History of Altitude Diving

[John C. Ratliff]

The full referenced article is attached (the poor quality scan is what is available on the web, I didn't make it). It was quite the expedition.

Having the divers attempt to get used the cold water by having them do surface swims on days prior to the dive with either no protection or just a wetsuit seems a highly questionable practice. Was this once common?

Not to my knowledge.

SeaRat

 

[shurite7]

Having the divers attempt to get used the cold water by having them do surface swims on days prior to the dive with either no protection or just a wetsuit seems a highly questionable practice. Was this once common?

I am not aware if this was common practice anywhere. I do remember reading about people diving the Andrea Doria doing things such as holding their hands in a bowl of water with ice cubes in it and taking cold showers to become accustomed or learn to deal with the cold.

While I was in the navy I was told you never get used to the cold, but you can get used to being cold. Another person stated you don’t have to like cold water, you just have to learn to tolerate it.

 

[lowwall]

he cold water acclimation reference in the Pangong Lake paper is to a 1985 PhD thesis by D Murdoch: "COLD ACCLIMATION IN A HYPERBARIC ENVIRONMENT"

I don't have access to the full text (if anyone has FSU digital access privileges, it's at On-campus access only | DigiNole ), but there is a partial description (ellipses in original):

Eight members of the research diving community in Tallahassee, Florida were volunteers for this project to determine if there was an acclimation effect due to repeated cold exposures in water 18(DEGREES)C at two atmosphere of pressure...
The divers performed three 30 minute dives per week for two weeks wearing bathing suits and diving the Kirby Morgan Band Mask (KMB). Each diver completed series of pre- and post-acclimation tests in a cold water bath at 25(DEGREES)C, ...
A significant decrease was seen in MST and MBT at the shivering threshold between the pre- and post-acclimation cold water bath exposure test and cold air exposure test. No difference was seen in the thermoregulatory Vo(, 2) at the...
There was an acclimation effect from the two week diving exposure in cold water evidenced by an decrease in shivering threshold, a reduction in post-dive finger temperature, and an enhanced feeling of well being by the divers over the..."

Sounds unpleasant enough. But taking this and trying to apply it to a high altitude lake with 3 degree C water is a special brand of stupidity.