Woman's Hour - Women and Water

Episode Date: August 31, 2026

After a summer when hot weather has drawn many of us towards the water, we explore its pull as a place of freedom, adventure and friendship, as well as the risks it can pose.Writer and wild swimmer Brigid Lowe tells us how swimming in Scotland’s lochs gave her a sense of freedom, a journey she charts in her new memoir, Shiver: The Lessons of the Lochs. Musician Tricia Duffy explains how rivers and the sea flow through her songwriting, including her recent EP, River Stories.Seren Jones, co-founder of the Black Swimming Association, joins us to discuss who feels able to enjoy the water, why some communities face greater barriers to swimming and how we can all enjoy open water more safely.We also meet some of the women whose working lives depend on water. Ivana-Maria Carrioni-Burnett, a former Royal Navy officer who now works as a sea pilot on the Thames, describes climbing aboard huge vessels and taking control of their navigation. Plus Sara Barsley and Hayley Garrod from the Canal and River Trust reveal the work that goes into keeping Britain’s waterways flowing.Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Simon Richardson

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Today we're celebrating women and water and the many different ways it shapes our lives. For many of us, this summer's hot weather has made the pull of the water feel even stronger than ever, whether that's to cool off, to clear our heads, or simply to find a little escape. For women, water can be a place of adventure and friendship. It can be the backdrop to a working life or a source of creative inspiration. Well, we're going to hear from writer and wild swimmer Bridget Lowe, who found a new sense of freedom in Scotland's locks. Also, we'll hear from the musician Tricia Duffy.

Her relationship with water flows through the music that she writes. And after a summer, which has brought reminders of the risks that water can pose, Saren Jones, who is the founder of the Black Swimming Association, will also join us to talk about who feels able to enjoy the water and how we can all do so safely. Plus, we'll hear your stories about what water means to you. But we start with a woman on a ladder. Her name is Ivana Maria Carrioni Burnett.

She's a marine pilot navigating visiting vessels into the port of London. And she's arriving at work, hanging off the side of a ship. So the first two steps, you get as quickly as possible, and then sort of settle yourself down. and then start climbing the ladder. This ship is a tanker, it's carrying gasoline, and it's about 144 metres long, so we're talking about one and a half football pitches,

with a draft of nearly nine metres. And there is absolutely nothing on my mind except my next handhold, one handhold at a time, until I get to the top. Once I'm on the deck, I usually give a little wave back down to the pilot boat Say, look, I'm on safely. Off you go. I arrive on the bridge and I'm met first by the captain

and then usually the next question is to your coffee pilot, which is very welcome, especially in the middle of the night. Once we've gone through the master pilot exchange and I'm happy with everything, I will then ask the captain if I can take conduct of navigation. So I just asked the captain, I'm going to take conduct of navigation now.

And it's as simple as that. London VTS. London VTS, the specified harbour fountain. Good morning, open. Specified harbour fountain, London, Viches. Good morning. Okay, so I'm now on board the ship. I make my first call to London vessel traffic services.

I'm entering their area, and they need to know some information about my arrival. Would you at Gravesend at 1300? I have to use the word specified to prefix the name of the ship. because this tanker is carrying gasoline and it just means that other vessels need to keep a certain distance away from me. So we're now in the river and we are a few miles away from the berth. I've made contact with the tug and I'm going to then relay my plan to him. This is really important that the tugmaster and the pilot both have a shared understanding of how the manoeuvre is going to progress.

So I've passed all my arrival information on the radio. We're well on our way and making good speed towards the birth and I've been provided with my much needed coffee. Taking us into her world was the voice of the voice. of Ivana Maria Carrioni Burnett, Marine Pilot with the Port of London Authority, from whom we'll hear more shortly. I've also left the beach, and I'm back in the Woman's Hour studio

where I am surrounded by the women of the water that I was mentioning a few moments ago. Now, today's programme is all about the inspiration that water can offer us. But as you've been hearing, we want to start with a woman whose relationship with water is rather practical. Yvanna is back from the sea

and with me here in the Woman's Era studio. Hello, good to have you with us. Hello, good morning. What a job. Maybe you could describe a little bit, Ivana. What role does the marine pilot play? Yes, so we are local area experts.

So you can imagine that ships all around the world go into lots of different ports and the master and the crew can't be expected to know in detail every single one. So we go on board as the local experts. We know all about the depths of the water, the births, and especially the tidal streams that we can expect. And they're quite complex, as you can imagine, on the Thames.

Yes, absolutely. We begin to get a taster of it from being at work with you for a few minutes. Help us understand, however, the scale of the task that you often have ahead of you. You're maneuvering, I understand, a vessel that could be the size of a football pitch or even several pitches. Yes, that's correct. That's length. And then they've also got a draft, which is the depth of the ship underneath the water. And I do up to 9, 10, 11 metre draft.

