[HN Gopher] Drowning Doesn't Look Like Drowning (2013)
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Drowning Doesn't Look Like Drowning (2013)
        
       Author : matthewsinclair
       Score  : 159 points
       Date   : 2021-07-28 14:56 UTC (4 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (slate.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (slate.com)
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | lsllc wrote:
       | From 2013, but still highly relevant and something all adults
       | should be aware of.
        
         | abfan1127 wrote:
         | this type of training should accompany CPR training, something
         | all adults should know also.
        
           | SavantIdiot wrote:
           | The last time I took CPR certification the instructor said it
           | shouldn't be taught anymore because it is essentially useless
           | in day-to-day life. The speed at which the brain dies without
           | immediate hospital attention is just too rapid for CPR to be
           | effective outside of a hospital.
           | 
           | EDIT: I'm not lying, I was literally told this by the person
           | performing the certifications. She said only 1 in 20 people
           | survive without severe brain damage. Which is better than
           | death to some people I guess.
        
             | lsllc wrote:
             | According to the American Heart Association [0], CPR can
             | double or triple the chances of survival:
             | 
             |  _" Each year nationwide, more than 350,000 people suffer a
             | cardiac arrest outside of a hospital; only about 10 percent
             | survive.
             | 
             | When the heart stops beating, a lack of oxygenated blood
             | can cause death within minutes. If CPR is performed
             | immediately, it can keep blood flowing to the brain and
             | other vital organs, doubling or tripling a person's chance
             | of survival."_
             | 
             | [0] https://www.heart.org/en/news/2018/08/22/cpr-training-
             | at-sch...
        
               | choeger wrote:
               | Counter example: Danish captain at the Euro 2020 opening
               | game.
        
               | pdovy wrote:
               | Not to mention that AED's are more prevalent in public
               | spaces these days. If you can provide CPR _and_ use the
               | AED the chances of survival increase dramatically.
        
               | [deleted]
        
             | willyt wrote:
             | That sounds like nonsense and it's certainly not what I've
             | been taught when I've taken advanced first aid courses.
             | It's true that the statistics are not on your side in that
             | the CPR has only a 1 in 5 chance of being successful and
             | that is if you start immediately after the persons heart
             | stops, but that's no reason not to try it.
             | 
             | Recently, an acquaintance of mine was saved by two of his
             | employees who performed CPR on him for 30 mins until the
             | ambulance arrived. He was very lucky to have collapsed in
             | front of them and that they had both been in the army and
             | had good first aid medical. He was hospitalised for 3 weeks
             | and he has memory problems now, but he's out of bed and
             | there for his kids.
        
               | [deleted]
        
       | lamontcg wrote:
       | There's a video out there of three Indian guys who filmed
       | themselves drowning when they went swimming in a pool of water.
       | Most people seem to think it looks fake/staged. I won't bother
       | linking to it, but I'm sure google can turn it up if you go
       | looking.
        
       | gamegoblin wrote:
       | So, at the risk of doing the SV "how can we ML this" thing, this
       | seems like a pretty good opportunity to apply computer vision.
       | I'm sure OpenAI or Deepmind or whoever could build a lot of good
       | will by training such a model and freely distributing it.
       | 
       | I'm sure it will be tricky due to lack of training data, though.
       | 
       | You could maybe even do this without an end-to-end ML system, and
       | just use ML to do the head+arms detection, and then do a rules-
       | based approach to determine the drowning status. This is probably
       | much more tractable and doesn't have the lack of training data.
        
         | bigmattystyles wrote:
         | Yes we can - and what people miss, you don't have to be ML only
         | or Human only - it can be Human lifeguard augmented by ML,
         | especially at places like beaches where the horizon to scan is
         | much larger. I suppose the danger is of the human becoming
         | complacent.
         | 
         | As far as training data, if we know what it looks like, we can
         | create virtual scenes that simulate different conditions and
         | scenarios and train on that. Obviously, it won't be perfect but
         | if it gets deployed, we can start getting more real life data
         | and augment the training on that.
         | 
         | Not for lifeguards, but I've always imagined a future vision
         | system that would track me in my lap swim workout. At the end,
         | it would tell me my stats, length swam, times, stroke done
         | (with count) and maybe even down the line coaching my form.
        
