An award-winning stretch of the North Tyneside coast has landed another share of the spotlight after proving a clear winner for open water swimming.
Longsands has been named one of UK and Ireland's best wild swimming spots in terms of water quality and visitor experience. The popular beach in Tynemouth has been singled out by Ocean Bottle which included it in a top 20 list dominated by bays in Ireland and Wales.
Ocean Bottle, a social enterprise which works to tackle the scourge of ocean-bound plastic, revealed its round-up of the best wild swimming areas just as forecasters predict a prolonged spell of hot weather which will make taking a dip in cool water more inviting than ever. At the same time there are repeated warnings about potential dangers for swimmers and tips on how to keep safe.
Read more: Fancy a wild weekend? Here's where to try wild swimming
Ocean Bottle, which to date has funded the collection of 6m kilograms of plastic preventing it from entering the ocean, says that keeping seas and rivers clean and protecting them from disease and pollutants is vital too. So, in identifying the best spots for its list, it examined the latest year of water samples from more than 800 areas, as sourced from bathing water quality information on Government sites and including the likes of E.coli counts to find out how they safe they are for swimming.
This was then cross-referenced with each location's Google ratings and reviews to come up with a ranking of the best places for wild swimming based on visitor experience. Any location with fewer than 100 reviews was removed from the final ranking.
Longsands, which also was just recently named in a Guardian article as one of the best UK beaches for swimming, is one of just seven English locations in the list which is topped by Keem Beach at Achill Island in County Mayo, Ireland, which achieves a water cleanliness score of 20.
This is based upon the count of E.coli and intestinal Enterococci per 100ml and the levels, to be at safe, must be under 130 and under 104 respectively. Keem Beach also has an average rating of 4.9 from more than 1,683 reviews.
Tynemouth, at number 16 in the list, also has a water score of 20 along with an average rating of 4.8 over 866 reviews. It beat a beach in Cornwall, two in Wales and also Seacliff in Berwick which rounded off the top 20. Ocean Bottle has also drawn up lists of the UK's least safe to swim locations and the least-visited areas: for all three lists in full see here.
The Royal Life Saving Society UK points out that around of 85% of accidental drownings happen at open water sites, with hazards including cold water shock, water depth and currents. For water safety advice and information about how to be aware and organised in order to continue to enjoy open swimming see its site here.
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