PORT ANGELES — A Seattle man will make a second attempt to swim the Strait of Juan de Fuca on Sunday.
Andrew Malinak, 28, a civil engineer, plans to leave Beechy Head at the southern tip of Vancouver Island,on Vancouver Island at about 6:45 a.m., swimming without a wetsuit in water temperature anticipated to be 50-52 degrees.
He expects the 12-mile crossing to the North Olympic Peninsula to take between five and six hours, he said in a news release issued today.
Malinak will follow Marathon Swimming Federations rules for unassisted swims, he said.
Wetsuits are not allowed by the rules of the Santa Barbara Channel Swimming Association, which records major open water swimming achievements.
He will be supported on the swim by Captain Charles Martin, captain of Livin the Dream, a 26-foot Sequim-based catamaran safety vessel that accompanied Malinak on his first attempt.
Also supporting him will be local swimmers Howie Ruddell, Scott Lautman, Melissa Nordquist and Erika Norris, Malinak said.
Malinak halted his first attempt two years about 1 mile from the Peninsula, hampered by heavy fog, water temperatures in the high 40s and strong currents.
Since then, he has trained in the Puget Sound to be better prepared for bad conditions, he said.
The swim across the Strait will be Malinak’s last of three swims in his “Summer of Bert” series inspired by Tacoma swimmer Bert Thomas, who swam the Strait in 1956, the first person documented as doing so.
On June 6, Malinak completed an 18.8-mile swim from Tacoma to Seattle in 8:43 hours and on Aug. 8, he swam 25.5 miles around Bainbridge Island in 12:23 hours.
If he is successful, Malinak will be the eighth swimmer since Thomas to document swimming the Strait.
The swim will be live-Tweeted by the crew at @andrewswims #SJDF2015 #SummerOfBert, and live GPS tracking will be available on vessel tracking websites such as vesselfinder.com or marinetraffic.com by searching MMSI (ship number) 367575160.