And we can actually get up to 16, 17 metre draft into the Thames. You're basically working with the captain and crew that you may never have met before. You're kind of parachuted in, so to speak. You're, I suppose, sailed in to take over. I imagine people are happy to see you. But how do you build trust? You're just immediately building that trust through an exchange of information. So I tell them all the safety information they need to know for the passage and the manoeuvre.

And they provide me all the information they can about the ship. How do gender dynamics play out in those situations, I wonder, because you're dealing with people from all over the world with different cultures around. Gender, for example, or perhaps different roles for women in society? It's a great question. And it's one of the things I love about the job is that. We get to meet people from all around the world. Culture often plays a bigger factor than gender.

Is anyone surprised when they see a woman pop up as their pilot? Sometimes, many years ago, I did have one captain say, oh, I should have shaved when he saw me, which I found very amusing. I don't know how that made any difference. Are there many women doing what you do? Not at all. There are around maybe over two and a half million seafarers in commercial shipping around the world

and the statistics are around 2 or 3% some even as low as 1 and a half percent so yeah there aren't many of us at all So you are exceptional how does that sit with you It's something that I'm actually really comfortable with because I understand the importance of that representation and that visibility I was once on board a tanker

and there was a woman cadet and she was so thrilled to see me and it made me realise how important it is to maintain that presence online through my socials. Oh yeah. And also, you know, just engaging with them and encouraging them.

And that kind of, if you can see it, you can be it. But it is just from the little that I'm learning about it, it could be an incredibly stressful job. I'm just wondering, it sounds to me like you take it all in your stride, but do you have tricks, tips for yourself when you're working on something that could be, I don't know, just this huge endeavor? So obviously coming from the military, being calm under pressure is something that is almost innate to me now.

And it's really important that I project a sense of calm and control to the captains because I don't want them to pick up on any nervousness. And I want to try and keep them calm and show them that this is eminently possible, even in difficult conditions. But I've got my own towels. There's always a radio to hold on to speak to the linesman or the tug, and I grip that. I try not to chew the rubber end of the antenna. And I'm sometimes got my hand in my pocket fiddling with a piece of lint.

So nothing anyone will ever notice, but I know. I love these little insider tips while you're doing something so incredible, very inspiring to hear your story. You know, we are going to hear more stories of water meaning freedom or, you know, inspiration, but I am struck that you're working with something that is so industrial, yet what you love about it is nature, for example. It's kind of a paradox in some ways. Absolutely, yes, that's a funny way to look at it, but it's the best way that I can get to see and yet spend time at home with my family as well. So lovely to hear your story. You're going to stay with us, I'm delighted to say throughout the hours. So you're kicking us off as we talk about women

on water and in water and crazy about water as we talked about the workplace as it is for Ivana there. She has learned to read and navigate the seas with extraordinary precision

but our relationship with water can go in lots of directions can't it? My next guest is Bridget Lowe she's a writer and swimmer she's the author of a new memoir Shiver The Lessons of the Locks

it's a book about the roll water and swimming in particular has played at difficult times in her life. I was reading it recently on the beach, before I knew what was happening, I was pulling on my swimsuit and inspired to take a dip.

I always have this sense of anticipation when I get to this spot. Ankle deep in salty water. But there is a pole. There is a draw.

No matter how cold it is, I actually know I will get in. And I'm going to bring you along as we catch a wave together. Deeper. Oh, a little splash. Deeper still. I'm up to my knees.

At some point, you've just got to commit. Here goes nothing. One, two, three. Oh, chilly, my gorgeous. Salt water on my lips. Okay, I'm going for a swim. So, you know, I have that conflicting relationship when I'm getting into cold water for a little swim,

one that Bridget chairs. But for her, it has come to offer a very particular kind of liberation. It's a space away from commitments and responsibilities of everyday life, as we're going to hear. And also in the aftermath of trauma, some details, I should say, which you may find distressing. But that pull off the water has taken her to Scotland, where she has set herself.

Can I say crazy challenge? I'm swimming in 1,000, 1,000 Scottish locks. Bridget, you're very welcome to the Women's Air Studio. Okay. Why? So, well, I'm a bit of an extremist. So when I discovered how much lox could do for me, my immediate impulse was, I have to swim in all of them.

But unfortunately, there are 30,000 freshwater locks. That was news to me until I read you. I knew there was probably thousands, but I did not know that figure. So that was already the first part of learning that I had from your book. Yeah. And then there are also the sea locks and I wouldn't have wanted to leave them out. So I kind of thought, my life isn't long enough, which is an interesting reflection in itself. In some ways, the swimming has become for me a way of exploring the notion of goals in itself.