         | MattGaiser wrote:
         | There is apparently a company doing this already:
         | 
         | https://swimeye.com/
        
           | [deleted]
        
         | gentleman11 wrote:
         | Strongly agreed in theory, but...
         | 
         | That goodwill ends when the company is found to be uploading
         | all footage to the cloud to evaluate everyone's physical
         | fitness and body shape for future insurance company use, and to
         | build a picture of your social web for Facebook one day, and
         | heck, whatever else people will pay to know, including to serve
         | warrants against other people incorrectly identified by other
         | ml systems as commuting some crime
         | 
         | I'll become 100x more pro-machine vision once severe laws get
         | made to restrict how it's used.
        
       | andrewem wrote:
       | The author of this has some videos related to swimming (0). See
       | for example the one called "1-10-1 Final" where he jumps into
       | cold water that is about 40 degrees F (4 degrees C) and stays in
       | for a number of minutes, showing what to do.
       | 
       | [0] https://vimeo.com/mariovittone
        
       | seriousquestion wrote:
       | What an odd title. Drowning does look like drowning. How could it
       | be any other way, given that it's involuntary?
        
       | opium_tea wrote:
       | I've seen this as an LPT or similar posted on Reddit. I think it
       | helped save a life in the New Year pre-pandemic.
       | 
       | I'd stopped at a picnic location near a rocky Atlantic (European)
       | coastline with my partner. It was a picturesque location but the
       | sea was inhospitable - huge swell and waves that just looked
       | violent. We'd sat down at a bench with a view of the sea and set
       | out our lunch. At some point after that I noticed two people in
       | the sea, maybe 30-50m out. They were bobbing about in the swell.
       | Initially I was confused. It didn't look right but my mind tried
       | to make explanations - maybe the locals just swim out there in
       | crazy conditions? After some time it became clear that they were
       | in trouble, I guess that's when the "drowning doesn't look like
       | drowning" advice came to me. Luckily the beach (tiny strip of
       | sand between cliffs) had a well-labelled sign with an emergency
       | number that I called and managed to ask for an English speaker
       | and described the situation.
       | 
       | Whilst waiting for the response one of the people in the water
       | started trying to tow the other towards shore but made no
       | progress. They kept disappearing behind large waves and at some
       | point I could only pick out one of them, then I saw a pair of
       | shoes or sandals floating then I saw the other person face down
       | in the water, occasionally visible behind the swell. There was
       | some dithering where a local official came to the beach to check
       | out the report but eventually we heard helicopters and one person
       | was rescued and the body of the other recovered.
       | 
       | It turned out there was a group of three tourists, two sons
       | (teenage/early 20s) and their dad. A local had taken them to a
       | fishing spot - a flat rock that spanned out towards the sea close
       | to water level. A large wave had washed the dad and one of his
       | sons out to sea. The dad died. I witnessed the other son - who
       | hadn't been washed out to sea - being interviewed by police, as
       | utterly distraught as i've ever seen a person, understandably.
       | 
       | Looking back on it I should have realised the severity of the
       | situation sooner but perhaps without this advice I would have
       | left it too late and neither would have made it.
        
       | MarkMarine wrote:
       | One thing I learned in naval aviator swim qual was how easy it is
       | to float for a very long time, given the right technique. (Called
       | a dead man's float. Link: https://www.sportsrec.com/prone-
       | float-8623477.html )
       | 
       | We naturally try to swim with our heavy head out of the water,
       | but with full lungs most people will easily float for almost an
       | unlimited amount of time, only popping your head up for a breath.
       | Somehow, the more nervous you are, the more you struggle to keep
       | your head out of the water. Learning that I could float like this
       | for hours if needed keeps me calm in the water, I recommend you
       | all try it, and keep it in mind to fall back on if you ever start
       | to panic in the water.
        
