WATER SURVIVAL-”Sinkers and Floaters”
October 22nd, 2009 | Photography | Posted by Erik Hildebrandt
As it turns out, the pool does not care if you’re a fast-track Captain or a newly minted Petty Officer. Once you’re in the water, there are only two kinds of people; sinkers and floaters. Luckily, like a lot of people, I was born a water-baby. Since the first time I was required to complete this training, it has been a little like running the obstacle course in gym. However, there is a portion of this training that will challenge even the strongest of swimmers and push you to the brink of panic: Drown Proofing.
Back in the day, drown proofing was a sort of filter exercise that would weed-out weaker swimmers. The modern approach to this exercise is to familiarize air crew members with the techniques and equipment that they will need to stay alive. Even without the extended 15 minutes of “drown-proofing” after swimming 3 lengths of the pool, there is still plenty of stamina required to complete this event.
After suiting up in a complete complement of flight gear, including steel toed boots and full torso harness with survival vest, candidates are required to swim 2 lengths of the pool single file. The course follows several floating balls and winds up in the deep-well of the pool where you then need to demonstrate a technique for prolonged dorwn-proofing. This is essentially a dead-man’s float where only the top of your head should be visible on the surface as you hold your breath and minimize movement. Don’t forget, you are already out of breath from the swimming, and staying on the surface is a lot harder than it sounds. With all of your gear, even floaters are dragged toward the bottom. And sinkers are very close to panic.
IF you are able to demonstrate this technique with some measure of control, you are cleared by the instructors to manually inflate your “horse-collar” life preserver. For some, the vicious cycle of gasping for air, then trying to calmly stay near the surface catches up to them and eventually they are no longer able to stay on the surface. Obviously, there are safety swimmers in the pool at all times, and as you will see in these photos, more than a few candidates are given assistance to the side of the pool. The sinkers are allowed to continue with the rest of the training, but are required to reattempt this portion at the end of the day. Virtually all are eventually successful since the idea is to train them in the techniques of water survival, not screen them for a certain level of performance.
After all, the best fighter pilot in the Navy may not be a natural floater.
EROK
Comments
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Erik Hildebrandt Says:
October 23rd, 2009 at 8:38 amLike I said, for someone who is comfortable in the water, getting to do the “devices” is great fun, especially when you are actually half-way proficient. In the next post, I will put up the “night-storm” photos, which was an incredible experience to go through.
EROK