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A World Record
Wed 23rd Aug 2006
Sea & Sea Limited offers its congratulations to Colin Osbourne and his team following their crossing of the English Channel in aid of the Orchid Cancer Appeal for Male Cancers.
After two years of endurance training at Horsea Island the home of the Royal Navys Defence Diving School, Colin Osborne and his team of six experienced scuba divers, Lt Com John Bainbridge, Warren Brown, Paul Cushing, Mark Evans, Lt Com Mike Leaney MBE and Roz Lunn have completed the gruelling challenge they set themselves the worlds first scuba-relay across the English Channel, entitled, 10,000mm under the sea!
The divers met up twice a month at Horsea to train in the inland salt-water lake, which is exactly one kilometre long. By the start of July the team were completing runs in less than 25 minutes, with up to six runs being swam in a day per diver. Lieutenant Commander Mike Leaney from the Royal Navy said, we did do endurance diving training in the navy, but we have never done anything like this before.
The team began final preparations on Saturday 29th July with last minute testing and practising, whilst being based at Dover. Unfortunately the glorious weather they had during July disappeared, and the weather took a turn for the worse. High winds picked up and the channel grew rougher by the day, a dj vu descended on the team. Did they face having to postpone the Channel crossing yet again. It was just too dangerous to practise in the English Channel and the team was restricted to Dover Harbour.
The 1st of August arrived with 10 feet waves breaking the beaches at Dover. The window to attempt the crossing was between the 1st and 6th August, there was nothing the team could do but to keep on practising in Dover Harbour and wait. The practising drew large crowds along Dover Harbour seafront, especially on the Wednesday when ITV spent the day filming for a special programme on the channel crossing. The divers support vessel supplied by the 17 Port Training Regiment Royal Engineers. A RCL (Ramped Craft Logistic) or known as a Tank Landing Craft beached and lowered its ramp to allow the dive team to walk ashore whilst being filmed! Dover town sighed with relief they werent being invaded!
Then on Thursday the 3rd, a break in the weather. Ray Cooper the teams pilot from the Channel Crossing Association who had been studying the latest weather reports from the Met Office rang the team at 2 pm to say it was all systems go for a 6am start on Saturday 5th August!
The team woke on Saturday to a perfect dawn, not a cloud in the sky, little or no wind and most importantly hardly any swell. The challenge was on! The team now consisting of the divers and Lt Sue Gardner (medical cover), Myles Gascoyne (surface cover), David Millin (diver communication) sponsor David Pugh, Zo and Penny (Paul and Marks wifes essential support to supply endless drinks and food to the team), left Dover Harbour at 5am, for the short sail to Shakespeares Cliff just down the coast from Dover.
Whilst the rest of the team lowered the 6 x 3 metre dive frame into the water from the Landing Craft, which was to be towed behind Ray Coopers and Les Brays Pilot vessel Sea Venture II, from which the divers would swim above as they crossed the Straits of Dover. Myles took Colin and Mike ashore on the RIB. At 6:08am Colin stepped into the English Channel from Shakespeares Beach. Colin said, as I stepped into the English Channel the butterflies in my stomach felt like elephants! Then the adrenalin kicked in, I had waited two years for this moment and we were not going to fail!
Whist Colin swam under the water, Mike was swimming on the surface trailing a line down to Colin, which he followed, enabling him to navigate to the dive platform stationed 350 yards offshore. Once Colin was above the platform, he gave the okay signal via the Ocean Reef underwater com system to David Millin, on the Pilot boat. They then began their 22.3 mile crossing of the English Channel at a depth of five meters.
After 34 minutes Mike replaced Colin, as soon as he surfaced his first words were, are we there yet? Colins average speed whilst underwater was 1.9 knots and he had covered nearly a mile. The pace had been set! This was maintained across the Channel, and at times improved on especially by Mike (the tuna) Leaney, Mark (cod fish) Evans and Warren (flipper) Brown. The roster of Colin, Mike, Warren, Mark, Roz, John and Paul was continued across the Straits. In between dives the team could re-hydrate, rest and catch some of the summer sun on the huge deck of the landing craft.
The crossing went like clockwork with well-rehearsed changeovers taking all of 20 seconds to complete. When they entered the busiest shipping lanes in the world they were often passed by huge container ships and oil tankers, almost within touching distance of the pilot boat. The diver underwater at the time felt their whole body vibrate with the noise of the propellers as these huge ships passed so close by.
The fine weather continued with everyone hard pressed to spot a cloud in the blue sky. The white cliffs of Dover disappeared into the horizon behind, and the fawn coloured cliffs of Cap Gris Nez appeared out of the horizon in front! Then at 17:53, with the pilot vessel as close inshore as they could go, Mike and Warren slipped underwater together with Mark on the surface with a line to the divers to guide them in for the final shallow leg.
At 18:03 after just under 12 hours of swimming Mark, Mike and Warren walked ashore to applause from the local French sunbathers. They were then joined by the entire team. Standing on the beach looking back at England Colin said, seeing the white cliffs of Dover appearing to be ten millimeters high on the horizon puts into context how far we have actually swam and was a fitting way to celebrate my tenth year in remission from testicular cancer and the tenth anniversary of Orchid. Ten minutes on the French beach for photos, not even enough time to grab any duty free shopping! Then back on the Landing craft for the two-hour trip back to Dover and Colins Michael Schumacher moment spraying the team with champagne!
Apart from the little matter of the channel swim, the team have raised just over 50,000 for Orchid!
Colin, the team and Orchid would like to thank the following sponsors:
Mike & Tony from Vivaldi Potato By Naturally Best for being the main sponsor, without their support and belief the event would have never happened.
David Pugh and Mindon Tiling for once again supporting another Orchid event and to David for giving up his time in assisting the event.
John Sinclair and Suunto for donating a D9 computer and transmitter for the raffle and the loan of Vytec dive computers.
David Millin from Sea & Sea and Ocean Reef for the loan of the full-face masks and underwater communication system and to David for giving up his time in assisting the event.
Longwood Holidays for donating the Red Sea holiday for the raffle.
Richard Branson and Virgin Unite for donating the US flights for the raffle.
Scubapro for supplying the divers with 5mm Everflex Steamer wetsuits.
AP Valves for the loan of low profile Buddy Travelwing BCDs.
TUSA for supplying SF-8 X-Pert Zoom fins.
Deborah Sutton and PADI for their generous donation and raffle prizes.
Roger Muir and Goodman Baylis for once again printing the promotional materials free of charge.
John Farmer, Jason Gale and St X Design for donating the design of the dive logo and promotional materials.
Alan Willis and Datum for printing the promotional materials free of charge.
DUI for supplying the divers with Weight&Trim2 weight harness.
Central Compressor Consultants for the loan of the portable air compressor.
The Royal Navy for allowing the team the use the facilities at Horsea Island to train.
Warren Brown and Active Scuba for donating the raffle prizes and promoting the event.
Mark Evans and Sport Diver Magazine for donating the raffle prizes and promoting the event.
The Royal Engineers at the Military Port, Marchwood, Southampton and crew of RLCV Audemer for supplying the Landing Craft (RCL) and for their help and support during the week.
Lt Sue Gardner for coming along on the trip to keep her medical eye on the dive team.
Myles Gascoyne for spending all day on the RIB shuttling the divers back and forth between boats.
Ray Cooper and Les Bray the pilots for getting the team safely and so quickly across the Straits of Dover.
Pat Cash and P.H. Moriarty for helping to promote the event.