Drowning doesn't look like drowning

From a buddy on TKF. Good info to know.

"Are you alright?" is a question to ask anytime you see someone who has stopped an activity. For instance, while kayaking/canoeing ask "Are you alright?" anytime you see a fellow paddler on the shoreline. 99% of the time they are just taking a break. the other 1% could be dehydrated and getting delusonal or approaching collapse. (especially applies to racing)

On the water, the playing field, bike or hike trail, mall walker, car on the side of the road etc etc. Asking "Are you alright?" could save a strangers life.

Drowning Doesn't Look Like Drowning
by MARIO on MAY 18, 2010
BOATING SAFETY,COAST GUARD,GCAPTAIN
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.

The Instinctive Drowning Response – so named by Francesco A. Pia, Ph.D., is what people do to avoid actual or perceived suffocation in the water. And it does not look like most people expect. There is very little splashing, no waving, and no yelling or calls for help of any kind. To get an idea of just how quiet and undramatic from the surface drowning can be, consider this: It is the number two cause of accidental death in children, age 15 and under (just behind vehicle accidents) – of the approximately 750 children who will drown next year, about 375 of them will do so within 25 yards of a parent or other adult. In ten percent of those drownings, the adult will actually watch them do it, having no idea it is happening (source: CDC). Drowning does not look like drowning – Dr. Pia, in an article in the Coast Guard's On Scene Magazine, described the instinctive drowning response like this:

Except in rare circumstances, drowning people are physiologically unable to call out for help. The respiratory system was designed for breathing. Speech is the secondary or overlaid function. Breathing must be fulfilled, before speech occurs.

Drowning people's mouths alternately sink below and reappear above the surface of the water. The mouths of drowning people are not above the surface of the water long enough for them to exhale, inhale, and call out for help. When the drowning people's mouths are above the surface, they exhale and inhale quickly as their mouths start to sink below the surface of the water.

Drowning people cannot wave for help. Nature instinctively forces them to extend their arms laterally and press down on the water's surface. Pressing down on the surface of the water, permits drowning people to leverage their bodies so they can lift their mouths out of the water to breathe.

Throughout the Instinctive Drowning Response, drowning people cannot voluntarily control their arm movements. Physiologically, drowning people who are struggling on the surface of the water cannot stop drowning and perform voluntary movements such as waving for help, moving toward a rescuer, or reaching out for a piece of rescue equipment.

From beginning to end of the Instinctive Drowning Response people's bodies remain upright in the water, with no evidence of a supporting kick. Unless rescued by a trained lifeguard, these drowning people can only struggle on the surface of the water from 20 to 60 seconds before submersion occurs.

This doesn't mean that a person that is yelling for help and thrashing isn't in real trouble – they are experiencing aquatic distress. Not always present before the instinctive drowning response, aquatic distress doesn't last long – but unlike true drowning, these victims can still assist in their own rescue. They can grab lifelines, throw rings, etc.

Look for these other signs of drowning when persons are n the water:
Head low in the water, mouth at water level
Head tilted back with mouth open
Eyes glassy and empty, unable to focus
Eyes closed
Hair over forehead or eyes
Not using legs – Vertical
Hyperventilating or gasping
Trying to swim in a particular direction but not making headway
Trying to roll over on the back
Ladder climb, rarely out of the water.

So if a crew member falls overboard and every looks O.K. – don't be too sure. 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.

Very good read

thanks

Good stuff. Thnx rev

Excellent reminder. Thanks Jerry

I had no idea. As a parent, Im very greatful for the share.

Thanks Jerry, thats great info.

Very, very important article that everyone needs to read. Thanks for sharing this. I've honestly never thought about it, but I'm sure thinking about it now.

Better to look silly rescuing someone that doesn't need it, than to stand by watching someone die.

I just re-posted this on my facebook status.

Wow this is a good read. This makes me think of when I was a kid and my parents would take my brother and I camping at Denison Dam almost every weekend during the summer. We would fish all morning and then go to Texoma (East Burns Run) to go swimming until late afternoon. This one year in particular when I was about 10 my 15 year old cousin was swimming with my brother and I. The lake was flooded and the water was all the way up to the playground area. We went wading out and I knew there was drop off before the beach area but I thought we were still a good distance from it. While wading around I look over to my cousin who was walking with us and he looked like he was running in place. I don’t remember his face but I remember the look on his eyes. He was just staring right at us with no emotion. My brother and I stood there and watched him flutter in the water and his arms never broke the surface. No sound and no splashing just like the article said. My brother finally reached out to him because we could see his arms stretched out to us. He grabbed my brother’s arm and pulled violently. He nearly pulled my brother under. My brother kept his footing and my cousin was able to pull himself up. My cousin started coughing up water and began puking. We finally realized that he had found the drop off and he was drowning.
I just put that off as a freak thing. We laugh about it now but before reading this post I have never thought about what an actual drowning would look like. I would have still pictured someone screaming and waving their hands for help.
Thank you for posting that.

Spot on post because I saw it happen 10 feet from me one day.
Me, my girlfriend and my brother were at my apartment pool one day back in the 80's and there was an older man with a kid out there swimming. The man was drinking some sort of liquor out of a big cup and was buzzed and not very friendly, he was rude and we paid little attention to him. There were two levels to the pool with a waterfall between them and we noticed he was doing the "dead mans float" and then would pop up and talk and move around like normal. (he was in the the lower end of the pool and we were sitting by the upper end) He climed up the waterfall (about 2 feet) and fell face fist in to the upper pool and the kid followed. He kept doing the dead man float but very slow and would roll his head from side to side and we again payed little attention to it. Until his head ended up on the top step sideways just as my gf was getting in. His face was blue. My brother and I pulled him out and started cpr as my gf called 911. They landed a helicopter and flew him away and he died. Sad day.... He did not thrash, wave his arms, or give any indication that something was wrong. Had he not been doing the dead man float before and seem fine we could have reacted faster

A simple head pat could save someone's life. It's a very simple form of communication. Whenever you're around other people on the water, let them know that if you pat your head, you are asking if they are OK.

If the person pats their head back, they are answering your question and they are indeed OK. If they do not pat their head back, you know something is wrong. It is a very simple and effective form of communication.

Life saving info here. Thanks! the head pat - a thumbs up - with both the hand is up and out of the water and that is a good sign that the swimmer is OK.

Thumbs up can be hard to see from a distance. The head pat can be seen from a much greater distance.