Happy Holidays from the staff of Explorer's Guide Maritime Training
Friday, December 24, 2010
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
USCG suggested Christmas Presents
Here are some ideas offered by the USCG as ideal Christmas presents for any boater on your list. There are a couple of items here I would love to see under the tree.
Capt Gary
The Coast Guard recommends safety gifts and stocking stuffer ideas for the Holiday season.
The Coast Guard reminds boaters that being prepared for the unexpected is essential in our unforgiving waters and strongly recommends equipping friends and family with safe boating essentials.
Coast Guard’s gift recommendations are:
For more survival gift ideas visit http://coastguard.dodlive.mil/index.php/2010/12/deck-the-hulls-boating-safety-kit/, the official blog site for the Coast Guard.
From the Coast Guard family to yours, Happy Holidays!
Capt Gary
The Coast Guard recommends safety gifts and stocking stuffer ideas for the Holiday season.
The Coast Guard reminds boaters that being prepared for the unexpected is essential in our unforgiving waters and strongly recommends equipping friends and family with safe boating essentials.
Coast Guard’s gift recommendations are:
- A Marine GPS navigation system
- A 406 Mhz EPIRB (make sure you register it after purchase, or rescuers may be delayed in reaching you! In remote Alaska areas, this may become your ONLY way to call for help.)
- A Coast Guard-approved life jacket (because they float, you don’t…)
- A handheld VHF marine radio
- A Boating Safety Course (boater education saves lives — it’s a fact)
- Vessel Safety Check (VSC) from the Coast Guard Auxiliary (it’s free!)
- A Coast Guard approved fire extinguisher
- A first aid kit in a watertight container
- A seamanship book
- Nautical charts for the areas your favorite mariner frequents
- A signaling kit (mirror, whistle and day/ night flares)
- Clothing that is warm and water resistant and appropriate for Alaska and its extreme environments
- Life raft with a survival kit
For more survival gift ideas visit http://coastguard.dodlive.mil/index.php/2010/12/deck-the-hulls-boating-safety-kit/, the official blog site for the Coast Guard.
From the Coast Guard family to yours, Happy Holidays!
Friday, December 17, 2010
Upcoming Classes
Happy Holidays! Enjoy your time with family and friends this season and make your new years resolution of getting your captains license a reality in 2011! Join our highly trained licensed instructors for a weekend of fun and learn everything you need to make your maritime dreams come true in 2011
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Cold Water Rescue. Survival Facts you need to know. Part I
Falling through the ice, you feel the unforgiving cold rush of water hit your skin even through layers of winter clothes. It stings you like a thousand angry hornets. Your body instinctively hits panic mode. You gasp for breath and suck in the icy broth into your lungs. Without a pfd (personal flotation device) your chances of surviving have now been cut close to nothing unless there is someone very near you to help drag you out. And even then you are still in serious danger. Even with a pfd you have to be able to mentally turn yourself out of the downward panic cycle into survival mode or all you will do is drag out the amount of time it takes you to die.
The question now is what can you do? What if this was you? Would you be able to beat the odds? If this happened to your father, brother, sister, friend would you be able to save their life? There are a few major facts you need to know on how to survive, and a few more about how to save someone else’s.
The first major cause of death in cold water immersion is drowning. So obviously the first step to survival is always and I mean always wear your pfd. In the first 5 minutes your body goes into immediate shock. Your body will instantly do the gasp reflex (the sudden gasp of air as result of the shock, the inability to hold breath, hypertension and increased cardiac output) Many people succumb to drowning or heart attack before hypothermia can even begin to set to in.
If you fail to keep afloat or swim and have little ability to grasp or climb into things such as an overturned vessel or life raft, typically, you will drown due to excessive inhalation of water. Unnecessary swimming increases the rate of body heat loss. Keep your head out of the water. This will increase your survival time. If you’re spending all your strength and body heat by struggling your inner core temperature will drop even quicker. Those with a life preserver will have the chance to conserve heat by being able to stay afloat with a lot less effort.
