oh man that’s cold!
Published December 19, 2008 | 
The only thing colder than the swim is the bit where the narrator refers to a “chilling” statistic about drowning deaths in cold water. . “chilling?”, Now THAT’S cold! Overlooking the bad wordplay this is an excellent video to share with your new-to-paddling friends and students who may not understand the real risks of cold water immersion.
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5 Responses to oh man that’s cold!
That’s a great video. I have taken some COLD swims, but always with a PFD on. And, once you get used to wearing a PFD all the time, it seems weird to be in the water without one. I jumped off the swimming pier in Lake Mendota a couple summers back and realized how much work swimming is without a lifejacket!
Awesome find, Derrick. Hope this will find its way around the net paddlers of the world. Your ‘do we scare beginners enough?’ post returns to mind.
I note two things. There’s not enough mention of how strong the gasp response can be – especially as one falls into water from a kayak UP-SIDE DOWN and staying that way for a bit unless one has strong bracing or rolling skills. The first thing a cotton-t-shirt wearing cold water paddler would do is gasp-inhale underwater, coming up panicked and choking after a wet exit.
We used to strive to the “BIG BREATH Before Tipping” response in pool white water training classes. We taught it the usual mean nasty teenager way – through experience. Someone learning to brace (or solidify their roll) would have 2 to 4 paddlers, bow and stern, rotating the hull. The force would be increased until the paddler succumbed and capsized. Coming up choking and coughing up water a few times in a row… well, humans are great at learning through adversity! Eventually they’d remember a big breath and have lots of time if their first roll failed to try again.
Second – Concerning us paddlers, I think we should realistically focus more on Cold Water Incapacitation times than hypothermia. Incapacitation is dangerous to both ourselves, and to our paddling buddies. I may be misunderstanding, but they seem to be referring only to low core temp as hypothermia – fine for university theory but useless for us who need to be able to actually hold onto a paddle to move, hold onto our own or climb onto another’s kayak, tie a knot in a rope, light a rescue fire or open that hot-drink thermos we have behind our seat. If we can’t hold on, we need someone strong enough to pull or push us ashore (tow-line?), a real chore of a task. In the days I did white water, shore was never more than 75 feet or so, and often less. On the ocean or big lakes? Yikes!
I’ve seen two things that really marked me as a paddler.
One was a muscular (the kind that sink) triathlete who’d lost the ability to swim, had gone into water-slap and gasp for air mode. I was then a triathlon rescue virgin. His body was full of Vaseline (What??!!) – no way to hold onto him!! No way to get a rope around him as he floated way too low and see Vaseline comment. He’d lost the ability to hold onto anything due to the kilometer he’d swum in cold water. All other rescue kayaks were busy, and far away. I towed him ashore by his very short 3/4-inch hair pinched against my paddle shaft. It was a close call, but it worked.
The other was bringing absolute beginners to a white water river in an strange paddling program from the retarded early days: Beginners who’d learned the wet-exit and minor pool stuff (almost no bracing, and certainly not paddling in a straight line) were taken to an R2 chute where 80% would capsize against the eddy lines and standing waves. No paddling spray jackets or gear! Just a PFD and helmet, and maybe KWay top and pants over who knows. I saw lots of hand incapacitation within one or three minutes in 50F to 60F water, and got a sense of how fast incapacition hits – WAY faster than all the stats and studies claimed at the time saying 15 to 20 minutes (studies done on Navy SEALS in 3/8ths wetsuits, perhaps?). We got really really good at rescues – maybe not a good thing.
These were smaller Canadian kids, aged 16-19 and half the weight of those shown in this video, so vulnerable to losing heat faster than the video’s strongly-built volunteers. This was mid-80′s, before dry suits, before inexpensive stretchy-fit-many-people wetsuits were available from China.
On the good side, last Spring in Ontario, I saw several dry suit buyers cold-water testing their new suits and choice of underlying insulation by floating around close to shore for a half hour or more (with qualified but un-needed rescuers nearby). Water was +5C or about 41F. I was quite impressed by their endurance.
Wish the video had given us stats on even colder water temperatures!
2 years into my paddling life my wife and I went to the local lake in late November. The water was still open but there was a dusting of snow on the frozen beach. Water temp I’m guessing in the low 40′s. We slipped off our shoes and walked down to the water and slowly worked our way out until the water was up to our necks. We were wearing summer paddling gear and PFDs. It seemed like in moments we could no longer tie knot. A few minutes more we were shivering uncontrollably. A few minutes more the shivering stopped. Although we both suddenly felt we could now handle the cold and stay out for much longer, we were at least aware enough to know what that really meant was that it was time to get back in.
We walked back to the shore. Moving my legs through the water felt like trying to push your foot against a concrete wall. My toes burned as I walked barefoot across the frozen beach. But I could’nt concentrate to put on my shoes. It was a challenge to open the car doors and get the heater on to warm up.
In time we drove back home and curled up on the couch under a blanket. Every muscle began to ache to the point that it would cause occasional shudders. Of course in time everything settled down and we just slept through the night.
Yeah, it was sort of a hard core, crazy experiment but I came to understand not just how the cold effected me in the water, but also how just getting out of the cold water was not an instant fix either. It’s a good thing to know that if a paddler swims without the proper gear, they may be worthless for hours afterwords as well.
Now THAT’s real experience without bad consequences (except for the temporary muscle soreness…)
Thanks for posting this, Derrick. And great comments from you and MarkP. I took a swim once in water that was probably in low 40s, upper 30s. There was scrim ice in the shallows. First day I’d bought my first immersion gear, a 3/2 surfer’s wetsuit. Even with that, I waded out and was “OK” chest deep, but as soon as I kicked off shore I went to huffing and puffing, and it felt like my heart would explode. I lay on my side/back in my PFD and side kicked out, and after a few minutes I warmed up enough to get my breathing controlled, and climbed back in my kayak. Just a few minutes in the water, but it darn sure taught me the value of rolling.
Great video.