Swimmer rescued from rough Lake Erie waters

A solo swimmer was plucked from the waves of Lake Erie by Canadian search and rescue crews Sunday after becoming separated from his support boat during a race from Sturgeon Point, N.Y., to Crystal Beach.

Event organizer Miguel Vadillo said Michael Kenny, 41, of Cambridge, was picked up by just after 1 p.m. in U.S. waters nearly eight kilometres south of the Point Abino lighthouse in Fort Erie.

Vadillo, of Embrace Open Water Swimming, said Kenny was very disappointed and very apologetic afterwards.

“He has nothing to apologize for … his crew made a mistake that cost him the race,” said Vadillo, who didn’t elaborate on the mistake. He also didn’t fault the crew.

Kenny is a swimmer, he said, who knew not to panic and knew how to get to shore, even when alone in the waves, which were two metres in height or more at times Sunday afternoon.

“He’s such a nice fellow, has such a great spirit … we were very lucky.”

The race — it saw 13 solo swimmers and six relay teams, of between four and six swimmers — was supposed to take place Saturday, but after checking the forecast organizers decided to call it off and postpone for a day.

“The wind predictions were too strong for it to be comfortable swimming,” said Vadillo, who in 2010 became the 44th person to swim across Lake Ontario.

With more favourable conditions Sunday — winds of seven to 13 km/h — the race was on.

“They were pretty much optimal conditions,” said Vadillo.

However, when competitors took to the waters off of Sturgeon Point, 20 kilometres directly due south of Crystal Beach, they found much stronger conditions. Winds were gusting at more than 30 km/h and waves were growing. “It wasn’t what we expected.” Three-and-a-half hours into the race, one of the support boats for a female swim mer lost steering and was unable to move, said Vadillo, adding the crew on the boat was very sick.

“I went back with my boat to assist with the emergency. The fix for the support boat wasn’t an easy one,” he said, adding a Fort Erie Fire Department boat came out to assist.

The support vessel ended up being towed to Crystal Beach and the swimmer, with no crew and no vessel, ended up abandoning her race. She was now also four-and-a-half hours into her swim and had yet to make a 10-kilometre mark set for a time of five hours.

“She had no crew or boat and made the decision to stop.”

As her crew was being transferred to shore, Vadillo said, a call went out for a missing swimmer — Kenny.

Vadillo said all of the swimmers in the race abandoned the event, and joined their support boats in a search and rescue effort to locate Kenny, who had been missing for between 40 and 50 minutes.

“Every boat became a search and rescue vessel. The open water swimming community set aside everything to search for their fellow swimmer.”

A U.S. Coast Guard vessel, operating out of Buffalo, was sent to the scene as were other search and rescue vessels.

Kenny was found by search and rescue crews from Port Col borne Marine Auxiliary Rescue (POCOMAR) unit’s vesselP1. The all-volunteer Canadian Coast Guard Auxiliary members took the swimmer on board and transferred Kenny, who was uninjured, to a Fort Erie fire boat.

Vadillo said if Kenny had not gone missing, the race would not have been called by officials as one swimmer was within two kilometres of shore.