So I think the book is slightly about working past youth into midlife. And often at that stage in our lives, we've already fulfilled a lot of goals. You may have achieved something in your career and your kids, you've completed your family lightly, navigated them through the dangerous parts of infancy. And you begin to realize that life isn't about achieving the goals. It's about the journey along the way. And so this thousand loch goal is really about facilitating moments of full living along the way rather than the moments being about achieving the goal. So it really is the journey, not the destination. But what is it that you get when you enter? I try to tell a little bit of what I get.

when I enter the sea, but what does it you get when you enter a lock? There is something about getting into water. It is a good metaphor for that particular kind of orientation towards a goal, but presence in the moment that means so much to me. When you get into cold water, you're only going to be there a certain amount of time. There is nothing to be busy with. It really is about suspending myself and suspending normal senses of time and normal kind of goal-orientated behaviour.

So in a way, water has its own goal. Eventually it will reach the open sea and yet a river still is fluid present. And in loch and pools, this is where the water rests, gathers its energies before moving on. And loch swimming is about that kind of gathering. It's also just the cold turns up one's attention. Sure does. And it's so multi-sensory. So you're looking around, see.

the light on the water different every time, maybe the mist rising off the water, coiling through the rolling hills around, through the falling tears of scree or trees. It's almost as though it's pulling everything into that still moment in the water. Yeah, you can't really think of a to-do list when you're at that temperature, right? You know, I alluded to there, and I'm really sorry you went through this, but your project came after a period of considerable trauma in your life. you're a survivor of rape. What did being in the water offer you in the years that followed?

Partly I did it just because it worked. I mean, cold water has a powerful effect on your brain chemistry. Often when we're feeling bad, we just want to change something. That's how people get sucked into alcoholism and addiction and so on, just that need to change things. When something like that happens to you, it can make you almost afraid of your own body. Your body's been the medium through which control has been taken away from you. Afterwards, you can become afraid of like your own heartbeat. You know, when you feel your heart

speed, you're immediately taken back to a moment when you were out of control. And so when you get into cold water, that speeding of your heart, that feeling that you're going through something, but it's something that you've chosen. And that moment, as you were getting into the water there, that moment, that slight moment of crisis for a second, we're all like, can I get through this? But then a moment later, you have got through that and you've proved your age. and your kind of resilience by acclimatising to the cold. Do you rehearse that over? You write it very beautifully.

And I think also perhaps in a different way that some people may not have read about before. So I found it very inspiring. And I'm so sorry you went through that. I should say we do have links to the BBC's Action Line if you've been affected by some of what I've just been speaking about here with Bridget. There is a temptation to tell the story about nature healing us after. trauma at times. Some would even call it, sometimes it becomes this cliche in nature writing about nature always healing us, but you very much resist that. Why did you want to not present water

simply as a kind of cure? For me, certainly, nature is a place where I can get back in touch with my feelings, but that can be a lot. A lot to do, a lot to take on. A lot to take on. Sometimes the depths of us are as deep and dark as the depths of the loch. Some loch are deeper than the continental shelf and you have that feeling within yourself and there can be monsters down there. It's not something to do lightly. Everyone kind of thinks they love nature and yet we avoid it a lot of the time and to avoid it all of the time and never face anything, that's a problem. But to dive right in, like diving into deep cold water, you need to be ready. Ready for the feelings that may surface.

Exactly. You can quite successfully suppress lots of your feelings just as you get swept up into the busyness again, but then stepping outside that busyness, that's a risk as well as having potential. You also talk about the old stories about women and water, stories of Selkees, that's mythical creature from Scottish and Irish folklore that can transform from a seal in the water into a human on land by shedding its skin. How do you think they resonate today, some of those stories with women? So I think they come in two types.

So the Selkees are one type about water wives who come out of the water. So you find by the edge of a loch, and they've come from a wilder place. And then they'll come and they'll start a family, but then they may suddenly depart and just go back into the water. And I think there there is an element of wish fulfillment for women with lots of caring responsibilities. Just to leave. Just to leave.

But on the other hand, in those stories, sometimes the wife will try to return. If she's a seal, she won't be able to speak human language and she can't communicate with her family. So it's extremely poignant too. And I think we all, as women, we have that anxiety that if we put down the burden for a minute, we won't be able to take it back up again. But then there are other less guilty stories, too.

