Swimming to Antarctica_ Tales of a Long-Distance Swimmer - Lynne Cox [73]
What this did, though, was to enable us to study the current alongshore by watching the movement of kelp in the water. The kelp was stretched completely out, at right angles to the shore. That meant that the current was whipping around the cove, moving at full bore, at nine knots. Tides were going to be critical in this swim, and our success would depend on the way we crafted our course.
John and I were very concerned that the current flowing into the strait from the Atlantic would be so strong that it would push me too far west, to an area where the Strait of Magellan expanded; there the distance across was at least ten miles. We were also very concerned that the current flowing from the Pacific side of the Strait of Magellan would be so strong that it would push us completely out of the First Narrows and into the Atlantic Ocean, so that we would never make it to shore.
What we decided to do was to start the swim at the tail end of the tide when the water was flowing from the Atlantic toward the Pacific, from east to west. Then the tide would go slack for a period of time. We had no idea how long this would be, but it would be when I could swim directly across and gain the most direct distance. Then the tide would turn and the current would flow in the opposite direction, from the Pacific toward the Atlantic, west to east. The change would start out gradually, then build like a freight train. Any miscalculation and we would be either too far east or too far west and would fail on the attempt.
To hedge our bets, we figured that we would make the starting point in the area of the First Narrows in the middle of Tierra del Fuego. That way, if the current carried us too far to either side, we would still be able to land onshore before being swept into the Atlantic Ocean or into the widest part of the Strait of Magellan. From that midpoint, we could aim for the center of the beach on the Chilean mainland. The beach there was seven miles long, which would give us a three-and-a-half-mile margin for error. There was another major consideration, too: the ferryboat captain had warned us that if a storm approached and the tide changed very rapidly, whirlpools would occur at the headlands, near the area where we would finish the swim. The whirlpools reached full velocity when the tide was flowing at maximum speed. They were extremely dangerous. Local people had told John and me that these whirlpools had taken down ships and small boats, killing everyone on board.
Using binoculars, Captain Furniss studied the shore, looking for a small beach where we could land. The spray off the wave tops was so thick that he had trouble seeing through the veil of saltwater mist. He directed his men to sail closer to shore, then turned the ship directly into the current and increased the ship’s engines to nearly full throttle so we could hold our position and all of us could take a good look at the shore. We found a cove without many rocks or much kelp, perfect for the start of the swim. But the weather conditions were deteriorating so rapidly that Captain Furniss had to turn the ship around and head for the Chilean mainland before the storm hit.
The sea in the Strait of Magellan could become ferocious within twenty minutes. Storm fronts originating in Antarctica sweep northward across the Drake Passage, and without any real landmass to buffer them, they hit the Strait of Magellan suddenly and at full force. Fortunately, the Chilean navy had outposts and weather stations at Cape Horn, at the southernmost tip of Tierra del Fuego, and along the Antarctic Peninsula where men and equipment gathered meteorological information and transmitted it to the ship; they had alerted Captain Furniss. Without a doubt, it was an impossible day for a swim. Still, it was disappointing; we all had great expectations and underlying tensions, and we wanted to get the swim off as soon as possible. I think Captain Furniss understood this better than anyone. Perhaps it was to boost our confidence,