewards, and high-tide alerts would double the interruptions to say “less beach”.
How much warning — appears once tides are not Off. Choices are At the tide, 15 min before, 30 min before, 45 min before, 60 min before, 90 min before; the default is 45 min before.
Each alert is titled like “Low tide at 3:42 PM” and its body gives the predicted height and the lead time — “0.3 ft in 45 minutes.” — followed by a note when it applies: “Wide, hard-packed sand — the best of the cycle for walking and shelling.” for a low of 1 ft or under, “High water — not much dry sand.” for a high, and “The lowest tide in the forecast.” for the lowest low in the loaded window. Tapping a tide alert opens the Water tab.
The section footer is a caveat worth repeating: “Tide times are harmonic predictions for Sunset Beach Pier — astronomical maths, not a live gauge, so wind and pressure can shift the real water level.”
Worth a special trip
Section titled “Worth a special trip”Two toggles, both on by default. The footer says: “Both are rare — a handful of times a month at most.”
- Full moon over the ocean — “Only when a near-full moon rises over open water rather than behind the mainland”. The alert fires 15 minutes before moonrise (this lead is fixed) with the title “Full moon rising over the Atlantic” and a body giving the moonrise time and compass bearing. It is queued only on nights the Worker marks as a near-full moon (85% or more illuminated) rising over the ocean. Tapping it opens Today, where moonrise and its bearing are shown.
- Visible rocket launches — “Only launches the model expects to clear the horizon from here”. When it is on, a Launch warning picker appears with the same choices as tides but labelled At liftoff instead of “At the tide”; the default is 30 min before. The alert is titled like “Falcon 9 launch at 8:12 PM” and its body is the visibility verdict (for example “Good chance. Look SE. You’ll want a clear ocean horizon.”), the mission name, and “Launch times slip — worth checking before you go out.” Tapping it opens that launch’s detail screen on Events. See How the app judges things for the visibility model.
When conditions change (pushed)
Section titled “When conditions change (pushed)”Three toggles, all off by default. Turning any one on registers your device with the push service; turning all three off withdraws it — the footer ends “Switching both off withdraws this device entirely.” (it predates the third toggle; the behaviour applies to all three).
| Toggle | Caption on screen | What is actually sent |
|---|---|---|
| When the water gets worse | Rip current risk rising to High, a swim advisory, a spill nearby, or a National Weather Service alert | See the table below — the safety topic. |
| A sunset worth walking down for | About an hour ahead, and only when the cloud is stacking up for a good one | ”Tonight’s sunset looks spectacular” / “Sunset is at 8:03 PM.”, once per day, sent between 30 and 75 minutes before sunset, only when the sunset model rates the evening spectacular. |
| A sunrise worth getting up for | Up to an hour and a half ahead — which in midsummer means before 5am. It won’t break through Do Not Disturb | ”Sunrise looks spectacular” / “Sunrise is at 6:24 AM.”, once per day, sent between 45 and 90 minutes before sunrise, only when the model rates it spectacular. Delivered quietly, so Do Not Disturb keeps it silent. |
The safety topic sends exactly four things, and only when they change:
| Event | Fires when | Title and body | Interruption |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rip current risk rising | The NWS surf zone forecast’s rip level rises to High (never on the way down) | “Rip current risk is now High” — “There are no lifeguards at Sunset Beach. Swim near other people, and know where the nearest access is.” | Time Sensitive |
| Swim advisory posted | NC DEQ posts an advisory at a monitored station that was not under one before | ”Swim advisory posted” — “The state posted a swim advisory for <station name>.” | Time Sensitive |
| Sewage spill reported | A spill appears within ten nautical miles in the last fortnight and none was reported before | ”Sewage spill reported nearby” — the spill headline | Normal |
| NWS alert issued | A National Weather Service alert appears that has not been announced before (once per issuance) | The alert’s event name (e.g. “Rip Current Statement”) — “In effect from 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM.” | Time Sensitive when NWS severity is Severe or Extreme, otherwise normal |
What is deliberately not pushed: a rip level falling back to Moderate (good news is not an interruption), an alert or advisory that was already in force when you switched the toggle on, and launch slips (those go to the Live Activity instead — see Widgets and the launch Live Activity). The Worker checks for changes every five minutes, and the very first check after it starts only records what it sees and sends nothing, so switching push on never produces a burst about conditions that have been true for hours.
Tapping a rip current alert opens Today at Right now; tapping an NWS alert opens the Alerts screen. Tapping the swim advisory, spill, sunset or sunrise notifications opens the app on whatever screen you last had open.
Why there is no local “good sunset” alert
Section titled “Why there is no local “good sunset” alert”Whether tonight’s sunset is worth the walk depends on cloud that has not formed yet, so it cannot be scheduled on the phone in advance the way a tide can. That is exactly why the sunset and sunrise alerts live in the pushed section rather than the scheduled one, and why they need a connection.
Queued
Section titled “Queued”The Queued section lists what is actually sitting in iOS’s notification queue — up to 12 rows, with the total count in the header — each with its title, the day and time it fires, and how far away that is. “Alerts are on” and “alerts will fire” are different claims; this section shows the second.
- iOS allows an app 64 pending notifications, so the app budgets them: at most 40 tide alerts, 6 launch alerts and 2 moon alerts per queue.
- The tide predictions the app loads run about 15 days ahead, so the queue runs dry if the app is not opened for longer than that. The footer reads “Scheduled … ago from data loaded … ago. Open the app now and then to keep the queue topped up.” Every successful load of conditions rebuilds the whole queue.
- Anything less than a minute away is not scheduled at all.
- Send a test notification fires “Alerts are working” / “This is what a tide alert will look like.” about five seconds later. It is disabled until notifications are allowed.
When the list is empty the row explains why:
| Message | Meaning |
|---|---|
| ”Nothing queued — notifications are off for this app.” | Permission is denied in iOS Settings. |
| ”Nothing queued yet — tap Turn on notifications above and iOS will ask once.” | You have alerts switched on but have not yet granted permission. |
| ”Nothing queued yet. Turn an alert on and iOS will ask for permission.” | Permission not asked yet and every alert is off. |
| ”Nothing queued. The app needs to load conditions at least once before it can schedule anything.” | Permission granted, alerts on, but no conditions loaded yet. |
| ”Nothing queued — every alert is switched off.” | Permission granted, all alerts off. |
Permission and what iOS asks
Section titled “Permission and what iOS asks”The app never asks for notification permission at launch. The first time you open the Alerts screen before permission has been decided, a Turn on notifications button appears at the top with the footer “iOS will ask once. Nothing is scheduled until you allow it.” Tapping it shows the standard iOS prompt (alerts and sounds — no badge).
If you have declined, the screen shows “Notifications are turned off for this app in iOS Settings, so nothing here can fire.” with an Open iOS Settings link. Nothing can fire — local or pushed — until you allow notifications there.
Alerts that fire while the app is open are still shown as a banner with sound. Alert times are computed in the beach’s own time zone (Eastern), so a tide at 3:42 PM means 3:42 PM at the pier even if your phone is elsewhere.