Surfski Knowledge Base

Erik Borgnes
01/01/11 #9835

This might have been the article which is a really good read anyway:

http://www.sportsscientists.com/search?q=hypothermia

Switching gears a bit, it would seem to me that the best locomotion in cold water - if you lose your boat or can't get back one and have to swim for it would be swim flns. If they made a smaller version that you could stuff in the back pocket of your pfd or under your bungees, and if they could be slipped on relatively easily, one could move fairly quickly going backwards on his / her back, the advantage being that the more cold-resistant hips and thigh muscles would be used instead of the arms. Anyone tried this?

Erik

Re: hypothermia article
lori & beau whitehead
01/01/11 #9836

I could have used some fins (and PFD for that matter) last week when my board leash broke in the Straits while SUP surfing. Fortunately we were only 100-150 yards off shore and plenty warm in wet suits. Made me think though. After 2 hours of surfing, even that short swim in was tiring.

Beau Whitehead

Re: hypothermia article
Dale McKinnon
01/02/11 #9841

Unfortunately, the magazine has allowed me only 1,000 words for a nice, “soft” article about hypothermia in our northern waters, specifically Skagit and Bham bays and connecting waters (their distribution area). To tell a story about a 2-hour survival and include the key survival elements for cold water: body fat, adaptation to cold shock by training, and survival attitude and throw in a few words about the physical aftereffects of extended cold-water immersion… and direct people to reputable outfitters and resources that will effectively educate their clients sucks up the available word allotment. Magazines have finite real estate on their pages. Most of it goes to advertisers. I have no commitment from them for publishing. They want to see it first.

The information in the link is interesting. I may use some of it in an extended version of the article for another publication. One point throughout the entire article that I found interesting is that the writers made no distinction between survival rates

However, I find your statement of the “more cold-resistant hips and thigh muscle…” contradicts American Canoe Association recommendations for survival in cold water. They call for the fetal position to reduce heat loss because the greatest loss of heat is from the groin, and lower trunk suspended in water which gets increasingly colder even a few feet down from the surface. The person I am writing about, Chris Wigen, floated on his back through half of his ordeal in the water last June. Keeping his trunk towards the surface of the water helped his survival. To keep it simple, he is alive because of his body fat content, prior cold water training, his PFD, and his technique for staying calm (meditation). Oh yeah, the people on shore saw him. It always helps if someone can see you and rescue you…

Re: hypothermia article
Michael Gregory
01/02/11 #9842

Hmmm . . . Fins eh? Next y'all gonna be talkin about gills too? Yeah, I've thought about including swim fins in a safety kit. Pool swimmers have adopted swim fins as training aids and there are some nice little designs out there. Perhaps there is merit to the idea for paddlers as self-rescue tools, but there are practicalities that challenge this notion. Like where to stash them and how to put them on when the s–t is hitting the fan, know what I'm sayin?

When one is obliged to swim in very cold water, the ability one loses first is coordination and then sensation in arms and legs. Extremities become numb and useless. So, anything that's gonna get ya outta the water sooner is good.

Yo Beau. Y'all do your stand up thing in winter sans PFD?

Best in the New Year, Mike.

Re: hypothermia article
happypaddle <happypaddle@…>
01/02/11 #9843

Why not add a paddle float on deck under those surfski bunges to increase self-rescue ability- especially in our PNW hypothermia-inducing cold waters?…and/or especially while storm paddling?

It is a valuable piece of self rescue gear which helps get you out of the water faster, gives you something else bouyant to hold onto besides your boat, can greatly increase survival chances-sans USCG-and only weighs a few ounces.
toggle quoted messageShow quoted text

Re: hypothermia article-unfinished sentence
Dale McKinnon
01/02/11 #9844

My cat jumped up on the keyboard and sent the prior message before I completed the second paragraph. What I was trying to say before I was rudely interrupted, was that the sportsscientist.com writers stated:

“Perhaps the first, and maybe the most surprising fact about cold water physiology, is that your body has too much heat to become hypothermic within about 30 minutes, no matter how cold the water is!”