         | Rapzid wrote:
         | I grew up on lakes in Florida. I wasn't taught to "swim" as
         | much as I was taught to survive in water.
         | 
         | Swim classes should be reframed as water survival classes IMHO.
        
       | Confiks wrote:
       | If you want to try yourself if you can identify drowning, there's
       | this great educational 'game':
       | 
       | http://spotthedrowningchild.com
       | 
       | It's pretty hard to spot it before your hear the lifeguard
       | blowing their whistle. Turns out [1] that the game was actually
       | inspired by a HN thread on the same article in 2015 [2].
       | 
       | [1] https://github.com/FrankSalad/spot-the-drowning-child
       | 
       | [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9947237
        
         | MattGaiser wrote:
         | It seems easy to spot once you see the first one, but it really
         | just looks like a child bobbing up and down until then.
        
         | ineedasername wrote:
         | > _http://spotthedrowningchild.com_
         | 
         | Wow, even _knowing_ there would be someone in danger, I didn 't
         | spot until, at best, the lifeguard jumped in and usually a
         | little after that. And they didn't know something bad was about
         | to happen, and had to be scanning the entire pool constantly. I
         | should have had a few seconds of advantage on that at least.
         | 
         | I think I would be terrified to have a job like that... 99.99%
         | of the time everything is fine, which would make it hard to
         | maintain constant vigilance when you might go multiple days
         | without an incident. while needing to be prepared for that
         | extremely small window of crisis.
        
           | Natsu wrote:
           | After you watch enough videos, you learn to look for kids
           | doing unsafe things (e.g. climbing on flotation devices) to
           | spot things ahead of time. Sure, you learn what drowning
           | looks like, but if you watch, the lifeguards often react
           | _instantly_ which means they predicted that person would get
           | themselves in trouble ahead of time and reacted as soon as
           | the person went under.
           | 
           | I got a lot better at it after a little bit of practice and
           | most of the improvement was figuring out who was doing
           | dangerous things that you needed to keep an eye on.
        
         | bruiseralmighty wrote:
         | I used to be a lifeguard. I am glad I never had to deal with a
         | pool like that with so many people and inner tubes in it. Makes
         | line of sight so much more difficult.
        
         | dgfitz wrote:
         | When I was a lifeguard we forbade floats. They're lifeguard-
         | resistant deathtraps.
        
           | BuildTheRobots wrote:
           | Because of people getting trapped underneath?
        
             | tj-teej wrote:
             | Because you can't see underneath, a pool is 3D and if we
             | can only see the surface we're missing the most dangerous
             | part.
        
           | jdavis703 wrote:
           | This is why jobs like lifeguard or airport security
           | frequently rotate workers during a shift.
        
         | dgan wrote:
         | Watching these videos make me extremely emotional :( I had no
         | idea that's how drowning looks,
         | 
         | I am also scared of water, so I guess (?) I am safe on that..
        
         | spywaregorilla wrote:
         | I was a lifeguard and I never felt very confident in it tbh.
         | But I do win this "game" every time. So... idk, what that says.
        
           | codetrotter wrote:
           | Sounds like a good mentality for a lifeguard I think,
           | probably keeps you alert. And combined with the fact that you
           | are good at spotting drowning people means that you really
           | are a good fit for the job.
        
           | ineedasername wrote:
           | I think that's the only way I could do this job, if I was
           | pretty much constantly terrified I might miss something,
           | never comfortable, not at all. That has to be a hard state of
           | mind to maintain when you might go a fairly long time in
           | between crisis.
        
         | secondcoming wrote:
         | Those inflatable tubes can't help a lifeguard's view of the
         | pool.
        
           | tstrimple wrote:
           | No, but they help my gaming mindset. The majority of the
           | issues arose when someone fell off of a tube in water too
           | deep for them, so that's what I optimized for. I'd probably
           | be a terrible life guard but I do just fine at the "game"
           | version.
        
