Lewis Gordon Pugh swims across the Maldives
Lewis Gordon Pugh, continues his legacy on long distance swim in the beautiful Maldives. Mr. Pugh and his team arrived in Male’ the very small capital of the Maldives on the 13th Feb 2006.
The aim of this swim is to raise awareness on the problems of global warming and ask the industrialized nations such US, EU, China, Russia and other countries that emit carbon to reduce it.
Maldives is one of the most endangered nations in the world. Mr. Pugh, who is the only person to have completed long-distance swims in every world ocean, said the group of Indian Ocean atolls were heading for disaster and their population faced becoming “environmental refugees.”
The 36-year-old maritime lawyer said he would tackle the 160-kilometre (99-mile) challenge over 10 days, starting his bid to become the first to swim across the island chain on Saturday.
The highest point in the Republic of Maldives, about 700 kilometres southwest of Sri Lanka, is just 2.3 metres and around 80 percent of the islands’ land is no more than one metre above sea level.
“Unless we are able to cut our carbon emissions dramatically we are going to have environmental refugees,” Pugh said at the Maldivian High Commission in London.
“We hear a lot about polar bears, melting sea ice and retreating glaciers and I wanted to show the full breadth of climate change (with this swim).”
He highlighted the recent prediction by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that the sea level would probably rise by 59 centimetres per century over the next 200 years.
It would take less than 100 years for much of the Maldives to become uninhabitable, he said.
“This will have a devastating effect on the Maldives and its people. While they have done virtually nothing to contribute to the causes of climate change, their future now lies in our hands.
“Unless we all cut our carbon emissions today, the Maldives and many other low lying areas have no future.”
He plans to swim 10 kilometres in the morning, avoid the midday sun and complete another six kilometres in the evening.
Maldives Tourism Promotion Board gave their full backing to Pugh’s attempt.
“So far there are no signs of the sea levels rising but we have noticed quite a lot of erosion on many of the islands suggesting climate change is really happening,” he said.
Born in Britain and raised in South Africa, Pugh, who lives in London, swam the length of England’s River Thames last August to raise awareness of the dangers of global warming.
Mr. Pugh stayed in Meeru for 2 days and now on a safari vessel “Noorani 2″ halfway through his journey.
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