Dr. Gordon Giesbrecht (world-renowned researcher on hypothermia and performance in extreme environments) says that you'll be dead (most likely of drowning) in 30 minutes in 59F water UNLESS you are wearing a PFD. This begs the question of whose definition of hypothermia to use, what is the standard FUNCTIONAL definition of hypothermia for use in life-threatening situations, as opposed to medical and laboratory definitions of hypothermia. I'm encountering several different descriptions of hypothermia as I research available literature. None of this will make it into an article since the writing must be focused at a lower level of knowledge and frankly, it seems a hard/fast definition is untestable because variations in body-fat density can skew standardized results. The basic physiological responses to cold water immersion will, for the majority of us, occur regardless of how fast or slow they happen.

But wearing a PFD will extend our chances of survival by hours… depending on what insulation we have on our bodies, both as fat and/or as exterior-to-the-skin protection (drysuit, aquatherm, hyrdroskin, woolies, farmer johns, whatever). Not all of us are extreme- or expedition-caliber boaters. 90% of the drowning deaths in the US last year were without PFDs. 60% drowned in water under 50F. 43% were six feet from safety. Ouch. Darwin Awards aside, when putting actual numbers to the percentages, it's impressive.

Re: hypothermia article
Dale McKinnon
01/02/11 #9845

Fins seem like a good idea. But if you dump in the middle of Bham Bay… three miles to shore in 59F water? Personally, I'm going to be in George Gronseth's freeze fest next year. I want a reality check.

Re: hypothermia article
Dale McKinnon
01/02/11 #9846

It was the yellow paddle float being waved in the air that the kayak polo paddlers saw when they rescued Chris Wiggen last June. It was the only thing they saw until they were within 100 yards of him, because of the chop.

Re: hypothermia article-unfinished sentence
Michael Gregory
01/02/11 #9847

- Perhaps the authors were defining hypothermia by core temperature (?).
- A proper wetsuit effectively blunts the “cold shock” phenomena.
Mike.

Re: hypothermia
Erik Borgnes
01/02/11 #9848

The decision to “swim for it” or to “survival float and wait for assistance” cannot be applied to every situation and to every paddler, of course. When one decides to swim in or to 'float it out' might just be a gut feeling based on awareness of the distance from shore, one's perceived ability in those conditions, and the possibility that someone sees you or will rescue you or come across you by chance. In 59 F water, assuming noone will see me, and I'm 100 yds from shore, I'll swim in because a survival float in some situations is like playing hide-and-go-seek by yourself, i.e. you'd drown before anyone knew you were missing. What about 200 yds? 400 yds? 1/2 mile, 3 miles? There's no right answer and the situation always has multiple factors that go into making the decision. What we're really talking about is a time - heat loss - distance to shore - chance of rescue - time until rescue curve.

Our local collective experience is more applicable to our safety than the generalized ACA or USCG recommendations which are essentially aimed at the larger population who are more likely to be inexperienced, in an open canoe or plastic 10 ft kayak, wearing blue jeans, not wearing a pfd, and drunk. We need to write our local safety recommendations down on the whatcompaddlers site and see it as an evolving list with specifics for sea kayak, ski, OC, SUP paddlers' situations. I don't have the time for that project, though.

MG (the old man of the sea) has good experience with the above - better than most of us - and I'd be interested in hearing his take on what factors made him decide to swim for it (on more than one occasion) and what he thinks would have been the outcome had he survival floated in those instances.

I think many of us who have spent some time swimming in cold water know that it's not easy or fast to swim in with your arms because to get into any sort of a streamline shape, you've got to put your head in the water to get your body horizontal. Compact swim fins might work better than doing the breast stroke both in water speed and in an-arms-at-your-side core temp preservation. I don't know how applicable they would be to us, though, because I really haven't looked into it.

Another crazy idea for us cold water paddlers might be an inflatable raft or “donut” that we can carry on our pfd and that we could empty a CO2 cartridge into and use in the situations where we decide to “survival float it out”. It would have to be a really lightweight material and the shape would have to lend itself to getting up onto easily. I haven't been able to find a good one in the marketplace yet, though, which seems surprising. The pfd helps keep your head above water but keeps your body submerged. In Wisconsin, I sometimes carried a swim donut in my pfd rear pocket that might have worked but you had to inflate it with your lungs and many times that wouldn't work.