             | Natsu wrote:
             | I'm pretty sure this is what most of the guards were
             | watching for, too. Quite often they react instantly once
             | someone goes under, so you know they had an eye on the kid
             | climbing on top of their tube before that.
        
       | okareaman wrote:
       | After watching the videos around the time this article came out,
       | I spotted a man drowning in the ocean. I was on a cliff looking
       | down at some tourists not familiar with the ocean. I couldn't get
       | down to him or make myself heard to shout a warning. Fortunately,
       | he pulled out of it and got to shore. It was the most helpless I
       | ever felt.
        
       | srean wrote:
       | I continue to be amazed by what lifeguards can do.
       | 
       | Even if drowning looked like drowning there is just so much going
       | on in a crowded pool I cannot imagine how people can pick on
       | anything. To me it seems like an audio-visual version of drinking
       | from a firehose.
       | 
       | If I was in their place the best strategy that I could conceive
       | of adopting would be to a for loop checking each one out, and
       | perhaps dwelling a little longer on those who I think maybe
       | particularly susceptible. But this would be a terrible strategy,
       | too easy to miss someone, too much latency in revisit time.
       | 
       | So a hat tip to all lifeguards on HN, deeply appreciate your
       | work.
        
       | wkearney99 wrote:
       | We had our 9mo child take 'Infant Swim Rescue' courses, basically
       | anti-drowning lessons. The concern being the waters near us are
       | cloudy and it'd be impossible to see someone if they went under.
       | Classes went well.
       | 
       | At a neighbors party a 2.5yo fell into the pool. I saw it
       | happening and the little girl just SANK LIKE A STONE. With a
       | panicked look on her face. Little feet hit the bottom, let out a
       | blurp of air and did nothing. Her Dad was already in the air
       | diving into the water before I could get up. The child was fine,
       | thankfully. Her folks immediately asked about the classes I'd
       | mentioned before.
       | 
       | I can still see the complete bewilderment on that child's face.
       | She just had NO IDEA what to do and would have drowned had it not
       | been for quick actions.
       | 
       | My point here is lessons are absolutely worth considering
       | starting MUCH earlier than you might guess. This isn't learning
       | to 'swim', it's learning how 'not to drown'.
        
       | ChrisArchitect wrote:
       | (2010)! (it's a republish)
       | 
       | Some previous discussions of this old piece resubmitted often by
       | usual suspects:
       | 
       |  _11 years ago_ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1492835
       | 
       |  _6 years ago_ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9947237
       | 
       |  _5 years ago_ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11667755
       | 
       |  _3 years ago_ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17170593
        
         | ineedasername wrote:
         | _resubmitted often by usual suspects_
         | 
         | Do you mean you think they were posting/reposting things purely
         | for upvotes? If so, I still don't care: As something both
         | interesting & important, popping up on the front page seems
         | like a good thing every few years. I don't care is @tomte or
         | whoever is doing it just to get meaningless internet points.
         | Different people rotate in & out of HN, so anything really
         | interetsing/important is just fine by me if it keeps popping
         | up.
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | oalders wrote:
       | On a swim safety note, if you're going to be swimming in open
       | water, I highly recommend getting yourself a swim buoy for
       | visibility. You can also use it to stash your phone, keys, etc if
       | you've got a dry bag. https://outdoorswimmer.com/product-
       | reviews/tow-floats-and-dr...
        
         | alex_anglin wrote:
         | Thank you for sharing. I wasn't aware these existed and am
         | already looking at getting one. As others in the discussion
         | have noted, it doesn't a lot of depth or distance for bad
         | things to happen.
        
