In Boston, 'polar' swimmers mark New Year with icy plunge

Dozens of participants in the annual L Street Brownies Polar Plunge run into the frigid waters of the Atlantic Ocean in the Northeastern US city of Boston to start off the new year.

Braving water temperatures of six degrees Celsius and air temperatures just above freezing, the swimmers dived in as bagpipes played and people held up pictures of loved ones they had lost in the past year and who had participated in the freezing festival in the past.

There are a number of such cold-water swim clubs in America, but Boston's so-called L Street Brownies claim to be one of the oldest, with their tradition dating back to 1904.