da submarine suit

[DANAUISOLDER]

hello DR decompression a couple of weeks ago there was a documentary on discovery channel(in NZ) that was focused on submarines and their activity when they brought to light for me the submarine suit which was used in case of an emergency to get seamen/soldiers, or what ever they are called, back to the surface, now what bothered me or what i could not understand, was that the commentator said that the suit sends the person back to the surface at a whoppin 200 plus meters a min he than said that this ascent rate was infact to fast to get bent, can you offer any explanation on this

thank you MR MIKE(danauisoldier)

 

[MonkSeal]

hello DR decompression a couple of weeks ago there was a documentary on discovery channel(in NZ) that was focused on submarines and their activity when they brought to light for me the submarine suit which was used in case of an emergency to get seamen/soldiers, or what ever they are called, back to the surface, now what bothered me or what i could not understand, was that the commentator said that the suit sends the person back to the surface at a whoppin 200 plus meters a min he than said that this ascent rate was infact to fast to get bent, can you offer any explanation on this

thank you MR MIKE(danauisoldier)

The submarine crew doesn't take compressed air, so there's no disolved gas in body. Suit is probably constructed as hard suit i.e. like mini submarine.

 

[Phaethon]

Is this what you saw?

Inventor Phil Nuytten of Vancouver has developed a "personal pressure suit" he calls the Exosuit, which, he insists, can be packaged in a 40- by 76-cm cylinder—small enough to be stored aboard a sub, one per crewman. One problem with external rescue, Nuytten explains, is that a sunken sub almost inevitably "pressurizes" as water creeps in; with no power for pumps to purge it, the water compresses what air is left aboard. "The guys inside are saturating to that pressure," Nuytten explains, "and if you try to pull them out into a 1-atmosphere [surface-pressure] system, they'll die of massive bends."

Nuytten's Exosuits have two-way joint seams that, he claims, withstand both external pressure from the depths and, when the escaping submariner rises to shallower water, internal pressure from whatever psi load the crewman has had to charge the suit with aboard a sunken sub. "When you come to the surface, an automatic controller depressurizes the suit in stages," Nuytten says. He says he's done a feasibility study for the Navy, but the Navy's position on the Exosuit echoes that of NASA regarding the shuttle. "It would be a great idea," says Orr, "but when you look at how much space you're dedicating to it and how much value you're getting from it, our position is that you don't get that much."

K.

 

[Dr Deco]

Hello DANAUISOLDER:

Escape Suits

The only units with which I am familiar are those that total enclose the submariner in a flexible suit. The man stands in an escape chamber that is pressurized in a few seconds (very few). The man then exits the submarine and ascends to the surface. I understand that this rate is 100 feet/min. Because the total time under increased pressure is only a few minutes, the risk for DCS is small. The depth is limited to about 500 feet by this method since the expose during ascent will determine the on gassing and determine the depth limit.

Pressurized Subs

This is a very serious problem since leaking water will slowly pressurize the sub and result in considerable on gassing in the submariners. The problem with rescuer is that it must be performed under pressure and the crew returned to a pressurized environment. This can be a logistical nightmare if there are many survivors in the submerged ship.

Dr Deco :doctor:

 

[Don Burke]

hello DR decompression a couple of weeks ago there was a documentary on discovery channel(in NZ) that was focused on submarines and their activity when they brought to light for me the submarine suit which was used in case of an emergency to get seamen/soldiers, or what ever they are called, back to the surface, now what bothered me or what i could not understand, was that the commentator said that the suit sends the person back to the surface at a whoppin 200 plus meters a min he than said that this ascent rate was infact to fast to get bent, can you offer any explanation on this

thank you MR MIKE(danauisoldier)

Submarine escape procedures are written to allow less time under pressure as the escape depth gets deeper. I don't recall the numbers as it has been quite a while. I do remember that below about four hundred feet, escape without getting bent is nearly impossible. I suspect this is what the suit you are referring to is supposed to do.

Rescuing submariners from a partially flooded ship is a problem. The current U.S. procedure is to go ahead and bend the people and treat them as soon as possible.

Other countries have spent quite a bit of time and money on rescue vehicles with chambers built in. Since a pressurized rescue involves getting a lot of very large and heavy equipment to a remote site in a hurry, it may not be worth the trouble to design and build something that can't get to the site in time anyway.

 

[Jeddah Aquanaut]

I seem to recall reading about a sort of escape apparatus in Tom Clancy's "Submarine," a non-fiction account of modern submarines. It was called the Steinke hood. There was not a picture, so I don't know more than that, except to say that when the submariner gets into the escape trunk, he somehow charges it with enough air to be able to surface from a max depth of around 400ft.