           | oalders wrote:
           | They're handy to have. I think most of them are technically
           | not life saving devices, but you can use them for a bit of
           | extra flotation if you need them. They're handy to rest your
           | head on if you're taking a break and hopefully they make you
           | more visible to other traffic on the water. If you're
           | swimming with buddies it helps them to see where you are at
           | in the water, especially if you're farther apart or if the
           | water isn't flat.
           | 
           | I'll sometimes swim with a group at sunrise. We swim out
           | about 750m from shore. Having the buoys helps us see where
           | the other swimmers are at and ensure that everyone is safe.
           | Also, if the swimmers ahead of you have good lines and
           | they're sighting on the same thing as you are, you can be a
           | bit lazy and just follow their buoys instead of having to
           | pick out a landmark on the horizon.
           | 
           | You can even put an LED inside of some of them to get a bit
           | of extra visibility depending on conditions. Lots of options!
        
             | s5300 wrote:
             | >We swim out about 750m from shore.
             | 
             | Yeesh, this for some reason invokes a likely unreasonable
             | bit of fear in me. I completely understand sucking it up
             | and getting over things if money is involved (like working
             | on a crab boat in the Bering Sea), but that far out for
             | leisure activity spooks me.
             | 
             | I was always a pretty good swimmer and had my lifeguard
             | license for a bit as a teen through boyscouts activities.
             | I've always been aware of risks of open water and riptides
             | and how to deal with them... for as long as I can remember.
             | 
             | However, a few years back now at Blacks Beach in La Jolla
             | (reputation of the best yet most dangerous surf in
             | California AFAIK), in a normal beachbspot I'd spent a lot
             | of time around away from the surf, I mind bogglingly got
             | hit by an outlier of a wave out of nowhere in otherwise
             | calm waters, close to shore. I had prescription glasses on
             | with no safety, stupid, but I'd had no plans of being in
             | anything higher than my low waist, and only for a short
             | while.
             | 
             | Glasses got knocked off (I'm really near sighted without +
             | severe static vision), wave brought me down under to the
             | sand, and I was pulled out by the most insane force. I'm a
             | mechanical engineer, so well aware of the sheer insanity of
             | the forces involved with bodies of water and currents, but
             | it was just an unreal and out of nowhere rip.
             | 
             | Got myself quickly situated and calm but internally scared
             | as all fuck, was pulled out probably 1.5 miles by the time
             | I swam out of the rip. Swimming back in was hell because I
             | was mostly physically exerted from hiking already.
             | 
             | Nobody noticed what had happened and there wasn't a damn
             | thing anybody could've really done about it either.
             | 
             | Not too sure why I felt the need to write this out... but
             | stay safe. I can only want to get my swimming done in a
             | pool at this point, unless I'm around highly competent
             | lifeguards with boats and rescue equipment (I'm sure
             | there's a chance you are perhaps around boats when doing
             | this?). Just so much that can go wrong so fast.
        
       | krumpet wrote:
       | Something else that is important to mention is that young kids
       | can easily slip into a pool or jacuzzi and not make a sound. We
       | might think we would hear a "splash!", but that isn't necessarily
       | true.
       | 
       | I watched my daughter step of the ledge in a jacuzzi once and it
       | was completely silent. One second she was walking and the next
       | she was under water.
       | 
       | Keep your eyes on young children near water at all times. If they
       | are really young and can't yet swim, either be with them or have
       | them wear an approved flotation device. Going under can happen in
       | a split second when your back is turned.
        
       | zengineer wrote:
       | This article actually "saved my life". I read it back then in
       | 2013 and in 2014 I almost drowned.
       | 
       | Just before I felt that something was very wrong I remembered
       | that this post said that if you drown it is already too late to
       | scream for help. So I shout to my friend, who was also with me in
       | the water, that I am about to drown. He then tried to help me but
       | then he struggled too because of the current and the strong waves
       | which came out of nowhere. It took us a lot of effort to get back
       | to a point where we were able to stand. Until today I try to
       | avoid to go deeper than I can actually stand.
        
       | March_f6 wrote:
       | As someone who recently almost drowned a couple weeks ago this
       | article is spookily accurate. I was surprised how indifferent
       | everyone on the shore was when a wave finally coughed me up onto
       | the sand. My only assumption, post stress headache, was that it
       | just didn't look like I was drowning.
        
