KILLING IT
Rowan Clarke finds out why toxic neoprene is responsible for a health crisis
Swim Dem Crew try out Finisterre’s suits
The award-winning documentary The Big Sea is full of the cinematic shots you’d expect from a film with this title – beautiful waves crashing on white shores under a blue sky. You can almost smell the sea air and feel the cold water on your skin. However, it’s not here to tell the usual tales about how healing the ocean is for our mental and physical wellbeing; it tells a dark story about our wetsuits.
THE ISSUE WITH NEOPRENE
Those beautiful oceanic shots cut to scenes of smoking factories, chain-link fences and people weighed down by grief, worry and malaise. Their stories are shocking. Living in the shadows of petrochemical factories in an area of Louisiana nicknamed ‘Cancer Alley’, families are stricken with illness. Suffering from cancer and autoimmune conditions, they describe the choking fumes from the nearby chloroprene factory.