Tag: rescue

What You Need To Know About Surviving Rip Currents.

WHAT IS A RIP CURRENT?

A great article by National Geo and RIP current Heros
https://www.nationalgeographic.com.au/nature/everything-you-need-to-know-about-rip-currents.aspx

Rips can be identified by deeper, dark-coloured water, fewer breaking waves and a rippled surface surrounded by smooth water. The most common type is a channelised rip. These rips occupy deep channels between sand bars and they can stay in the same place for days, weeks and even months. Then there are boundary rips – which can also be channelised and are found against headlands and other structures reaching out into the ocean like piers and jetties. Sometimes these can be almost permanent. But one of the most dangerous and unpredictable rips is the Flash Rip.

To be able to form, rip currents need breaking waves. It’s the spatial variation in the breaking waves, normally caused by undulations in the sand bars that commonly begins the process of a rip current forming. A flow develops, that moves from the region of intense wave breaking toward the region of reduced or no wave breaking, inside the surf zone This flow is the pathway of least resistance for outgoing water – often a perfect channel – just like a river of the sea.

Typically rip currents are about 10 to 50 metres wide and they can flow anywhere from 50 to 100 metres offshore normally. But Dr Rob Brander has measured rip currents that have flowed 400 metres offshore

To study how rip currents Doctor Rob brander places mobile devices called drifters directly into the currents. These drifters have onboard GPS units that record rip current data such as flow speeds and flow direction both inside and outside the surf zone.

The average rip current flows offshore at speeds of about half a metre to one metre per second. But they all have a tendency to pulse and what that means is that suddenly the rip current can just dramatically double in speed in a matter of thirty seconds and then you’re talking speeds of two meters per second which is literally Olympic swimming speeds.FollowVIDEOTHE FATAL RIPLOADING…

HOW TO SURVIVE A RIP CURRENT 

Not all rip currents flow straight out to the breaking waves. Some rip currents flow in a circular movement within the surf zone. These are referred to as rotating eddies. Rip currents are very dynamic – they can change direction quickly.

Rob Brander’s research has revealed that there is no single escape strategy that is guaranteed to get you out of a rip current. Instead, you have options based on the conditions and the behaviour of the rip.

The golden rule is to never attempt to swim against the current – they’re just too powerful. Remember to stay calm and focus on floating. Just go with the current and raise your hand for help. Depending on the flow of the rip, floating will normally deliver two scenarios: 

A circulating rip current should float you back around to either a sandbank or put you close to breaking waves which will help you get back to shore.

A current that flows directly offshore will normally float you just beyond the breaking waves where the rip will cease to operate. At this point, you can either continue to float and wait for rescue or you can swim around the rip and back to shore.

The other option you have – and this applies only to good swimmers – is you can try swimming parallel to the beach in either direction as you float with the current. In some situations, this may free you from the rip.

It’s really panic that is the biggest killer when it comes to rips. Rips don’t drown you that don’t pull you under. Panicking will drown you. People panic because they find themselves being taken quickly offshore, the situation is outside of their control, and it’s a scary experience.

And what you need to do when you’re caught in a rip is try and take control of the situation yourself. You can float and you can assess what’s going on – do you want to swim this way, do you think that will work. If it’s not working, float a bit and swim the other way or just float. If you’re constantly thinking about the situation and the options you have you’re in control of the situation, provided you haven’t exhausted yourself, but you do not want to panic. Anything that will eliminate panic is the best approach. FollowVIDEOBLACK SUNDAYLOADING…

INTERESTING FACTS 

  • Each year (on average) rip currents claim more lives in Australia than bushfires, floods, cyclones and sharks combined.
  • Rip currents are responsible for an estimated 90% of the over 10,000 beach rescues made in Australia each year.
  • Australia has over 11,000 beaches and scientists estimate that up to 17,000 rips could be operating across Australia’s beaches at any given time
  • Almost all of Australia’s rip currents fatalities occur on unpatrolled beaches or outside of the red and yellow flags
  • Less than 4% of Australia’s 11,000 beaches are patrolled by Lifesavers or Lifeguards. This means that there are a lot of beaches and a lot of rips where any beachgoer could find themselves in serious trouble.
  • Many coastal tourist parks in NSW are situated closest to unpatrolled beaches that are rated as hazardous in terms of rips.
  • Many of Australia’s rip current drownings take place on isolated stretches of coastline where the nearest patrolled beach is neither close nor convenient.
  • The simplest way to describe rip currents is that they’re like rivers of the sea: strong, narrow, seaward flowing currents that extend from the shoreline out beyond the breaking waves. They exist to bring all that extra water that’s coming in with the breaking waves back offshore.
  • The majority of rip current drownings take place underneath bright blue skies, moderate waves and what appear to be perfect beach conditions.
  • Young males between the ages of 15 and 39 are the most likely to die in rip currents.
  • Rips are not undertow, they won’t pull you under because there’s no such thing as an undertow. They’re not ripping tides because they’re not a tide, they’re current and they flow pretty steady and they won’t take you to New Zealand. 

Drowning Doesn’t Look Like Drowning

By Mario May 3, 2010 Boating Safety, Water Safety

Translations: – العربية – Norsk 汉语 – tiếng Việt – Español – Italiano –  Français – Magyar –  Português – română – Deutsch – Suomi – Svenska –  Čeština – Русско –Íslenska – Nederlands – ελληνικά – עברית‬ –   Audio Version

The new captain jumped from the deck, fully dressed, and sprinted through the water. A former lifeguard, he kept his eyes on his victim as he headed straight for the couple swimming between their anchored sport fisher 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 know 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. 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:

  1. 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.
  2. 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.
  3. 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.
  4. 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.
  5. From the beginning to the 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.

(Source: On Scene Magazine: Fall 2006 (page 14))

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 in 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
  • Appear to be climbing an invisible ladder.

So if a crew member falls overboard and everything looks OK – 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.

(See a video of the Instinctive Drowning Response)

Next – READ THIS

(Download an interview on the instinctive drowning response with myself and Francesco Pia)

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