Drowning Doesn’t Look Like Drowning ( Must Read )

http://mariovittone.com/2010/05/154/ ^ | Mario

[ventanax5]

The new captain jumped from the cockpit, fully dressed, and sprinted through the water. A former lifeguard, he kept his eyes on his victim as he headed straight for the owners who were swimming between their anchored sportfisher and the beach. “I think he thinks you’re drowning,” the husband said to his wife. They had been splashing each other and she had screamed but now they were just standing, neck-deep on the sand bar. “We’re fine, what is he doing?” she asked, a little annoyed. “We’re fine!” the husband yelled, waving him off, but his captain kept swimming hard. ”Move!” he barked as he sprinted between the stunned owners. Directly behind them, not ten feet away, their nine-year-old daughter was drowning. Safely above the surface in the arms of the captain, she burst into tears, “Daddy!”

How did this captain know, from fifty feet away, what the father couldn’t recognize from just ten? Drowning is not the violent, splashing, call for help that most people expect. The captain was trained to recognize drowning by experts and years of experience. The father, on the other hand, had learned what drowning looks like by watching television. If you spend time on or near the water (hint: that’s all of us) then you should make sure that you and your crew knows what to look for whenever people enter the water. Until she cried a tearful, “Daddy,” she hadn’t made a sound. As a former Coast Guard rescue swimmer, I wasn’t surprised at all by this story. Drowning is almost always a deceptively quiet event. The waving, splashing, and yelling that dramatic conditioning (television) prepares us to look for, is rarely seen in real life.

[valkyry1]

If the person goes in and gasps for air underwater he probably wont come back up again.

[valkyry1]

//they can’t call out for help or thrash around//

No they cant because they are not taking air, they are taking in water. It does not take long at all, 30 seconds or so like the article says.

[Tunehead54]

No comment reference bump ... ;-)

[Cicero]

About 25 years ago I happened to come down to the beach where my wife and a German babysitter had taken the kids. One of my adult sons was then a toddler, I think around a year old.

Everyone was relaxed in the son, when I heard the next oldest daughter happily say, “Hey, look at Peter! He’s swimming!” I glanced down, and the youngest was floating face down in about a foot of water, not stirring or making a sound.

I rushed down and pulled him out. He was, fortunately, just fine, and not even very upset. Completely relaxed. But he would have drowned in another minute or two.

I guess my wife thought the babysitter was watching out for him, and vice versa.

[dimk]

The first thing that child needs to be taught is how to swim, those things are incredibly dangerous, pretty much any flotation device is unless you already are a swimmer. My parents never let me wear then until my dad taught me how to swim when I was 7-8 I think

[bolobaby]

Excellent, excellent post. Thanks for sharing.

[B4Ranch]

>>The people that were in real trouble always got a really stupid look on their faces - as in “Oh sh$%, I don’t know what to do!”<<

Kinda like an Obama voter who just realized there’s BS in the soup.

[little jeremiah]

Null, thanks for pinging me.

I almost drowned on a beach on the Big Island which is notorious for drownings and rip tides. The drop off to deep water is very radical and it creates rips that are very dangerous. I was in my 30s and a very strong swimmer, was in water with around 20 other people up to the chest. I felt perfectly safe. I got in the rip and was instantly carried out, off to the side, and under the water in mere seconds. Around and around under the water, head bumping on sand, no way to know which way was “Up”.

Instantly I went into prayer (was automatic - not a conscious decision) and within a second was thrown on some rocks, maybe 100 feet or more down the side of the beach. I was trembling and bruised, and if I had not surfaced, my lungs would have been full of water.

I was always too afraid to swim in waves after that. Drowning is a terrible way to die.

[1951Boomer]

On a related note, “dry drowning” can occur hours after someone has been in water. Seems that there’s no end to what parents have to be alert for. They end up beating themselves up like this mom. Check out this site:

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/110157.php

[libbytarian]

Years ago I was teaching swimming lessons to children at a public lake. Most of the people there were parents and their children who had come for the lessons. Others were there just to swim and picnic but during the lessons they were constrained to a certain area until the lessons were over.

