I’m going to come right out and tell you something that almost no one in the maritime industry understands. That includes mariners, executives, managers, insurers, dock workers, for certain – fisherman, and even many (most) rescue professionals:

It is impossible to die from hypothermia in cold water unless you are wearing flotation, because without flotation – you won’t live long enough to become hypothermic.

Despite the research, the experience, and all the data, I still hear “experts” – touting as wisdom – completely false information about cold water and what happens to people who get in it. With another season of really cold water approaching, I feel compelled to get these points across in a way that will change the way mariners behave out there on (or near) the water.

What follows is the truth about cold water and cold water immersion. I know that you think you know all there is to know about hypothermia already (and maybe you do), but read ahead and see if you aren’t surprised by something.

When the water is cold (say under 50 degrees F) there are significant physiological reactions that occur, in order, almost always.

You Can’t Breath:

The first is phase of cold water immersion is called the cold shock response: It is a stage of increased heart rate and blood pressure, uncontrolled gasping, and sometimes uncontrolled movement. Lasting anywhere from 30 seconds to a couple of minutes depending on a number of factors, the cold shock response can be deadly all by itself. In fact, of all the people who die in cold water, it is estimated that 20% die in the first two minutes. They drown, they panic, they take on water in that first uncontrolled gasp, if they have heart problems – the cold shock may trigger a heart attack. Surviving this stage is about getting your breathing under control, realizing that the stage will pass, and staying calm. [Continue Reading →]

Drowning? Not likely.

The new captain jumped from the cockpit, fully dressed, and sprinted through the water. A former lifeguard, he kept his eyes on his victim as he headed straight for the owners who were swimming between their anchored sportfisher and the beach. “I think he thinks you’re drowning,” the husband said to his wife. They had been splashing each other and she had screamed but now they were just standing, neck-deep on the sand bar. “We’re fine, what is he doing?” she asked, a little annoyed. “We’re fine!” the husband yelled, waving him off, but his captain kept swimming hard. ”Move!” he barked as he sprinted between the stunned owners. Directly behind them, not ten feet away, their nine-year-old daughter was drowning. Safely above the surface in the arms of the captain, she burst into tears, “Daddy!”

How did this captain know, from fifty feet away, what the father couldn’t recognize from just ten? Drowning is not the violent, splashing, call for help that most people expect. The captain was trained to recognize drowning by experts and years of experience. The father, on the other hand, had learned what drowning looks like by watching television. If you spend time on or near the water (hint: that’s all of us) then you should make sure that you and your crew knows what to look for whenever people enter the water. Until she cried a tearful, “Daddy,” she hadn’t made a sound. As a former Coast Guard rescue swimmer, I wasn’t surprised at all by this story. Drowning is almost always a deceptively quiet event. The waving, splashing, and yelling that dramatic conditioning (television) prepares us to look for, is rarely seen in real life.

The Instinctive Drowning Response – so named by Francesco A. Pia, Ph.D.,  is what people do to avoid actual or perceived suffocation in the water.  And it does not look like most people expect.  There is very little splashing, no waving, and no yelling or calls for help of any kind.  To get an idea of just how quiet and undramatic from the surface drowning can be, consider this:  It is the number two cause of accidental death in children, age 15 and under (just behind vehicle accidents) – of the approximately 750 children who will drown next year, about 375 of them will do so within 25 yards of a parent or other adult.  In ten percent of those drownings, the adult will actually watch them do it, having no idea it is happening (source: CDC).  Drowning does not look like drowning – Dr. Pia, in an article in the Coast Guard’s On Scene Magazine, described the instinctive drowning response like this: [Continue Reading →]

A little, Sort Of.

image provided courtesy of Cospas-Sarsat

Back on February 1^st 2009, though boat owners and ship riders didn’t hear it, there were celebrations all over the rescue world as the COSPAS-SARSAT system stopped processing and reporting 121.5 distress signals. The hours of lost sleep spent chasing after ghost 121.5 EPIRB signals that were actually some other transmitter (like a radio tower or an ATM machine…seriously) is beyond measure. While I appreciated racking up flight hours on the government’s dime; the Coast Guard, along with SAR organizations the world over, have turned a lot of fuel into noise searching for….well…nothing. Only one out of fifty 121.5 alerts have been genuine distress situations. An end to all that warrants at least a little celebration. But even as the date came and went and the chatter about the switch increased – the first problem with the 406 EPIRBs is already showing itself: news release after news release touts the 406 as the “digital” beacon; more powerful, no-waiting, and accurate to just a few yards.  The problem is that none of that is completely true – not mostly – and only sort-of. And since recreational boaters and professional mariners are making purchasing decisions about the things, and they are lifesaving devices, I wanted to clear a few things up about the “able-to-leap-buildings-in-a-single bound” 406. [Continue Reading →]

Imagine, if you can, the confluence of events that would have to take place to leave you with marine flares being your primary method of signaling distress.  The number of devices that have to fail or become unavailable to you is amazing.  Your radios, GMDSS, SARTS, ERPIRBs, any number of SATCOM devices all have to be down (or gone) for pyrotechnics to be the best option. The things are the ultimate litmus test for a bad day at sea; i.e. If you ever find yourself launching a flare and you are not practicing, you are definitely having one.  If you find yourself reading the directions on the label then things are much, much worse.

Perhaps because the use of pyrotechnics in an emergency is so rare, there are a lot of misconceptions about the devices, their practicality, and how to best use these “last ditch” signals.  Here are some things all mariners should consider before pulling the trigger (or pulling the lanyard, or lever, or…): [Continue Reading →]