Lewis Pugh arrived in Battery Park on the southern tip of Manhattan on Wednesday. This is where the Hudson River, the East River and the Atlantic Ocean meet.
A feat of arm and leg strength. A British endurance swimmer completed his 500 km swim in the Hudson River in New York on Wednesday September 13 to raise awareness about water pollution. “Fifty years ago, it was one of the most polluted rivers on the planet”said Lewis Pugh, a 53-year-old athlete, arriving at Battery Park, on the southern tip of Manhattan where the Hudson River, the East River and the Atlantic Ocean meet.
Lewis Pugh, “UN sponsor of the oceans”, achieved this performance a few days before the United Nations General Assembly, which takes place next week. It will open the international treaty to protect the high seas to signatures by member states.
“We must have clean and healthy rivers”, said the head of the foundation that bears his name, welcoming the fact that the Hudson has been decontaminated since the 1970s. This allowed him to swim there from its source, in the Aridonracks mountains, to its mouth in the New York Bay: 500 km of descent without assistance for 32 days, with obviously breaks to eat and sleep at night.
A source of inspiration ?
Lewis Pugh now hopes that his performance in “will inspire” others to raise awareness about the depollution of rivers and rivers. Other environmental activists “will be able to say to themselves: ‘If we did it for the Hudson, we can do it for our river and save it'”, Lewis Pugh explained to the press. He said that before it was cleaned up, New York’s mythical river changed color daily depending on who was dumped into it by industries.
The Briton, who also has South African nationality, has already swum in the waters of Antarctica, the North Pole and the Red Sea to alert global public opinion to the need to preserve rivers, seas and oceans of the planet.