So one of the only warm, non-punishing swims in the book is at Queen Chavana's Bath in Italy. And that's a secret cyan pool, hidden amongst beautiful green forest. And Queen Chavana, no one else was allowed to go there. And she'd go down. And there were lots of stories about whether she met love. there, whether she met the sea as lover there. And we find these kind of stories around the world,

too. So back in Scotland, in Ainster, there was a lady Ainster. She was known as the Queen of Gypsies, and she had a very kind of subversive reputation. And she has a tower and a cave by the sea. She would ring a bell and no one was allowed to approach the coast while she swam. And again, all kinds of rumours about what she got up to. So water, I think, has always been a symbol of kind of potential wild freedom. Yeah, a bit of divine femininity. I have to ask you about pollution. When you choose somewhere to swim, how much are you worrying about whether the water is clean? So I'm very lucky to be able to swim in the highlands because this is one of, by European standards, it's exceptionally clean. And I mean, you can often see that there's hardly even a sheep in the

watershed, you know, like there is nothing above you but the sky. But in Edinburgh, it's a much bigger worry and in lowland rivers it's a worry everywhere. A good rule of thumb is that because of our Victorian drainage system, which we are not updating, heavy rain will take sewage into the water, but also commercial companies and just lack of maintenance means that even sometimes in good weather, there can be leaks. That's the one danger I can't control in the water. Everything else, but that's beyond me. Yeah. Thanks very much, Bridget. Shiver, the Lessons of the Locks, is going to be released on the 24th of September. I want to to continue talking about water. You know, we're talking about it can offer freedom, pleasure,

escape or escapeism, but can of course also be dangerous during the hot weather. So many of us are drawn to the water to cool off. But there's been so many tragic stories in the news lately over the summer with people losing their lives in the water. Serran Jones is the co-founder of the Black Swimming Association. She works to help more people enjoy the water safely. Good to have you with us, Seren. Thank you, Neila. Thanks for having me. So many stories I feel over the summer I know particularly with the heat waves I suppose more people perhaps going to the sea

but so many have lost their lives of all different backgrounds I'm sure you must have been reading those stories with such a degree of sadness as well Yes it's by far the hardest thing about the work that we do is there's the theory of understanding that there are inequities when it comes to aquatic participation and encouraging more people to get into bodies of water and enjoy them safely and learn how to do that.

But the reality is when things go wrong, we are reporting on, we are recording, we are analysing death tolls. And it is extremely difficult, especially when so many of these cases involve families, involve young people, involve children. And drowning is actually it's preventable. It's something that can be solved

if the education is out there and that's something that we're really passionate about at the Black Swimming Association is making sure people know how to be safe in water. So tell me a little, little bit more about what the association does? So the association was set up six years ago now. The four co-founders came together, understanding that every summer we see people, general public, flock to bodies of water, naturally because we're human and to stay cool. But what felt like a pattern

we were observing kind of anecdotally was that when drownings or water-based fatalities would occur, a lot of those people would look like us, would be from black and brown communities. So we started to wonder why that was. The foundation, essentially, what we do is we promote water safety and drown and prevention education to everybody, but especially to communities who need it most. And data shows now that across the UK you have people from lower socioeconomic communities who have very little to know water safety awareness and education, as well as black and brown communities.

And when you really look at the numbers, it's really stark. We know in England that black children are three times more likely to drown than white children. We know that the water incident database recorded their drownings last year and showed that 86% of these drownings involved teenage boys. So not only is there a race imbalance when it comes to drowning, there's also a gender imbalance. And I think a lot of people tend to think about, okay, you know, people who drown are usually unfamiliar with the bodies of water that they experience and adventure in. But actually, although there is truth to that, it's, we also have to think about the swimmers who actually are familiar with those bodies of water, who are comfortable

going in, and every now and then find themselves in difficulties as well. It's a double-edged sword, really. And the partners, the women, partners or women carers as well, they do play an important part of your strategy. We know that teenage boys are risk takers, and we know that most drownings in this country happen between the months of May and August. That coincides with the end of GCSEs, with the end of A-levels, and young people, you know, working so hard all year, wanting to celebrate and do something fun, and it's 30 plus degrees outside. What better idea than to go to,

is it a river, is it a reservoir if you live in the urban cities or is it the beach if you live, you know, around the coast? But if these young people don't have that water safety education, you spoke about before about committing to the cold water when you were in that tape, you know, and jumping in. And you do have to commit. And when you do, and the water is so cold, if you're prepared for that, it feels euphoric.