Erik

Re: hypothermia
Dale McKinnon
01/02/11 #9850

The donut sounds workable for survival floating, as long as you can get your legs up to your chest, or float horizontally. In our waters, the top is warmest. It might be worth a serious conversation with Mustang (which has an office here in Bham), or an enterprising inventor that also paddles… a lot.

Re: hypothermia
ALAN CLARK
01/02/11 #9851

Coming from a mountaineering, sea kayaking, and fire/rescue background, I see the decision to “swim” or “float” in light of maintaining as many choices as possible during a potential survival situation. Usually I'm going to stay with my ski, kayak, outrigger, or boat, if I've dumped and I can't get back on or in it. Clinging to an upside down watercraft, I'm more visible, have more of my body out of the water and am warmer, and I've preserved more choices about what to do next. When you decide to swim, you've effectively limited your options to just one (sometimes a necessary evil) option. Obviously to maintain your ability to make choices, you have to stay connected to your boat in some way.

If I'm paddling solo (due to schedule, travel, or inclination) or I'm going out in challenging conditions with a group, I'm going to plan my paddle so that wind, current, and waves take me toward safety. As we've seen, sometimes even a group paddle can become a solo paddle. Paddling and sailing in the waters off of NW Washington has made me aware that it is not always easy to predict what will be happening at a particular place at a particular time. That is where talking to people (pick them carefully) who have local knowledge may help. Safety recommendations for local waters would be a great thing to have on the whatcompaddlers site.

Last June, I injured my back while checking the Surf Ski Champs course out to Point Bonita. Knowing the area, I was able to use wind, the flood tide, and wind waves to make it back to Horseshoe Cove without really being able to paddle. My partner came back with me after telling the rest of the group what we were doing. But the point is that I made it back without outside assistance due to an awareness of the prevailing, local, conditions for the day I was out. Was I happy that I had someone with me and that we had a radio? Yes, it was great to know that someone on the Bay knew what was going on and was in a position to give me limited help, or access emergency services. An unexpected occurrence ( injury ) had made the day's moderately gnarly conditions, a lot more threatening. But utilizing conditions, I was able to “float” ( fortunately I stayed upright) back to the put-in

I like Erik's idea of an extra float. It could have many uses beyond keeping more of a paddler's body above the water. Depending on size or number of floats available it/they could be used to provide extra floatation to a swamped kayak or holed/cracked ski or outrigger. Outriggers frequently seem, at first glance, to be immune to stability issues, but I've seen one-man, two-men, and OC-6's broken by ocean conditions in both Hawaii, (on the Maliko run) and in Mainland waters, (off of Newport, CA in wind waves from 20 - 30 knot winds) so they too could carry the Borgnes Rescue Float (BRF).

Alan

Re: hypothermia
Reivers Dustin
01/02/11 #9852

I'm most impressed with the quality of this discussion. Particularly yours EK. Some generally accepted strategies don't apply equally. MG has shared some of his hard-won knowledge over our after paddle coffee. I can testify that his New Years recovery of several years ago was epic. Mike, say more about your observations if you will. I would like to share one in particular: swim-ability may outweigh longer term survive-ability in some situations (i.e. that New Years' recovery). Dry-suits & PFDs have a downside.

In general-boating PFDs are a no brainer. However, at work-out level intensity there is a cost. I can perform better on my HPK without a PFD. A drysuit further degrades my performance. I can't dress for immersion, then jump on my 'ski and get full rotation, full extension and work my body heat balance at peak.

Also, as I've discovered: every item you are not using is a penalty or worse when the shit hits. I could hardly believe how messy it got when the seas were heavy that time LG and I called in the coasties dealing with our young friend. (You are a helluva solid partner in a tight spot LG.) How about this: the little leash on my VHF was a confounding basterd that drove me nuts. MG is right: swim fins? paddle float? It's got to be bone simple. (And my usual thing: the VHF is da bomb.)

rd

Re: hypothermia
Michael Gregory
01/02/11 #9854

Broken leash or no leash, stuff can happen. Then what . . .
-If the water is very cold, no one knows your in trouble, and shore close by - swimming in might be a reasonable option. Remember in very cold water there is a pretty small window before muscles shut down and effective movement is lost. Within moments bodies begin to shunt blood away from arms and legs toward vital organs in a bid for survival. Assuming one is covered with neoprene a 100 meter swim can work. I know that I will keep function longer swimming than floating.
-If one is further from shore or not experienced at open water swimming floating might be the only option. If you have a marine radio to call for help and you are lucky, the coasties might get to you out in 20 min. That is within the 30 min survival window cited in the study Erik sent out to us. That is survival, does not mean one will come away without disability.
-So, venture out in winter with great caution, wear appropriate clothing, cinch your PFD such that it won't ride up around your ears when you go in the water, know where your buddies are, keep cell/radio on you, and test your leash well.
-CO2 inflatable float is intriguing.
Best, Mike.