         | libria wrote:
         | What was the cause of duress? Undertow? Fatigue? Inexperienced
         | swimmer?
        
           | March_f6 wrote:
           | I suspect it was a mix of a couple things. Here's how it
           | went: 1. I exhausted myself to a fair degree when I first
           | swam out in order to get past the point at which the waves
           | were breaking. Once I was in a calm area I began to rest and
           | catch my breath. 2. I began to feel what I can only describe
           | as a slight panic attack when I noticed that the current was
           | behaving slightly like a rip (a current pushing away from the
           | shore). 3. The cold temp of the water mixed with the newfound
           | anxiety and my exhaustion began to make me feel shorter and
           | shorter of breath. 4. At this point I was in full panic mode
           | and started using all of my energy to get back to the shore
           | or at least to the point at which the waves were breaking to
           | carry me in.
           | 
           | So I think in general you could categorize it as an
           | inexperienced swimmer because I couldn't spot the rip from
           | the shore but I don't think its always so obvious since even
           | a small one could carry you away.
        
             | meepmorp wrote:
             | Yeah, never fight the rip tide, you won't win. Move
             | laterally - rip currents are usually narrow, and you can
             | swim out of them sideways. The lack of control, though, is
             | freaky and unsettling.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | drucik wrote:
       | Article seems to be spot on - it's good to remind people about it
       | once in a while.
       | 
       | When I was a kid I jumped into a semi-empty pool, where depth was
       | more or less equal to my total height. Bad judgment on my part. I
       | couldn't swim so all I could do was bouncing of the bottom,
       | gasping for air with each bounce. That was the only thing I could
       | think of doing. Lifeguard was there but he didn't notice drowning
       | kid, nor did people around me in the pool. Fortunately my father
       | was more aware, and jumped in, fully clothed, to drag me out. I
       | don't remember if it lasted 30 seconds or 2 minutes but I do
       | remember the scared face of the 'lifeguard' when we were walking
       | past him.
       | 
       | edit:grammar, at least what I've noticed
        
       | devoutsalsa wrote:
       | When I was in the army, one of my roommates drowned right in
       | front of a bunch of people he was swimming with. He was in about
       | 3 meters of water, got a leg cramp, went under, and never came
       | back up. I found him face down on the bottom of the lake with his
       | face in the mud. He was later declared dead. Took a while to get
       | over that.
        
         | Rendello wrote:
         | My mother was a lifeguard and was swimming in a medium-sized
         | empty pool surrounded by other lifeguards (her colleagues). Her
         | leg cramped badly and she went under, she said the pain of
         | trying to move was unbearable. She crumpled up at the bottom of
         | the pool and nearly drowned before her one of her fellow
         | lifeguards noticed something was wrong and saved her.
         | 
         | That story's always stuck in my head.
        
         | EvanAnderson wrote:
         | This topic has come up on HN several times before and it never
         | ceases to unsettle me. I'd never had a personal experience with
         | it before. It's even more chilling after having had an
         | experience with it.
         | 
         | My 8 y/o daughter recently attended a "pool party" w/ sports
         | teammates. One of the mothers, fully clothed and there only
         | acting as a chaperon, jumped in to pull out one of the girls
         | who was in distress.
         | 
         | The distressed girl's mother had commented, just a few moments
         | before, on how the girl was "fine" and "just playing" as she
         | flailed about in the water. My wife said the girl didn't look
         | to be in distress, per se, but was kind of "jumping around".
         | 
         | I found out later that the mother who rescued the girl she'd
         | been a lifeguard. She recognized the girl was in distress.
         | There were 8 to 10 other adults present and no one else, in or
         | out of the pool, was thinking too much of it. It's absolutely
         | chilling.
        