This is another major reason you need your pfd. We cannot stress enough how important this is. If someone was threatening your life at gunpoint and told you “give me 10 dollars and you live”, would you give them the 10 dollars or take your chances? You’d give them 10 dollars. So why wouldn’t you wear your 10 dollar life vest? How much is your life worth? Your family’s life? Many times more than the cost of a life vest. So wear it and make sure any one you’re with is wearing theirs as well.
So now you’ve survived the drop into the icy cold depths, your life preserver is keeping you afloat, but your still immersed in the debilitating grasp of the frigid water (by the way water doesn’t have to be “ice cold” to cause hypothermia, see our water chart to learn more) The next fifteen to thirty minutes will have a lot to do with whether you make it or not. This is when your core temperature will begin to drop.
98.6° F is considered normal body core temperature. When core temperature drops to 96° F, muscle tone becomes affected. The first thing to go is your small motor skills and your hands will have a hard time functioning. You will start to have a feeling of tension in your back and neck. Once your core temperature hits 95° C, you’re considered mildly hypothermic. (Most immersion experiments with human test subjects are terminated at this point for ethical reasons.) You’re shivering will become persistent or even violent.
If you find yourself reaching this state the best thing to do now is get into the HELP Position.( Heat Escape Lessening Position, or H.E.L.P.) This position helps to protect some of the areas of your body most prone to heat loss - the head, neck, sides of the chest cavity and the groin area. If you are wearing a life jacket, this position can be very effective. To reach this position, you should bring your knees up as close as possible to your chest and grasp your hands together over your chest. If this is too difficult, or too unstable, cross your calves, bend your knees and pull your legs close to your body. Cross your arms and tuck your hands flat under your armpits. Keeping as much of your body heat as you can is your best chance of survival.
At a core temperature of 93.2° F, you’ll start to experience mental confusion, some even have experienced amnesia. Once you become disillusioned and your muscles have weakened (can happen as quickly as 10-20 min) your chance at surviving depends now on someone else being able to rescue you. Another 2° drop down to 91.3° F will lead to a lack of sensation or feeling. At 89.6° F you’re considered profoundly hypothermic and will start to lose the ability to shiver. At 87.98° F, shivering ceases all together. (Shivering is a human’s only method of increasing their internal heat generation, thus once it stops, and core temperature starts falling rapidly.) At 86° F, heart arrhythmias occur. Death follows at 77° F.
Experts seem to have varying opinions on how long a person can stay alive submerged in cold water (with a life jacket, without one the census is that you will most likely drown quite quickly). On average they are saying anywhere from 1-2 hours with some experts saying less and some saying more. This means you have hope of rescue. That gives rescuers time to get to you and time to get you out.
Now that you know the facts, stages and symptoms you can do everything in your power to stay calm, be proactive in your survival and stay alive until help arrives. Being informed and prepared can be the difference in whether or not you make it out alive.
Read our article, ‘Cold Water Rescue Part II’ to learn the right ways to save someone submersed in cold water, dealing with hypothermia and things you may have never known that could cause more harm, than good when aiding in a rescue situation.
The question now is what can you do? What if this was you? Would you be able to beat the odds? If this happened to your father, brother, sister, friend would you be able to save their life? There are a few major facts you need to know on how to survive, and a few more about how to save someone else’s.
The first major cause of death in cold water immersion is drowning. So obviously the first step to survival is always and I mean always wear your pfd. In the first 5 minutes your body goes into immediate shock. Your body will instantly do the gasp reflex (the sudden gasp of air as result of the shock, the inability to hold breath, hypertension and increased cardiac output) Many people succumb to drowning or heart attack before hypothermia can even begin to set to in.
