What is the Physiology of the Cartoon Helium Voices being left on my Voice Mail?

[Bryan]

Safer to inflate a balloon from the tank and then inhale from the balloon.

 

[Rick Inman]

This almost certainly has nothing to do with the gas being helium, just being pressurized. That's why we use a regulator!

True dat. However, when I was originally certified (long, long, long ago), we were taught to breath underwater directly from the tank.

 

[SteveAD]

True dat. However, when I was originally certified (long, long, long ago), we were taught to breath underwater directly from the tank.

Wasn't the first line of that block of instruction:

"DO NOT seal your lips around the valve!" ?

 

[Desert_Diver]

Safer to inflate a balloon from the tank and then inhale from the balloon.

This mitigates the gas pressure issue but still allows the huffer to pass out due to the lack of oxygen in the lungs. It is a self correcting problem since the victim will still breathe and eventually replace the helium with room air. The difficulty might be trauma suffered in the resulting fall though.

Art

 

[Dr Deco]

The short answer is that thousands of kids - and adults too - breathe helium from ballons bought in a local store. I did that fifty years ago and it was not new then. It certainly is funny at birthday parties.

Curiously, in a hyperbaric chamber, the same effect occurs breathing only air at about 100 fsw. .

 

[Charlie99]

Curiously, in a hyperbaric chamber, the same effect occurs breathing only air at about 100 fsw. .

Intriguing.

Since the speed of of sound in air is relatively constant vs. pressure, that casts some doubt upon the most common explanation for helium voice --- that the higher speed of sound in helium raises the resonant frequencies of the various cavities and passages in the vocal tract, thereby emphasizing the higher frequency formants.