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Just so you know (falling through ice edition)


Randomguy

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13 minutes ago, Page Turner said:

...I wonder what it's like to die, half in and half out of the hole in the ice, with your arms and beard frozen to the damn ice, waiting for rescuers who never arrive ? I bet somewhere in that process, you start feeling pretty stupid. :facepalm:

I don't see any prostitutes anywhere in the illustrations.  You would think ice-shanty prostitutes would help because if you die half in and half out with a frozen beard, how are you going to patronize those prostitutes on that day and in the future?

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8 minutes ago, Randomguy said:

I don't see any prostitutes anywhere in the illustrations.  You would think ice-shanty prostitutes would help because if you die half in and half out with a frozen beard, how are you going to patronize those prostitutes on that day and in the future?

Why are you posting stuff to keep Darwin from working his magic?  Falling through the ice is an epic Darwinian Event, and you're spoiling the benefits society would reap from this event coming to its expected conclusion.

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4 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

Why are you posting stuff to keep Darwin from working his magic?  Falling through the ice is an epic Darwinian Event, and you're spoiling the benefits society would reap from this event coming to its expected conclusion.

Some dumb chick my freshman year got trapped on the ice on the campus pond.  We had some drinks at a party and it was winter, and walking home put us at the pond.  She said we should go out to the middle where the fountain had frozen into a mighty ice mountain, I said that seems like a bad idea because it hadn't been cold enough to guarantee that we'd make it, except in the center where the water had been freezing when it was really cold.  She said sure it will hold us, I said have at it if you want to go out there so bad.  She steps on the ice near the edge, jumps up and down a couple of times, and it holds.  

She said "It is fine, it will hold us", and I said it won't.  She shrugs and starts walking and gets halfway to the ice fountain mountain, and then you hear the ice cracking in a big way.  She runs to the center because that is solid, and I start laughing and lay on the "told you so's".  She wants me to come and get her, I say no way.  I tell her to try the other side, but she is scared to leave the frozen fountain part.

I let her know that I will walk home and call campus police (no cell phones in those days), and I will see her at the dorm later.   The fire department came and laid a ladder on the ice that she could crawl out on, she told me about it when she got to the dorm (she lived a floor above me).  She was pissed at me for some reason, so I laughed at her again and had her recall the times I said it was a bad idea.

I miss college.

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11 minutes ago, Randomguy said:

 The fire department came and laid a ladder on the ice that she could crawl out on, she told me about it when she got to the dorm (she lived a floor above me).  She was pissed at me for some reason

...do you think she banged any of the firemen, out of some misplaced sense of gratitude ? Did she have a beard she could have let freeze to the ice ?

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6 minutes ago, Page Turner said:

...do you think she banged any of the firemen, out of some misplaced sense of gratitude ? Did she have a beard she could have let freeze to the ice ?

Who knows?  She was a trainwreck, I had worked with her at a restaurant in high school.  She was worse in college.

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38 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

Why are you posting stuff to keep Darwin from working his magic?  Falling through the ice is an epic Darwinian Event, and you're spoiling the benefits society would reap from this event coming to its expected conclusion.

My cousin drown at age 8, he fell through the ice trying to get his dog to safety. What benefits do the believe society has enjoyed from his death? 

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1 minute ago, Prophet Zacharia said:

My cousin drown at age 8, he fell through the ice trying to get his dog to safety. What benefits do the believe society has enjoyed from his death? 

Sadly, we lose good with the bad :(  It literally is Darwinism/natural selection/survival of the fittest or whatever else.  If a person (animal, organism, etc.) is less adapted to survival, they are more likely to not make it to reproduce. If they are more adapted - some biological trait like an extra layer of fat in colder climates - they may survive where less adapted folks don't.  

Accidents can be classified into a few categories - your cousin would be in the one where he made a mistake doing the right thing, others are "bolt of lightning on a clear day" bad luck, and others - like RG's gal - are stupid actions leading to bad results.  

Darwin stuff is for that third example.  As is likely the grown guy wandering over thin ice in RGs original post.  Firefighters rushing into a building to save folks is heroic (not Darwin).  Pyros setting a fire and getting trapped inside is.

