‘ESCAPE’ FROM ALCATRAZ

62-year-old British woman swims from Alcatraz to shore near San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf

This was quite a feat for a woman her age, or anyone else for that matter. She and her son started out together – he made it to shore in just 31 minutes, she in one hour and 16 minutes. Of the 36 who tried it, only one Alcatraz inmate ever succeeded in swimming from the prison island to the shore of San Francisco bay.

THE GRANDMOTHER WHO ESCAPED ALCATRAZ: JACKY PORTINGALE, 62, BRAVES FREEZING WATER TO SUCCEED WHERE HUNDREDS OF HARDENED CRIMINALS COULD NOT
Completed the mile-and-a-half challenge in one hour and 16 minutes

By Daniel Miller

Mail Online
August 29, 2012

It was hailed as the prison from which there could be no escape. If the freezing water and powerful currents didn't get you then the sharks would.

But a 62-year-old grandmother has succeeded where hundreds of the most hardened criminals failed, swimming the treacherous mile-and-a-half from infamous Alcatraz Prison to the shores of San Fransisco Bay.

Jacky Portingale, a receptionist from the UK, took on the grueling challenge during her summer vacation and claimed the waters were far warmer than those around her home town of Bristol.

Jacky, who started open water swimming when her son Lee took up the sport, said she prefers to stick to 'little swims' - of up to two miles.

The currents in the bay were a problem with Jacky having to be guided back in the right direction by a safety marshal in a canoe after she started to get 'swept away' in the direction of the Golden Gate Bridge.

But she completed the course in an hour and 16 minutes - somewhere behind son Lee, who clocked just 31 minutes.

She said: 'I thought it was a joke at first, I had heard that nobody had ever escaped from Alcatraz, partly because of the currents and the cold.

'I said I was too old for that and would never do it. But she booked it up and gave it to me as a Christmas present, so there was no backing out.

'I had been training at Henleaze Lake in Bristol and when I first went in there it was ten degrees, so we didn't find it cold at all. They said 'you're from England, you'll be fine'.'

US authorities claim only one prisoner ever managed to survive the swim from the world-famous American prison in San Francisco Bay.

In 1962 John Paul Scott washed up on the rocks at Fort Point. He was discovered by a group of boys who thought he was an unsuccessful suicide attempt from the Golden Gate Bridge.

Would-be escapees who got past the notorious prison's armed guards, barbed wire fences, sheer walls and cliffs then had to take on the strong currents and cold temperatures and even the risk of shark attack.

For 29 years Alcatraz prison held some of America's most dangerous prisoners including mobsters Al Capone and Machine Gun Kelly.

During that time 36 prisoners tried to escape but only one was proved to have made it to the mainland, where he was found suffering from hypothermia, although some people claim another three convicts listed as 'presumed drowned' actually made a clean getaway.

Organized swims from the island to the mainland now take place regularly.

Those taking part do not have to contend with one of the hazards that faced convicts going into the water - guards firing at them from the island's watch towers.

But they are warned to beware of the strong currents in the bay, where the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers flow into the Pacific Ocean.

Afterwards Mrs Portingale, who works at Shirehampton Health Centre, and her lorry driver husband William, 64, enjoyed a holiday to Yosemite National Park, Death Valley, Las Vegas and Los Angeles.