A league of his own

Michael Alexander speaks to international endurance swimmer and maritime lawyer Lewis Pugh as he prepares to bring his oceans advocate message to Perth

In truly icy seas, or in shark-infested waters, or just in the middle of nowhere, there’s none like Lewis Pugh.

When BritishSouth African endurance swimmer and environmental campaigner Lewis Pugh set himself the challenge of swimming the length of the English Channel from Land’s End to Dover last year, he made himself three promises after considering the old saying that most crossings are won or lost before the first stroke is taken.

The first promise was that he would leave all his doubts at the start in Cornwall.

The second promise was that he would swim 10km every day.

The third promise he made was that if it was too dangerous to swim on a specific day, the following day he would do a double session.

“These three promises steered me through the toughest swim of my life,” he said.

“I swam through storms, through injury, and through a number of large swarms of jellyfish.

“I was swept backwards around The Lizard, and I battled for three days to round Dungeness.

“Finally after 49 days I touched the harbour wall at Dover.”

The aim of Lewis’ 528km swim was to call for 30% of the world’s oceans to be fully protected by 2030.

One of his responsibilities as the United Nations Patron of the Oceans is to hold to account those nations which are failing to properly protect their waters and their wildlife.

It was for this reason that he chose to swim along the south coast of England.

During his 49-day swim, all he saw were a few birds, a pod of dolphins in Lyme Bay, one turtle off Portland and little else.

On every beach he visited there was plastic pollution. “It’s as if we have hoovered up the fish and thrown in our plastic,” he said.

While barely a week goes by these days without further awareness of the scale of global plastic pollution and the other environmental problems that threaten the very future of the planet, Lewis says the UK deserves praise for an “astonishing turnaround” over the past 12 months which, he said, means that in one year, the UK is now leading the world in ocean protection.

“Since I completed my swim, the government has, with the encouragement of all political parties, created 41 new marine conservation zones around England, fully protected a further 264,000 square kilometres of sea around its territories in South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, and earmarked over 400,000 square kilometres of sea around Ascension Island for full protection,” he said.

“The government has also agreed to review the level of existing protections in waters around England, with a view to increasing the amount of Highly Protected areas.

“I remain hopeful they will do the same with the 77% of waters around South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands which are still unprotected as this is one of the most important wildlife hotspots on the planet.”

In addition, he praised the government’s ban of some single use plastics, the government’s commitment that the UK will champion on a global target of protecting 30% of oceans

I swam through storms, through injury, and through large swarms of jellyfish. I battled for three days to round Dungeness