GIRL'S TRIUMPH.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 210, 6 September 1927, Page 7

GIRL'S TRIUMPH.

SWIMMING FEAT.

English Girl Crosses Bristol

Channel.

FIRST TIME IN HISTORY.

i ßy 'able—Press Association.—Copyright.)

(Received 9.30 a.m.)

LONDON, September 5.

.Miss Kathleen Thomas, a 20-year-old Penarth girl, swam the Bristol Channel tor the first time in history. The feat is regarded as equal to the swimming of the English Channel.

Miss Thomas started from Penarth at 4.15 in the morning and arrived at Weston-Super-Mare at 11.35. The distance is twelve miles, but Kathleen swam nearer, twenty miles owing to dangerous currents. '

Previous attempts have always failed before the swimmers have gone halfway. Kathleen's swim was made in secret and she refused to disclose her training place in order to avoid publicity. It was not till she was nearly at Wes-ton-Super-Mare that the crowd recognised what was being attempted and the whole town rushed to the beach to see her land. She was in perfectly fresh condition.

Miss Thomas swam strongly the whole way except in one bad patch in the centre where seven different tides whirl through. She was directed by her brother in the Bristol Channel.