AMERICA — A French-American swimming to raise awareness of plastic pollution in the oceans, has abandoned plans to swim across the Pacific Ocean after the mainsail of his support ship was damaged.<br />The BBC reports that Ben Lecomte set off from Japan's east coast with plans to swim 9,100 kilometers across the Pacific Ocean from Choshi, Japan to San Francisco, California.<br />Lecomte, accompanied by crew operating the support ship, started on June 5 and swam for about eight hours a day, collecting bits and pieces of plastic they spotted on the way.<br />Lecomte had already completed 2,780 kilometers of the trip when the mainsail of his support ship was abruptly damaged by strongs winds, reports The Guardian.<br /><br />Lecomte and the crew had just reached the Great Pacific Garbage Patch when the mainsail was destroyed.<br />Lecomte and his support team originally planned to swim across the Great Pacific Garbage Patch to collect water samples to test plastic pollution levels in the ocean.<br />On his website, Lecomte claims he was the first person to swim across the Atlantic Ocean in 1998.
