Cold water boot camp

Jay,

Thanks for posting this. I've sent it on to our Yacht Club's Safety and Medical officers for possible use in a program. Those temps are a way of life for us in the PNW. We'll be wearing our PFDs more this year.
 
As I watched the video I remember the two people I pulled off that over turned boat. One with out a jacket and one with. The one good dicussion they made that day was to stay with the boat. They had thought of swimming to shore in the beginning but they would never have made it. When we got to them they had no muscule movement and could not even stand. This is a great video to share with others.
 
Jay,

Thanks for passing that on. It is a very good refresher, and reminder. The jackets, (PFD's) stay on, even around the dock.

MErry Christmas,

Harvey
SleepyC :moon
 
Thanks for posting the video. We don't take as many precautions with the PFD's as those folks and some C Brats do. Of course in Florida, we don't have those colder waters, except in the winters. In Alaska, we often wore tight fitting foam lined vests, or float coats when on deck outside of the cockpit or in the dinghy.

The term hypothermia is somewhat relitative. I suspect in this case they use the classical medical defination, which is a deep body core temperature of 95 degrees F. The lower the core temperature goes, the less chance of survival. The points about peripheral vascular contraction is very important, as well as muscle stiffness and loss of function of fine movements.

They don't make as large a point of the "Cold shock" as I think they should: Cold Shock describes a series of rapid, linked, involuntary and detrimental physiological events in the inadequately protected human body characterized by immediate loss of breathing control, incapacitation and high risk of drowning or sudden death when suddenly immersed in cold water. Most of these immediate body responses are increasingly fatal as the water temperature decreases.

Due to rapid vasoconstriction and raising of the blood pressure, sudden cardiac arrest can occur. I feel that not only should one wear a life jacket in risky situations, but also be wearing a garmet which will help to keep the body warmer and hopefully prevent the cold shock deaths. Ideally this would be a survival suit such as the Mustang full floatation suit, or at least one of the bomber or floatation coats, which give floation, cold shock and hypothermia proteciton.

What do our brethern in Alaska do for protection routinely?

Also the techniques of preventing personal heat loss: "Heat Escape Lessening Posture (H.E.L.P.) can be used only if you are wearing a personal flotation device (PFD). Hold your arms tightly against your sides and across your chest, pull your legs together and up toward your chest.

With the H.E.L.P. a hypothermia preventing float coat your survival can be at least quadrupled, and increased up to 9 fold with a full imersion floating suit.

Again, thanks for an important lesson!
 
Dr Bob said:
"They don't make as large a point of the "Cold shock" as I think they should: Cold Shock describes a series of rapid, linked, involuntary and detrimental physiological events in the inadequately protected human body characterized by immediate loss of breathing control, incapacitation and high risk of drowning or sudden death when suddenly immersed in cold water. Most of these immediate body responses are increasingly fatal as the water temperature decreases.

Due to rapid vasoconstriction and raising of the blood pressure, sudden cardiac arrest can occur. I feel that not only should one wear a life jacket in risky situations, but also be wearing a garmet which will help to keep the body warmer and hopefully prevent the cold shock deaths. Ideally this would be a survival suit such as the Mustang full floatation suit, or at least one of the bomber or floatation coats, which give floation, cold shock and hypothermia proteciton."
Click to expand...


Dr Bob is right, and this would be born out be researching the "drownings" that occur in the PNW and northward waters. Very few of those fatalities actually have water intrusion into the lungs. Most often death is a result of sudden cardiac arrest, due to cold shock. This should be a very real presence in our personal awareness when we are on the water. We ALWAYS wear our PFD's, but have not migrated to the Mustang suits or float coats yet.

Moving towards more safe boating, one SPOT at at a time.

Harvey
SleepyC :moon
 
That is one cool ----- whoops, I mean HOT suit. :thup :thup Where do I sign up. (And they tested ti right here in our home marina and I missed it, bummer!) :sad

Harvey
SleepyC :moon
 
That survival suit looks like a dry suit. There is a lot of difference between a work suit and survival suit or dry suit. The recreational boater has to have something which will help to prevent the sudden shock--as well as prolong survial time in the water, and provide floatation, which they wear all of the time, when in risky situations. The float coat comes as close as what most of us can easily use on a daily basis. A good float coat will also have a beaver tail, and best to have some elastic around the sleeves and neck, along with a hood, to keep the circulation of cold water to a minimum in the device.
 
Having fished winters commercially offshore in the Gulf of Alaska I have the utmost respect for extreme cold waters, but don’t find it necessary or practical to carry survival suits of even mustang type suits on our little c-dory.
Someone can always make the argument for having every conceivable safety device known to man onboard, and for some this may be necessary or warranted. Truth is, the most indispensable safety device onboard is your head.
If we fished miles from shore, did it in an open skiff or ventured out in marginal conditions I’d certainly consider having float coats for everyone on board, but this becomes impractical unless you own an extensive wardrobe of these things.
I trust my judgment, know my limitations as well as my vessels, and don’t believe I’m putting my family or friends in harms way as recreational boaters.

Having said that I’ll take my beatings now… :)
 
I received this email from a friend on Chichagof Island. It's an interesting story on being out in cold weather.



"Steve Cold last night. A hunter got his boat stuck about 20 miles up the inlet. Nobody lives there. He shot at a deer and quickly did the Indian Anchor trick and went after the deer. The deer got away and when he got back his stern was aground and the tide dropping. He tried to lever it off but got it stuck on a submerged rock. The tide wouldn't be back up until 2AM or the next afternoon. There were two fishing boats working not far away. His hand held didn't reach. He set off two flairs. His wife by this time was worried and called the Fire Department. We sent 4 guys out to help him. It was about 6PM. I manned the radio at the firehall and we got the Coast Guard appraised of the situation. That way, they can both help out and reimburse expenses. We had GPS coordinates from the fishing boat and he had a big fire going by the time we got there. Our guys picked him up and were headed home when an alarm went off on the Rescue Boat. Water had gotten past the fuel filter and tripped a sensor in the motor. Seas were kind of rough so they took it to the beach to take the cowling off the motor and work on the two filters in the motor. The kicker although new starts hard in cold weather so that wasn't any help. Once they cleared the filters the alarm went off and they made it home. It was the first night that my down coat wasn't warm enough. We met the boat and his wife made sandwiches. The hunter is a capable guy. This could happen to anybody. It would have been an uncomfortable night to spend on the beach. There is a book called Almost too Late that I try to get everybody to read. It's about a family in SE Alaska in the 1970's that lost their boat in the wrong weather and almost died down by Dixon Entrance. When this guy got back to town last night we went over the circumstances. His matches were crumbly and almost didn't light. Old gear. His radio was insufficient at that distance. He liked having lots of plastic quart oil jugs to burn, plastic jug and all. He looked to have camping gear. I've seen guys who didn't have any. His wife was on the ball and was cool about the whole deal. Trusted both that he was able but late. All in all a good excercise. Pete"
 
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