It really does. But when you're not prepared, It's fatal. It can be absolutely fatal. So what, you know, mothers can do, if they do have, you know, younger children or teenage boys, it's to start having these conversations. Because the networks that we have at the BSA, it's understanding that we know mothers who've lost their teenage sons, who've lost their teenage daughters. And they say, we spoke to our kids about everything, about, you know, cyberbullying,

about the dangers of social media, sex, drugs, alcohol. But water safety was never a conversation that was had at home. And that's not to put the onus on women and families, but it's a wider conversation around, okay, well, why is water safety not prioritised in society at large? If it's not taught in schools, it's not taught in swimming clubs where I spend most of my childhood. And it's not, you know,

we're not having those discussions around the table at home. Then how can young people in this country understand what they're getting into before they do commit to jumping into that cold water? I want to bring Ivana in here. Vana, the Port of London Authority has launched a campaign about water safety in the Thames. What are their hopes for that? It's exactly as Sarin was saying, just to do that education piece

and that awareness for the communities who live along the river who look at it as somewhere to go and perhaps cool off or play and it's so, so dangerous. The Tidal Thames is ridiculously dangerous. Because you will know risks that the average person

looking at that water wouldn't know about. So Tidal is one. yes and there is an extraordinary amount under the water that you can't see and those are things that you can get trapped on caught up in then there's the mud as well which is a danger in itself and very often people jumping in won't know how deep that is in reality until they do that first jump so our campaigners see the river see the risk and it's so important that people understand that even if an accent happens, that they also don't go in to try and assist, even if whether that's, you know, your own child or a dog or someone, a stranger, you absolutely must call the Coast Guard. 999, call the Coast Guard. The RNLI will be there in minutes because so often we see that people who go in to help become a casualty themselves. I'd love to add to that because that's the hardest message that we struggle with getting our audiences to understand. I mean,

We're human beings. You know, when we see somebody in distress or in an emergency in water, especially if they're a loved one, our instinct is not going to be to stand there. It's going to be to get in. And that's why we've seen so many fatalities this summer of family units, not making it out of water because a young person's gone in or somebody else has gone in after them. And it's the hardest thing, but there are so many resources out there now to equip families to know that there are other options. Everyone's going to stay with us. We're going to talk a little bit more about a practical guide on how women can start swimming and also to swim more safely all year round.

We're not live today, so please don't text or email. But earlier we did ask you to send us stories about your relationships with water. I live by a river in West Wales and a few minutes walk from the sea. Lucky me. I belong to a local community choir that not only is named after the river Leri that flows through the village where we sing every week, Lairie Voices, we also join other local singers each year to raise money for charity. Over 100 of us sang a range of water-themed songs on the Aberystwyth Seashore just a couple of weeks ago.

And we donated £9,000 to water aid to help people that don't have the good fortune to enjoy easy access to clean drinking water or decent sanitation. That one is from Ros Martis. Well done to you, Roz. And as a singer, our next item could be just for you. Singer-songwriter Trisha Duffy performs under the artist's name Little Lorne. She released an EP last year called River Stories, each with a song exploring water from a different angle, from rivers and canals to boats and swimming.

She's with us in studio. Welcome. Thank you so much. Good to have you join our conversation. How did river stories come about? The initial idea was to go to a small island in the mouth of the Grand Union Canal, which is also the River Brent.

It comes off the Thames in Brentford. called Johnson's Island, which is home to around, I'm going to say, between 15 and 20 artist studios. It used to be the lockkeepers cottages back in the day. And now, yeah, host these artists. And I had this hairbrain scheme that I would go and meet the artists and interview them and write a collection of songs based on their stories. I had a friend who had a studio there and I called her and said, what do you think would happen if I did that if I came sort of three days in a row and interviewed the artist?

And she said, I think I can do better than that. why don't you borrow my studio for a few days? And so that's how the whole project originally was conceived and began. What a special place to work. It sounds wonderful. Yeah, it is absolutely idyllic. It's messy and full of paint splatters. Surrounded by water, obviously.

You access it over a tiny little bridge. And it is a place that seems to invite people to thrive around artistry, both music and visual arts as well. And you found it inspirational as you spoke to people. Well, I turned up on the first day. I mean, you know, unlike most musicians, I must be the keenest musician in the history of the world ever because I turned up on the first day with my computer and my guitar

and everything I needed expecting to meet some artists and there was literally nobody there. I was solitary, literally by myself, going, okay, this is not exactly going according to plan. And I sort of stared at that brown water and it just started to bring up some themes for me because I'd started to think about my own relationship with water

and the fact that coincidentally I'd lived next to bodies of water for almost all of my life And I have quite a challenging relationship with water because I, as my father always says, we like to say slipped Trisha in a pool when I was two years old. But I refused to swim as a child. I was an absolute swimming refusal. I would sit on the side of the pool and put my feet in and that's as far as I would go. And I thought anyone who got in the water and certainly put their head in was crazy. So I didn't learn to swim until I was a teenager.

