inert gas...

[kinetic]

Odd question.....but comments welcome..

If, you have an immediate loss of all gas bar an inert gas to breathe what happens if you breathe that inert gas on an immediate ascent?

Does anyone dive with inert gases on cave penetrations, for any reason?


Graham

[Deep-Thief]

Odd question.....but comments welcome..

If, you have an immediate loss of all gas bar an inert gas to breathe what happens if you breathe that inert gas on an immediate ascent?

Does anyone dive with inert gases on cave penetrations, for any reason?


Graham

Possibly Argon to fill your dry suit for warmth. What would happen, don't know, not qualified enough. Immediate ascent would mean you wern't in deco. If you are then that is not an option, unless you want to risk foaming at the mouth and a chamber ride or worse, death. Immediate ascent in O/W, just exhale, remember you don't breathe out of a lack of O2 but from a build up of CO2. Worst case as you are assending the air in your bc will expand, when you let it out, let it out into your mouth. No I have never tried it but you can bet if its that or dying I am going to try it in a hurry. Just my two cents worth.

[Gary]

If, you have an immediate loss of all gas bar an inert gas to breathe what happens if you breathe that inert gas on an immediate ascent?

The oxygenless inert gas would help purge what oxygen you had out of you lungs and posiably even help draw oxygen out of the blood. You'd loose consciousness in the most rapid and painless method achievable under the circumstances.

Rebreathing your wing would achive the same thing eventually but for a while it would at least provide some oxygen and CO2 removal. I think due to pressure increasing the O2 and CO2 concentrations that at any significant depth you'd achieve a CO2 headache before you ran low enough on oxygen to pass out. As you got shallower though that would reverse and the O2 would get less concentrated as you neared the surface - posiably leading to shallow water blackout and a CO2 headache.

(In theory rebreathing the wing could work but if you had the option just ascend while exhaling. In practice it woud be both difficult to do and probably unhealthy unless your wings were recently cleaned.)

Argon for drysuit inflation would also provide a fair amount of extra narcosis - slightly more then twice the effective depth for Nitrogen Narcosis.

There is an innert gas unconsciousness accident report on the IUCRR website where a diver acidentily used a deco bottle filled with 100% helium instead of oxygen, passed out and died: http://www.iucrr.org/20011026_01.htm

[bullfrog]

Breathing an inert gas is the worst option. You will die and fast! You can breath from the wings but that won't help for long. Tried that from 60 feet once , made it to thirty before my brain said use you regulator now! The co2 builds up fast. I don't think anyone in thier right mind would put a second stage on an argon bottle.

[DeWayne]

Saw a post about a year or so back about a dad finding his son floating face down in their pool. Seems the kid found dad's unmarked argon bottle, and thinking that it was a minature scuba tank put a reg on it and jumped in the pool. That should tell you just how quick breathing a pure inert gas will kill you. It will rapidly displace the oxygen in your system and kill you before you can even react to spit the reg out.

[jpdiver]

I know someone who mistakenly breathed a bottle of Aron at 10 feet and went unconconcious after about 3 breaths. Only a heroic CPR effort saved his life. A 100% inert gas will kill very quickly

[Stu]

Okay, I'm not exactly a guru on this subject, but I'd have to disagree with a lot of that.

Yes, breathing an inert gas will kill you. You have the same (roughly) 4 minutes of time without oxygen before you can be sure that you'd be unconscious, but my take is that you're getting rid of the CO2 buildup which is what makes you *feel the need* to breathe. As such, without the thought of "Must breathe!!! Must breathe!!!" you're not as likely to panic and lose those few extra seconds which could get you out.

The kid who died from breathing argon probably didn't even know there was a problem for a few minutes until he passed out, and it's unlikely he even realised he was going to pass out. As for breathing off the wing, if you ever saw the amount of fungus that builds up inside them, you'd realise that you'll probably survive longer by just holding your breath.

There's actually an easy and relatively safe way to test this theory though. Go find a bouncy castle, hold your breath, and see how long you can jump about for before you *need* to breathe. Now get a pony full of argon, breathe off the reg and time yourself again. Well, make that: get someone else to time how long it takes until you pass out. The bouncy castle will make sure that you don't get clobbered when you pass out, and the reg will fall out of your mouth at that point anyway. And it'll be a real laugh for the person timing you Or maybe that's just my twisted sense of humour....

2 points you should look for here. Which one gave you more time, and would you prefer to pass out from lack of oxygen or get a massive CO2 buildup first? At least breathing the inert gas is a pleasant way to go, but just think of the IRAP on that one....

I've managed to pass out from shallow water blackout once, btw. A little CO2 buildup making me want to get to the surface, but no panic due to lack of O2, and I didn't know a thing between hauling myself up a line and lying on the floor where they'd dragged me. That'd be a great way to go.

[crazyduck]

Ok, the wing issue-
I can’t speak to other subjects but this is something I have messed around with.

Perhaps the best known incident was a commercial diver that got caught laying beams underwater and was pinned. He realized that help would arrive but he needed time. He had a wing and did a basic SCR method. He inflated the wing- enough to breathe and then took 4 breathes and exhaled the gas. By doing this he survived the situation.

I had an accident in 2001 were I was diving a Beuchat steel tank (really a drop tank.) The recreational BC I was wearing could not support the tank properly. The tank strap slipped and I was suddenly connected via the LP hose connection and the second stage. The drop tank was incredibly over weighted so I felt like my head was about to be ripped off. Every breathe was a combination of air and lake water as I bit down on the mouthpiece praying it would not snap or break. After a few second I realized that I was in control and make a slow but deliberate ascent to the surface.
Probably a near drowning; medical care made the difference. I walked into the doctor’s office on Monday morning and they saw me immediately. I was already coughing and barking, treatment was heavy load of antibiotics. My head was clogged up for a good month.
Edit- -My point was the effect of trying to breathe lake water.

Depending on the diver and the type of diving- This sort of thing supports a bailout rebreather unit. However, that brings a ton of other issues to bear.

Andrew

[Gary]

Ok, the wing issue-
I can’t speak to other subjects but this is something I have messed around with.

Perhaps the best known incident was a commercial diver that got caught laying beams underwater and was pinned. He realized that help would arrive but he needed time. He had a wing and did a basic SCR method. He inflated the wing- enough to breathe and then took 4 breathes and exhaled the gas. By doing this he survived the situation.

I actually gave the wing breathing a try. After throughly cleaning my wing I went diving and gave it a try. I attempted a one breath to every 2 from the wing but found it hard to get water free air breathing from the wing and I still had to clear the reg each switch as well. It took some attention to do and distracted me from even swimming properly or watching where I should be going.

I have thought of a few ways to improve my first attempt but overall I concluded that unless I was going to sit still in one place and do nothing but pay attention to rebreathing the wing I could extend my air better by skip breathing, efficient swimming and paying attention to the cave.

Long, deep, slow breaths with an extended pause after each inhalation followed by a full exhale could extend most people's air by 50-100%.

[NitroxWarrior]

The only Inert gas I've ever used in diving was argon, I did hear that the chris and crissy rouse once experimented with an argon breathing mix. not sure what they were trying to acomplish, because argon leaves your body much slower than nitrogen so it doesnt make much sense to use...