My mother was on the shore watching my younger sibs taking their swim lesson's. She noticed a bobbing head in the water beyond where the lessons were taking place. The swimmer was wearing a swimming cap and was easy to spot. Mother said the swimmers head was just above the water line and there was no sound and no splashing water. The swimmer disappeared and my ever so shy mother went to the lifeguard and told him what she saw. They evacuated the lake and found the little girl. She was saved.

Two weeks later the little girl and her family thanked my mother. Later the owner of the lake later personally taught the little girl to swim. Libby

[wtc911]

Why did you wait?

[palmer]

Is rip the same as undertow? I’ve been in the undertow (also in HI), it grabbed me by the feet and pulled me under. The rip currents on the east coast are different, they are a channel of water at all levels that can send swimmers 100’s of feet out to sea in a minute but not underwater. Fighting the rip is impossible, need to swim parallel to the beach.

[wastedyears]

On a related note, “dry drowning” can occur hours after someone has been in water.

I think I could have sucked in plenty of water when I was a kid.

[wintertime]

My 18 month daughter nearly drowned in a kiddie pool. The two of us were in the kiddie pool and I was talking with a neighbor. My daughter was walking behind me and fell face first into the water. This meant that her feet could not touch the bottom of the pool. Thankfully my neighbor saw her floating behind my back and lifted her up before there was any danger of drowning. The entire event was completely silent.

Now, when I see parents at the beach walking ahead of their children as they exit the water, or splashing around behind their backs, I tell them about my daughter, and suggest that they **always** have their little ones walk and swim **in front** of them at all times.

[GOPJ]

Sometimes the most common indication that someone is drowning is that they don’t look like they’re drowning. They may just look like they are treading water and looking up at the deck. One way to be sure? Ask them: “Are you alright?” If they can answer at all – they probably are. If they return a blank stare – you may have less than 30 seconds to get to them. And parents: children playing in the water make noise. When they get quiet, you get to them and find out why.

Thanks ventanax for posting this - you might have saved some lives today...

Pass along ping...

[bitterohiogunclinger]

Drinking plays a big part in a lot of drownings. A few years back working EMS I had the displeasure of responding to a drowning call. In spite of responding within three minutes of the call we spent an hour trying to find the victim because his buddies were too intoxicated to tell us where he went into the water. Had they been coherent, the water was cold enough that we might have located him in time for a resuscitation.

[GOPJ]

Drowning people make a lot of noise, and go down three times. Waitresses in NYC can afford 3000 sq foot rental apartments. Police officers often kill 14 people and smash 8 cars in an average working day.

Odd how film makers NEVER show a film being made in 2 or 3 days - they know better. They show respect for their own profession ... and a few "artistic" ones - but that's about it. So the reality we crave takes too much work on their part... And yet, they wonder why adult Americans don't go to the movies...

[sickoflibs]

I am a experienced open water distance swimmer. Have been for years. A number of years ago I followed some friends out in the (Atlantic) Ocean when the waves were huge when I did not get the opportunity to train that particular season and I came very close to drowning trying to make it back to the beach through the huge waves while exhausted. I told myself that if I panic-ed I was dead as the waves dropped on top of me pushing me under over and over.

This was the closest I came to death and my friends were unaware of it till I told them later. An hour later the floating lifeguards came by calling people out of the water because of the wave conditions. In previous years we have swam out miles together as if it were a stroll. I had lost the fear of drowning I learned as a child and made a serious mistake.

[bgill]

And parents: children playing in the water make noise. When they get quiet, you get to them and find out why.

Same goes for when kids get quiet in the yard or in their room. Something's up.

[little jeremiah]

Sounds like both - I was instantly carried at least 100 feet (maybe more like yards) down the beach, all while underwater and banging around.

And the weird thing is, the lifeguard (there was one there) saw me go under, did nothing, and when I tremblingly tottered back to the beach he yelled at me for not coming out of the water when he shouted at me to come in. I never heard or saw him, as I was controlled by the water and plus my head was underwater the whole time. He was a real ***hole. Never even asked how I was or anything. I was extremely shaken.