Because you were mapping your life through memories of water. Tell me what that felt like when memories started coming back or that piece. it together. Well, I've used a tool that's created by an excellent academic whose name is Hewan Chang. She maps out tools that you can use to explore your own identity in ways that perhaps you might not. Give me an example. So she will say, have a look at how you identify in gender, how you identify in faith, how you identify in your work. You know, explore all of these things. So there's definitely a kind of tying together here about kind of what I was doing and what was important to me. Bridget, you were listening there. You know, you all.

also in your book talk about the music of water, a busy burn, taking its time to finish its song before the final plunge or the song of the waves. How does its music present itself to you? I think nature often offers us what's now being called soft fascination. Like actual music, there is a combination of pattern and change. So the song of the stream, it comes around to itself, but it moves on at the same time. In my swimming odyssey, I'd try and sleep within the sound of water as often as possible

and quite different sounds there. So tell me that, so you try and sleep somewhere nearby? Somewhere I could hear the water, yeah, and it's amazing. Especially if you're in a state of kind of hypervigilance, silence itself can be kind of frightening. Normally what cuts through the silence is kind of human sounds. There's a kind of strange company in the sound of water,

whether it's the quiet lapping of a loch or the rushing of waterfalls or I slept next to the River Dee and the feeling that you can hear this huge thing getting on with things while you sleep, Ivana must know about this but something strange about sleeping near restness sort of the restlessness of it. Well, let's go back to Ivana

because, you know, it's very romantic some of the images I feel that Bridget is putting forward there but does working on the water every day strip away some of that romance? Yes and no, I've always got that pool to be near the sea and yeah, sometimes the muddy terms doesn't quite suffice and I'm one of these strange people who likes it when it's wet and windy and wild and you can actually hear the waves as they land on the beach or against the side of a cliff but I'm equally happy to hear it lapping against the side of a boat hull or a ship's hull or a ship's hull or. as the pilot boat or a tug has made awake and it just starts rippling onto a little bit of muddy shore that all just soothes me and I love it.

So interesting, isn't it? We'll never look at those large tankers in the same way ever again. I should say you can find the EP River Stories by Little Lorre, wherever you get your music online. Sarah got in touch with us. She's in Woodstock and she says, I swim most days in a pool as I don't fancy wild swimming in the Thames. and I live far away from the coast.

I've found swimming fantastic therapy both for its physical and mindfulness benefits. It's offered a coping method through times of anxiety and bereavement as well as offering soothing relief for back pain, period or fatigue. I swam during pregnancy until the day before giving birth to both of my two children and had easy birthing experiences.

I think I get a wonderful sense of well-being because it is the closest feeling to being in the womb, giving a sense of weightlessness and the rhythm of swimming crawl or backstroke brings relaxation and a sense of calm. Thanks so much for your messages. Those of you who got in touch with us for this program, and you are listening to Women's Hour on this bank holiday Monday.

We have recorded the program, but if you do want to get in touch with us, you can get in touch with the usual ways, but we won't get to read your messages today. Next, from swimming and locks to maintaining them, the canal variety, that is. The Hanglock Clinic Canal is one of the most beautiful. waterways in the country. It crosses the Pankasilta Aqueduct,

perhaps one of the most iconic sites on the UK Canal Network. But you may remember last December, a major breach in the canal bank at Whitchurch sent millions of litres of water pouring into the surrounding countryside. Well, we're going to meet Engineer, Sarah Barsley and team leader,

Haley Garrard from the Canal and River Trust. That's the charity that keeps custody of these waterways. Their working lives are spent making sure canals like this flow safely and now they're going to talk us through exactly what they do. Haley starts us off. So I'm just walking to the Meathouse, a landisilio just outside Langotland. I've got the River Dee to my left and the canal to my right. Every day we'll do a daily inspection, make sure everything's doing everything that it should. And this morning it's actually quite

chilly. A welcome break from the horribly hot weather that we've had. A bird is singing. It's only about half past seven and it's absolutely gorgeous. My main job is to make sure that the water stays within the canal. A regular day for me is out looking at embankments and culverts, so big pipes, bridges, whirs, sluices, all different parts of the canal that keep the water in where it needs to be. Along this stretch of canal, there are some embankments. We need to make sure that they're not moving, because if they move, then we get leaks. leaks. Monitoring the water levels is the first job of the day. We've got a remote monitoring system, hundreds of observation points across the network where water levels, they're constantly recorded, and it's all on a really handy app, and it even gives us alarms when something

isn't quite right, like the levels being too high or too low. So today, despite the lack of there is 74.5 million litres of water coming into the Klangothan canal from Horseshoe Falls on the River Dee. That has remained stable but in the West Midlands it's been incredibly difficult for the teams in the drought. We get a lot of badges in our embankments that can cause a lot of trouble. So making sure we know what is causing our embankments to start leaking is really important so we can figure out how best to manage this. One method that I'm looking at, I've managed to obtain drones to be flown along this embankment and the one next to it, this coming winter. And this looks at the height of the ground. We'll then refly it the following year and look between the two different surveys, whether there's any movement has occurred.