           | Natsu wrote:
           | The problem is that drowning looks _exactly_ like someone
           | just  "jumping" in place in the pool. If you don't know what
           | to look for, you might not realize what's going on, but for
           | anyone who knows, it should rightfully set off alarm bells.
           | 
           | I hope someone sends the parent this game so they can learn
           | without having a dead kid :(
        
         | leaveyou wrote:
         | I'm a very amateur swimmer and I try to understand why people
         | drown from cramp in one leg? Because me being a novice, I
         | learned how to swim without using the legs too much (mainly
         | because it takes skill to coordinate everything well) and one
         | of the very first things was me floating by turning my head
         | hard backwards while standing vertically in the water and
         | sinking in water up to the nose, basically sticking as little
         | of my face above water as possible and IIRC I was floating fine
         | with very little help from hands and no use of the feet at all.
         | That seemed easy, especially in dense cold water..
        
           | Rendello wrote:
           | My lifeguard mother almost drowned from a leg cramp (see my
           | sibling comment), she explained that the pain of movement
           | becomes so unbearable that your body basically goes into the
           | fetal position and sinks to the bottom.
        
           | MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
           | I occasionally wake up from extreme leg cramps. It literally
           | feels like someone is taking a knife on the serrated edge and
           | pulling it down from the top of your calf muscle for a solid
           | 20 seconds. All you can do is writhe in agony and scrounge up
           | into a ball because naturally that is your response. After
           | it's over you're in a ton of fatigue, your heart is racing,
           | and just want to rest. Now do that in a pool.
        
             | treeman79 wrote:
             | Used to get that a lot. Leg once cramped super hard which
             | smashed my knee into a metal railing. Double agony that
             | night.                 Magnesium supplements really helped
             | a lot. Later on, stretching lots and lots of stretching.
             | Now a massage gun.  Cramps are a thing of the past.
        
             | MisterTea wrote:
             | I get those in bed from time to time and my course of
             | action is to keep the leg strait during the onset, get out
             | of bed and stand up stretching the leg muscle. The pain can
             | be very intense but once I stand up and apply pressure by
             | standing on the leg, it almost immediately stops the cramp
             | and the pain subsides within a few seconds.
             | 
             | I used to let the leg contract and curl up powering through
             | the cramp pain until it subsided but a few times it lasted
             | over a minute which is agonizing.
        
             | leaveyou wrote:
             | Ok, I understand.. it seems I had milder versions of
             | cramps. The one I remember the most was when I basically
             | had to grab the toes of my foot and pull hard counter to
             | the cramping muscle and basically it ceased after several
             | seconds. It was very painful but I didn't know they can be
             | paralyzing.
        
               | kibwen wrote:
               | This kind of extreme cramp is known as a "charley horse",
               | if you want more information.
        
           | em-bee wrote:
           | it doesn't take much movement to get a cramp. the few times
           | that i had a cramp, i was doing things like getting out of
           | bed or standing up from a chair. horribly painful and the
           | only thing you can do is to stop moving and try to relax.
           | 
           | if you do that in the water, you sink. by the time you
           | realize that this was a bad idea it's to late. i can imagine
           | that the pain would distract me to much to be able to focus
           | and use my arms to keep me afloat. never mind that i'd
           | probably also not think about taking a deep breath to get
           | enough air before sinking.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | lazyant wrote:
       | Also: stay away from low head dams
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsYgODmmiAM
        
       | soco wrote:
       | It's incredible how much text there's about it and zarroh video
       | material. So difficult to hire an actor and show us dummies how
       | drowning _does_ look like? There 's enough CPR videos, thanks a
       | lot for them, yet about drowning just blah and confusing
       | animations. </angryrant>
        
         | cycomanic wrote:
         | Look at the post further up were a poster pointed to
         | http://spotthedrowningchild.com/ which uses videos.
        
           | soco wrote:
           | I'm missing the explanatory, clear, close-up videos. The
           | gamea with a pixel-wide kid somewhere in the background would
           | then work to check on that learning.
        
         | canniballectern wrote:
         | Here's another comment with some excellent demonstration video:
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27984716
        
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