Trio swim the English Channel toraise funds for children's charity

Club coach Paul Harris, and athletes Ross Garnett and Joseph O’Gorman took on the challenging swim from England to France.

As well as the personal challenge, they did it to raise money for Charity for Kids, which helps disadvantaged children from Hastings and Rother.

Charity for Kids funds items which the NHS does not provide and the trio are trying to raise £3,130 to purchase a comfortable seating system for 12-year-old Harry Long.

Harry, who lives in Hastings and attends school in Bexhill, suffers from Lissencephaly (a life-limiting disease), has global development delay and profound learning difficulties.

The trio set off from Shakespeare Beach in Dover at 1.12am. Garnett swam the first hour well and O’Gorman then carried on his good work in the second hour.

Harris swam the third hour, taking the team into the English shipping lane.

At the eight-hour mark the team had made good progress in the separation zone, where they encountered patches of seaweed and jellyfish, which took a fancy to Garnett and Harris.

After 12 hours the team was told it needed to up its swim if it was to catch the tide to be carried in to Cap Gris-Nez, but they missed the Cap and got swept down to Audresselles.

O’Gorman arrived on French soil first, followed by Garnett and Harris.

As the team reached dry land, they were greeted by locals to congratulate them on their mammoth effort.

The crossing was a little lumpy and the swimmers took plenty of sea water on board when trying to breathe.

The trio would like to say a big thank you to the support crew of William Darby, Pete Garnett, Jemma O’Gorman and Jackson Moulton-Abbott.

Swimming the Channel is one of the worlds toughest endurance Challenges. Swimmers are only allowed to wear a swim costume, swim cap and goggles.

Some of the issues faced by seimmers taking on the challenge are hypothermia, raw sewage, jellyfish. The Channel is the worlds busiest shipping lane seeing over 500 ships a day pass through.