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Bell swims Tinian-Saipan channel under five hours
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Posted on Jun 09 2008
A 70-year-old man who sought to repeat the historic swim he made nearly 30 years ago successfully crossed the channel between Saipan and Tinian yesterday morning, swimming the five-mile distance in less than five hours.
James H. Bell was celebrating his birthday when he made the crossing early yesterday morning, with no escort and no knowledge of the tides and surf.
He left Tinian at 6am and waded ashore on the beach of Coral Ocean Point Resort in Koblerville at 10:30am, completing the swim in four and a half hours. He had expected the crossing to take eight hours. His previous effort took 12 hours.
“Maybe I’m getting better,” said Bell.
Nature, he added, made his crossing a little easier. He had prepared to swim against a strong east-to-west current. But he found the current flowing in the reverse direction, carrying him ever closer to his destination.
Even the jellyfish, which had been his other worry, proved to be nothing but a mild annoyance. He got minor jellyfish stings during the swim.
“Everything has turned out very well. I’m very happy. I’ve been thinking about doing this for a long time. It’s nice to do it and get it done,” he said.
As for his next goal to cross the Torres Strait from Papua New Guinea to the Australian mainland, he said, “I’m too beat to think about it right now. That one is going to take a while, and the conditions have to be right. My plan is to play it by ear.”
In July 1981, Bell marked his retirement from the U.S. Navy by swimming alone from Saipan to Tinian. He spent most Saturdays of 1980 swimming around the island of Guam’s 120-mile shoreline.
Bell resides in Boulder, Colorado.