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1 minute ago, Razors Edge said:

:needpics:

I don't have pics, but I have another fun story about Gail and my friend John.  Neither John nor I really liked or ever really wanted to hang out with Gail, she would just inflict herself on us and I have previously mentioned that she was a trainwreck.

John was at my dorm visiting, we were going to go out and have some beers a bit later after we had some beer in the room.  We'd already had a couple beers each when Gail suddenly burst into the room (she lived on the floor above me, remember?) and wanted to know if we would go to the cafeteria together.  We said no, we are gonna have some more beer in the room and then go out later and womanize (the womanizing part was so she wouldn't invite herself to come with).  She shrugs and tossed her keys on the desk because she didn't want to carry them if we were gonna hang around until she got back.

My buddy John was a bit of a practical joker, so of course as soon as Gail is out the door, he grabs her keys and decides to go to her room and rearrange all the furniture or somesuch.  I come along to offer spiritual guidance. 

We were gonna move everything around but then we see her camera, so we had to take pics mooning the camera.  This is hilarious for us, of course.  While doing this, John sees a pack of her cigarettes and pretty much starts dying laughing.  I asked what he was laughing about and it was literally minutes before he calmed down enough to talk.

He finally was able to get out the words "Only assholes smoke" and started up laughing again.  I am still holding the camera, and while I was wondering what was going to happen, he grabbed a cigarette out of her pack and stuck the butt end of a cigarette into his butt end while repeating "Only assholes smoke"  I am taking pictures of this process with Gail's camera, mind you, and I was also laughing hysterically.

We finish by putting the cigarette back in the pack, and I take a pic of this while it is happening.  We decided not to tell Gail about all of this, but let her get the pics developed and figure it out.  We came back down to my room and had more beer until Gail came and picked up her keys and then we went out drinking, not letting on about events at all.   18 year-olds are idiots, and this is kind of what they do when they are drinking, you see.

She was pissed when she developed the film and saw the photos a few weeks later, but we smoothed things over by buying her film and some beer.  She didn't come back for her sophomore year because her grades sucked, but then went to some other school and apparently got her shit together the next year.

The end.

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I nearly fell through ice on a frozen stream/small river.  We were on a winter field problem and had to complete a land nav course. We figured we could cut at least a mile by crossing a surely frozen stream as opposed walking to the bridge & crossing then doubling back. 

It was maybe 15’ across & I didn’t think it was a good idea but we stripped our rucks, one guy crosses just fine, we slide the rucks across and then the other guy goes.  As I start to cross we hear a loud “crack” so I haul ass across and do crash through in about 6” of water a few feet from the other bank.  

I had spare socks in my ruck so changed them and was good for the rest of the course.

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I am a bit conflicted about step one.

"Do not breathe in the water".  This one's easy, just to be sure, I practice this in the summer when there is no ice.  In the water, hold my breath, out of the water, breathe.

Now the next line - do I have to resist the urge to breathe for 1-3 minutes?  Will I still but in the water?  Or do they mean, in the water with my head out of the water, in which case, remembering step one, I stop breathing the whole time until they pry my cold dead beard off the ice.

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18 hours ago, 12string said:

I am a bit conflicted about step one.

"Do not breathe in the water".  This one's easy, just to be sure, I practice this in the summer when there is no ice.  In the water, hold my breath, out of the water, breathe.

Now the next line - do I have to resist the urge to breathe for 1-3 minutes?  Will I still but in the water?  Or do they mean, in the water with my head out of the water, in which case, remembering step one, I stop breathing the whole time until they pry my cold dead beard off 

The immediate physiological response to immersion in cold water is what is referred to as the 'cold shock reponse', a sudden and violent exhalation followed by short gasps for air which if not controlled can lead to hyperventilating and unconsciousness.  What they are saying is resist the urge when you enter the water to do that gasp while still submerged because a somewhat involuntary inhalation will follow.  Inhalation of even as little as 10cc of water will cause increased mucus production in the lungs and coughing all which affect the gas exchange at the alveolar level, resulting in less oxygen getting to the muscles and decreased ability to self rescue

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