If you fail to keep afloat or swim and have little ability to grasp or climb into things such as an overturned vessel or life raft, typically, you will drown due to excessive inhalation of water. Unnecessary swimming increases the rate of body heat loss. Keep your head out of the water. This will increase your survival time. If you’re spending all your strength and body heat by struggling your inner core temperature will drop even quicker. Those with a life preserver will have the chance to conserve heat by being able to stay afloat with a lot less effort.
This is another major reason you need your pfd. We cannot stress enough how important this is. If someone was threatening your life at gunpoint and told you “give me 10 dollars and you live”, would you give them the 10 dollars or take your chances? You’d give them 10 dollars. So why wouldn’t you wear your 10 dollar life vest? How much is your life worth? Your family’s life? Many times more than the cost of a life vest. So wear it and make sure any one you’re with is wearing theirs as well.
So now you’ve survived the drop into the icy cold depths, your life preserver is keeping you afloat, but your still immersed in the debilitating grasp of the frigid water (by the way water doesn’t have to be “ice cold” to cause hypothermia, see our water chart to learn more) The next fifteen to thirty minutes will have a lot to do with whether you make it or not. This is when your core temperature will begin to drop.
98.6° F is considered normal body core temperature. When core temperature drops to 96° F, muscle tone becomes affected. The first thing to go is your small motor skills and your hands will have a hard time functioning. You will start to have a feeling of tension in your back and neck. Once your core temperature hits 95° C, you’re considered mildly hypothermic. (Most immersion experiments with human test subjects are terminated at this point for ethical reasons.) You’re shivering will become persistent or even violent.
If you find yourself reaching this state the best thing to do now is get into the HELP Position.( Heat Escape Lessening Position, or H.E.L.P.) This position helps to protect some of the areas of your body most prone to heat loss - the head, neck, sides of the chest cavity and the groin area. If you are wearing a life jacket, this position can be very effective. To reach this position, you should bring your knees up as close as possible to your chest and grasp your hands together over your chest. If this is too difficult, or too unstable, cross your calves, bend your knees and pull your legs close to your body. Cross your arms and tuck your hands flat under your armpits. Keeping as much of your body heat as you can is your best chance of survival.
At a core temperature of 93.2° F, you’ll start to experience mental confusion, some even have experienced amnesia. Once you become disillusioned and your muscles have weakened (can happen as quickly as 10-20 min) your chance at surviving depends now on someone else being able to rescue you. Another 2° drop down to 91.3° F will lead to a lack of sensation or feeling. At 89.6° F you’re considered profoundly hypothermic and will start to lose the ability to shiver. At 87.98° F, shivering ceases all together. (Shivering is a human’s only method of increasing their internal heat generation, thus once it stops, and core temperature starts falling rapidly.) At 86° F, heart arrhythmias occur. Death follows at 77° F.
Experts seem to have varying opinions on how long a person can stay alive submerged in cold water (with a life jacket, without one the census is that you will most likely drown quite quickly). On average they are saying anywhere from 1-2 hours with some experts saying less and some saying more. This means you have hope of rescue. That gives rescuers time to get to you and time to get you out.
Now that you know the facts, stages and symptoms you can do everything in your power to stay calm, be proactive in your survival and stay alive until help arrives. Being informed and prepared can be the difference in whether or not you make it out alive.
Read our article, ‘Cold Water Rescue Part II’ to learn the right ways to save someone submersed in cold water, dealing with hypothermia and things you may have never known that could cause more harm, than good when aiding in a rescue situation.
Welcome to our Blog
Welcome to our Blog.
Originally we were going to call it the Captain's Blog but it sounded a little over used. As maritime educators we are concerned that mariners get a quality education to keep them and their passengers safe on the water. Just about anyone can get a license however; that does not make anyone a responsible and safe captain.
Over the coming weeks we will post comments, helpful advice, and tips related to merchant mariners license for vessels 100 tons or less.
Please post your questions or comments.
Capt Gary
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)