Saskatoon woman completes swim across English Channel

2 day_ago 2

Saskatoon

Long region swimming Aerin Bowers, who is primitively from Saskatoon, swam much than 40 kilometres connected June 30 to transverse the English Channel successful a azygous swim.

Aerin Bowers swam for much than 16 hours consecutive to scope the French coast

Chris Edwards · CBC News

· Posted: Jul 02, 2025 3:40 PM EDT | Last Updated: 5 hours ago

Aerin Bowers poses connected a formation with holding a swimming headdress coloured arsenic the Canadian emblem supra her head.

Saskatoon autochthonal Airen Bowers describes herself arsenic "half woman, fractional fish." That nickname was enactment to the trial this past weekend when she swam much than 30 kilometres crossed the English Channel.

The swim, which took much than 16 hours, was Bowers's 2nd attempt. She primitively planned to bash it successful September 2024, but cancelled owed to atrocious weather.

"I was conscionable truly blessed and relieved and arrogant and, yeah, grateful for each my enactment folks who are connected my boat," she said of arriving on the French shore.

"It was a really, truly epic moment."

According to the Channel Swimming Association, which tracks and authenticates transmission swims, the shortest region betwixt the 2 coasts is conscionable nether 33 kilometres. However, owed to the question of the tides, galore participants extremity up swimming overmuch further.

Bowers said she swam determination betwixt 40 and 50 kilometres by the clip she was finished. At the time, the h2o was 16 C.

"I was swimming connected a bigger tide than I expected," she said. "That last tide was truly hard to propulsion through. I was benignant of swimming successful spot for astir 2 hours wherever I was hardly moving astatine all, conscionable trying to support my changeable complaint up, conscionable trying to support my arms moving.

"It was beauteous exciting. I was amazed I was capable to locomotion retired of the h2o astatine the end, but someway your assemblage conscionable takes implicit and you cognize what to do."

Three radical airs connected a vessel with supportive yellowish signs.

Bowers said she had three-fold information for the swim. She turned 50 successful September 2025, which was besides the day of her begetter passing distant successful 2019. She besides money raised for Canadian Tire's Jumpstart charity, which provides funds for children to play sports.

Bowers has been a long-distance swimmer her full life and considers the transmission aquatics to beryllium the astir iconic successful the sport.

"The English Channel conscionable seems to clasp a mystery," she said. "It's that assemblage of h2o wherever truthful overmuch past happened. And it doesn't look similar it's that acold to swim, but it truly is simply a spot of a beast."