Re: hypothermia
Michael Gregory
01/02/11 #9855

Alan, my comments are directed to instances where the boat has gotten away. If one can stay with the boat, that is preferable. Best to get as much of your body out of the water as possible, so lying on or sitting on the boat ought to help ones chances.
Mike.

Re: hypothermia
ALAN CLARK
01/02/11 #9857

Thanks Mike, keeping both the boat and paddle close is probably another profitable discussion. Even though I surfed, swam and played water polo in high school and college, I've never been very confident in making a long (either time or distance) swim in cold water. I probably need to spend some time assessing my own abilities in cold water.

Thinking about Erik's idea, I remember pictures of Greenland kayaks equipped with seal skin floats. I always assumed they were used for hunting. Does anyone know if they had other uses?

Alan

Re: hypothermia
Larry <lbussing@…>
01/03/11 #9858

Two comments: I tried swimming for my winter exersize a couple of years ago and tried using a boogie board to work on my kick. I quickly realized that I couldn't go forward with just my feet. I could kick my brains out and not go an inch. Seriously. I have a size 8 shoe and my feet are too small to use as fins! Some literature research suggested that just a few degrees of angle on the foot is the difference between going forward or going backward. Again, seriously. I bought a pair of training fins that are just an inch longer than my foot and doubled my speed.
Second comment: I saw Morris blowing up his drysuit the other day by breathing into his neck cuff. Presumably to stay warm and not to look like the pilsbury doughboy. But it occured to me to carry a short tube to stick down my neck cuff and breath into for emergencies. It provides floatation, insulation, and the hot air will help to keep you warm. Breathing into a tube will also help control your breathing. Just a thought, I haven't wanted to practice in this 40 degree weather. Larry B

Re: hypothermia
allipp01
01/03/11 #9859

I grew up in Hawaii, paddled/surfed there most of my life, and I can't count the number times I've had to swim in broken/swamped boats, chased wayward surfboards, or whatever, and it was no big deal. Now that I live here, though, it's a different ballgame.

What about using a foam float, large enough to keep most of your body out of the water and to paddle like a surfboard? I know that years ago, Karel Tresnak Sr. was claiming that his OC-1 seats could be used as a flotation device. Let's go beyond that and think about a design where about 6 feet of the hull (OC-1 or surfski)is hollowed out and used as a large section where a foam seat is inserted.

If you get in trouble, you could paddle that to safety, especially if it is designed to paddle. That said, if you lose your boat you could be out of luck. Maybe an extra leash directly to the foam seat could be used. Just a thought.

Also, learning to hand paddle your ski or OC-1 on its own can save you. I've used a Hurricane OC-1, sans ama, in a paddleboard race and it's fast and doable. This is an option for broken Iakos in an OC or a broken paddle on a surfski. You can make pretty good time paddling this way, and your legs can be lightly dragged on either side of the boat for added stability.

Re: hypothermia article
lori & beau whitehead
01/03/11 #9860

Hey Michael… 98% of the time I either have a PFD or inflatable PFD with me in the winter. But 'true' wave surfing at a surf break is not always PFD friendly. Many times when you are “caught inside” and trying to get back out, you have to duck-dive under a mountain of white water, and not being able to dive under with a PFD is ugly. My wetsuit offers a good level of floatation, but obviously I don't rely on just that when doing any open water paddling. I don't want to test my swimming skills when I'm a mile or more off-shore. In those cases we have VHF, PFD's etc. etc.

The point of failure (besides my surfing skills) was the cord that attaches the leash to the SUP. Too many hard yanks in the waves & possible UV break-down lead it to be the weak link in the chain.

See everyone at the race Saturday.