Paralympian Jeremy McClure will reattempt 85km open ocean swim from Abrolhos Island to Geraldton Foreshore

After an unsuccessful first attempt, blind Paralympian Jeremy McClure will be back in Geraldton next week to take on the massive swim from Abrolhos to Geraldton, a swim not known to be accomplished before. McClure swam for 16 hours of the estimated 24-hour swim during his first attempt in June, but abandoned the task when his crew became unwell because of fatigue and strong currents pulling the swimmers south. He said he would attempt to swim from Long Island rather than Hummock Island, increasing his swim distance by 30km. But he said that he would not be fighting the current and he did not expect the swim to take much longer. “This time around we are looking at different islands. Last time the current was so strong and I wasn’t going to enter the marina,” he said. The original attempt from Hummock Island was a 55km swim to Geraldton’s shore. This time around, the swim would be 85km. Mr McClure expects to depart the island about 9am. Mr McClure will leave the Island and swim to the mainland sometime next week — after some adjustments — he said he was confident he would make the distance. “We will be waiting this week to check the weather conditions. If it’s looking better for Sunday or Monday we will go ahead with that,” Mr McClure said. McClure said the swim must be attempted before Tuesday, September 27 as his crew would be unavailable from then onwards. “We’ve made a few tweaks for safety, visibility and making sure the communication is better,” he said. Mr McClure said kayakers would have a radio to communicate any issues or questions, guide swimmers were increased from five to 10 and had assessed different starting points to drift with the current. “The team is very strong, we’ve learnt a hell of a lot from the last one. I have quite a lot of confidence that we will finish it this time, even if we end up on another beach,” he said. You can track the swim live on Jeremy McClure’s Facebook page.