We've got aqueduct, embankments, peat ground and sandy ground. Most leaks are pretty minor and we can quickly find them. fix them, but some are more severe. The witch church breach that occurred on December 22nd last year is on the Clangothan Canal in our patch. So my fiancé Dan and I were on call and the low alert sounded on my phone for that section and I thought that's not normal. And the harrowing scenes of what we found where the embankment had collapsed are going to stay with us forever. Thankfully, nobody was hurt and to maintain water flows around that breach, site we've got six large pumps and they're working continuously and working with these pumps

has substantially increased our workload and with the autumn leaves on their way that are going to cause blockages that workload is about to get even bigger today i'm in warwick and i'm looking at a sluice a sluice is a gate in the side of the canal which is used to release water that we don't want so the sluice that i've come to is actually broken at the moment and we can't open it so So I need to get some measurement of the structure. It might get a little bit noisy because there is a weir next to this sluice. So I'm going to put my ranging rod in and try and feel for the depth of the silt. So the silt goes quite a long way down.

So we'll make sure that we get a tanker with the correct size. I'm stood on a metal mezzanine looking down at this huge metal pipe that feeds the water straight through. the meter house where we record our levels, we can see how much water ascending through, we can also control that feed as we need to. And it's quite a long way down. It did take me by surprise the first time I came in. And it's really nice to see you've got heritage mixed in with this modernisation of remote controlled operating systems, which is very useful in the middle at night when things go wrong. I've seen a few very large-scale breaches. including the more recent witch church breach.

These large-scale breaches are actually quite rare. One that springs to mind, I just started as an engineer. I'd been in the role about six months and it was December. There was a large hole in the towpath where the water had eroded and there was a big whirlpool starting to form. So we knew that time was very limited and we needed to try and stop it as quickly as possible. We went along the canal to try and see where we could put planks in to try and stop the water, So if the bank did fail, we'd contained how much water would be released.

By this time we'd managed to get some tarpauling. We were able to stretch the tarp over the whirlpool and then the force of it managed to suck it and hold it in place and then we were able to try and distribute the sandbags across the edge to try and reduce the amount of water. And it did considerably stem the flow out of the canal. When there's too little water, we have to make... we have to make some difficult decisions about prioritising our water resources. On the Flangothland Canal, where we're transferring water for Hurlston Reservoir, the drinking water, this will take priority.

But for the first time, since I've worked on this section, we've had to actually restrict lock usage to prioritise those water flows into the reservoir. It is heartbreaking to see the impact that low levels can have on wildlife. But responding to drought is a really challenging task. Spending every day working around water, what does it mean to me personally? I've grown up as a bit of a water baby, I love swimming, I love water sports, so being able to actually work for a water charity is incredible. It's really special working with water. Let's say we're 60% water, so I suppose we're like naturally drawn to it.

It's really peaceful, there's wildlife, there's always a bird or a fish that's going to jump out. there's always different colours, whatever time of day or what time a year it is. And I just find it really inspiring. The sheer power that these forces can have, trying to tame it and help when things do go wrong is incredible. The canals built Britain, they were vital to the Industrial Revolution and to be able to work and preserve such an important... part of our heritage. I'm so grateful for the opportunity. That was Haley Garad and Sarah Barsley from the Canal and River Trust. Thanks very much to them.

Well, as we approach the end of the programme, I did want to offer listeners some of that practical guidance that we promised a little earlier. Serran Jones is here for a woman listening who likes the idea of open water swimming but has never done it before. How would you say they should start? That's a very good question. I think, you know, we've seen. seen since the pandemic, groups of open water communities kind of pop up. Obviously, the pools were all closed. And a lot of those groups still exist today. So finding communities. And again, that goes against kind of, you know, going alone. It's really important in the water safety sector. We have a process called the Water Safety Code, which we encourage all open water swimmers to adopt

before getting into water. And it's four very straightforward simple steps, which is stop and think, which sounds so obvious. But again, when we are boiling hot and we are just desperate to strip off, and get into water. We are really not thinking, but it's stop and think to ensure that you are in a safe part of a body of water, whether there's a lifeguard there, or you can see that there are people who are also around you. Staying together, again, going with company, calling 999 and Ivana mentioned this before. A lot of people don't know who to ask for when they are in danger. There's difficulty in open water. If you are at the coast or at the Thames, you ask for the coast guard, but if you are anywhere else across the country, you ask for the fire service. And the final

step is float to live, which again was part of, originally the part of R&LI's larger campaign, which the BSA has also kind of adopted, but it's turning onto your back, trying to stay relaxed as possible and fighting that panic, because that's the hardest thing about being safe and floating. It's about trying to just stay calm in a situation that feels so uncomfortable. But before that, before difficulty happens, when you're in the water, what are the warning signs that it's time to get out? With cold water. Really, most of the water in the outdoor water in Britain is cold almost all of the time. There are two discrete dangers there.

