Posted on 07/12/2018 6:42:31 AM PDT by rightwingintelligentsia
“Well, yes, it would! If there is such a thing”
—
There certainly is such a thing.
It happens to marathon runners,as it did to a friend of my granddaughter in Boston.
Mental confusion is very much a part of it. This young woman then collapsed but the medics at the scene were well prepared.
I'm that 60+ year old guy you were looking at when you were a kid. I'm 65 now, and only hung up my tool belt for good when I was 63.
I worked outdoors a good many summers in the same area where this postal worker died. I also spent ten years working in the Texas sun, after the age of fifty.
Did I hate it? Hell yeah, but I'm not complaining. It was my career, and I made more money doing it, than my cubicle bound brothers ever did, in their air conditioned, cushy careers.
That makes sense.
I'm in the (outdoors) home improvement business, and only wish we could provide that kind of thing for our guys during the summer months.
We cope with similar, but different methods, as is practical. We wear wide brimmed hats, stay hydrated with cold water, take cool off breaks as needed, hose off now and again, and take sea salt tablets to mitigate the killer effects of heat sickness.
Those simple techniques have gotten me and my employees through decades of brutal southwest summers.
Southern California native here. I've endured blazing summers my whole life, but one of the worst, was when I lived in the Tampa Bay area one year.
It reminded me of the boiling hot summers in Okinawa, where I lived as a kid. Just frikken unbearable.
11. Take sea salt tabs. 450 milligrams for every 25 pounds of body weight, once per day.
Doing so, will mitigate all of the heat related symptoms, such as cold chills, dizziness, muscle cramps, headache, exhaustion, nausea, etc.
I've worked outdoors doing construction in the southwest for decades, and can attest that this works. Just make sure it's sea salt, and not regular ionized salt, which helps, but isnt nearly as effective.
Was not trying to denigrate anyone.
I believe that anyone doing ANY honest work is a great and noble thing - just mentioning that I know what it's like doing back-breaking work in the heat.
I just chose a different path - and that's made all the difference.
I am glad that you made it out in one piece, I know many who didn't.
I've been to Florida many times...usually in the winter.However,I've been there once in April and once in October.The October visit was almost intolerable...95 degrees and 95% humidity.
I've also experienced 100 degrees on the Arabian Peninsula (Dubai) and found it not nearly as bad as Florida in October.
RIP.
Try May through September when it is so hot and especially humid because it is the rainy season, that I have to shower twice a day working outside sometimes and change clothes several times. I just get soaked. Sopping wet through and through. Socks, shoes, pants, shirt, undershorts, everything is soaking wet.
It is an oppressive heat where your face feels like it's going to burst. Like a steam bath that gets hotter and hotter the longer you're in it until you can't stand it anymore and have to burst out into the fresh air and a cold shower to survive.
I like hot. Much better than cold. But this heat is villainous. Treacherous. Almost obscene.
If she hadn’t been off so long she probably would have been more physically acclimated to working in the heat. Going back into it after likely being use to being in air conditioning was too much for her. Poor thing.
I used to do a lot of work over at the Hanford site in Eastern Washington. The buddy system is pretty critical too to keep an eye on the other guy. Some of the young guys I would have to MAKE go sit in the shade and drink water and take a break. Young, from the area and think they are tough and “used to it”. And of course this mail carrier didn’t have a buddy watching her.
I’ve never understood the “sipping” part. Working in the heat (110 + sometimes) I’ll drink 10-15 bottles of water and gateraide. I alternate them, and drink at least one bottle on the drive to the site. I see the bottles are 16.9 ounces. Recommended normal drinking is 8 to 10 glasses (8 ounces) a day. Of course if I’m sitting at my desk I’m thinking “How the heck can I drink eight glasses of water!?”
There are just some people who will stay focused on work or some thought in their mind....in 95-degree-plus heat, and two hours later into this process...they feel a bit exhausted or notice that they just aren’t sweating much now, and nausea has set in. Those are the people I’m talking about, that ought to be taking gulp or two every thirty minutes. If you are doing physical stuff...you ought to have at least one Gatorade every four hours. Diabetic? Nope...use plain ice-tea and a lemon. It just depends on your age, health situation, and work required.
I’ll give you a good example here. Back around 2003 in Europe....we had this great heat-wave. For about five weeks, it stayed at 95-degrees daily and never eased up. Somewhere around 3,000 French folks (mostly over 65) died from heat exhaustion. Across the border in Germany, same temperature, but only a couple hundred folks dying from the same thing. Difference? The older French were going to mostly wine in the afternoons. The older Germans were going to bottled water.
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