On Sat, 28 Jul 2007 17:37:18 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Fri, 27 Jul 2007 22:21:00 -0700, Chuck Gould
wrote:

And many people die almost right away from cold water immersion shock.
They either gasp involuntarily and get a lung full of water and drown
or go into cardiac arrest.

My only experience with really cold water, many years ago, was that it
was difficult to catch a breath because of involuntary contraction of
the chest and diaphragm muscles. Fortunately I was hanging onto the
edge of a canoe with my head above water, able to survive for a minute
on very shallow breaths. After that I was able to slowly work up to a
full breath but it took a while and some very concerted panic
avoidance.

Coldest I've ever been was on a body recovery on ice. Kids in a car
went through the ice. I was in my turnout gear (thankfully because
that's what saved me), the ice cracked under me while I was opening a
hole for the divers - ploosh.

I was hauled out after a minute, but I lost my boots in the process.
Literally couldn't feel my feet for five minutes, then when the
feeling returned, whoa did that hurt.

Even with the turnout gear, I must have lost a good three/four degrees
of body temperature. I didn't warm up for a freakin' day. :)

Side Note: One of the neatest things I ever did was an ice dive in
Lake Champlain at the invitation of the Burlington Fire Department on
a ice rescue class.

Ain't nothing like walking upside down on the bottom of two/three feet
of ice - totally weird and fun. Watching the fish was a blast too -
they would pick at the ice to get little pieces of algae and believe
it or not, there is a little crab like crustacean that lives on the
surface of the ice.

Neat stuff.