One is getting into water very suddenly. So until you are a very practiced cold water swimmer, you will naturally gasp. So if you jump into deep water, that gasp reflex can make you swallow water. And then the second danger, what we call after drop, which is that you can be in cold water.

And while you're in water, you develop what scientists call a bark, your skin, your capillaries, to your extremities are actually closed down. So the blood doesn't circulate into them. And so when you're first in the water, you keep your warmth in your core. But if you're in the water too long, the outside of you is cooled and that cold blood then returns to your heart.

So I should point out here, you should speak to your GP first, if you haven't exercised for some time or if you've a medical condition or other health concerns before trying open water swimming. But I do want to finish today talking a little about the idea of risk. This is a subject we keep returning to, the elephant in the room, how as women, as culture, how we think about it. Women in water is a useful example. Richard, how do you think women are taught to think about risk?

So I think, as Seren was saying, there is quite a big gender difference in terms of appetite for risk. I have a teenage son and, I mean, this is a totally different ballgame. But I think we're also expected then to be more cautious. As mothers, it's as though keeping our kids safe is, the only thing we need to do. Whereas I think learning how to assess risk and manage it is an important, a really important life skill too. I find that with swimming and advice to women generally, I hate it when the advice is just don't do such and such. It's dangerous. We really need a more

kind of granular explanation of why it's dangerous, explaining actually the content of the danger, rather than having danger as a boogeyman. agree and I think we're seeing, you know, younger generations of girls being more confident, more empowered, taking more risks than perhaps generations prior. So I don't want the information that we're putting out to fear munger or to stop women, girls from getting into these bodies of water because we deserve to enjoy them. They're beautiful, they're hours. They exist across the country. Let's talk about risk versus calculated risk though, Ivana, because your job involves managing risk every day. Absolutely. So I've been fortunate to have grown up by the sea and my

mom was a sailor, so I was always taught to respect the water and never turn your back on the sea. But yes, for work, it's all about you're constantly doing what we call in the industry a dynamic risk assessment. Keeps changing. Yeah, absolutely. I'm always working with a team of people to assess that risks. Always got that support to make the right decision. So you're in control, as you mentioned. I mean, is there a danger, Bridget, that women are encouraged to see themselves as more.

vulnerable than they really are. I think there definitely is when some of the hormonal changes of motherhood can actually make us naturally more risk-averse but then there's definitely a feeling that society then forces that upon us. I mean, I've often had people call police or the authorities when I've been in wild water. Really? And I always think about pictures of mainly men queuing up on a cornice on the way to the top of Everest and it's like, how that's fine? And it is something about, Sometimes our adventures are a little bit more because we have greater caring responsibilities often. They are a bit more domestic. Often they're free.

They're not as expensive. And there's some kind of a feeling that if you've paid someone to take you to the top of Everest, it doesn't matter how risky it is. But so, yeah, we need to be given the information that makes it safe for us to experience a bit. And I know you very much push for women to find those adventures, really, if not in their own backyard, you can find them not that far away. Yeah. Because you don't want to say and scare people off.

No, exactly. That's the last thing we want to do. But the reality is that most people who do find themselves in difficulty in water had no intention of getting into the water in the first place. So going back to what you were saying, in terms of saying it's dangerous, don't do it. That narrative is not enough anymore. Like we have a bigger responsibility as a society with the help of the government, fantastic partners like RNLI, PLA, who the BSA also work with,

to actually get into those details and actually understand. okay, well, why is it dangerous? And what can we do to make sure that you can enjoy this fantastic waterway, you know, these amazing bodies of water, safely with your loved ones? That is all we have time for. I want to thank Bridget Lowe, Seren Jones, Ivana Maria Carrioni Burnett,

and Tricia Duffy, aka Little Lore. Thanks also to Sarah Barsley and Haley Garad from the Canal and River Trust, who we also heard from earlier. From all of us here on Women's Hour, thank you for listening, and we hope you enjoy the rest of the bank holiday. Get more with BBC Podcasts, wherever you listen.

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