Mailing List Archive Mailing List Archive
>(2) Narcosis has the subtle effect of making you believe your in >control. At first when you hit 170' it hits you like a shotgun blast >to the head, then after a minute, you feel you're ok. You feel like >you're now able to function ok. The problem is you're not, you just >think you are because you're getting aclimatized. This might be true. As I published on this list earlier this year, Dr. Kevin Hamilton did a research at the DCIEM on dissociation between behavioral and subjectives components of Nitrogen narcosis. He found that subjectively, after a few days (4), we get acclimatized (adaptation). However, our capacity to perform does not increase under narcosis (no adaptation). I can repost more complete information if needed. As well, Dr. Hamilton is available to answer more questions. >(3) If you have a stress situation (emergency, entanglement, free >flow of octopus, whatever) you may find yourself suddenly losing that >mental control you just had a minute before. It's tougher to keep >focused on multiple tasks when you're narced. I felt that once (in the beginning of my deep diving ventures), when I got a small incident (one of the team mate left without telling) at 145 feet . The stress induced by the incident provoked intense narcosis. Now, on some dives, I prefer to carry a 'buddy bottle'. It requires less skills to switch to the backup source of gas. In your mail, you talk about personal limits. Limits should depend on standard, yes, but also on personal ability, comfort, training, equipment used, methods, knowledge, experience and ability to accept risks. Too often, experienced people do not seek training or knowledge. As a consequence, they do not use the proper equipement, gas and techniques. Divers that feel too comfortable are also at risk of exposing themselves to perilous situations (should they not have the training, etc). 130 feet may be ok for many divers, but I know many that should not dive deeper than 2 feet because of the other specified criteria. One of the criteria which is very hard to evaluate is the ability to accept risk... it seems that when everything goes well, people don't think about the consequence of an accident. I am sure that people that faced the medical system after an accident develop a higher respect to this criteria (ability to accept risk) and also change their diving practice (at least, it happened to me and to R. Pyle). I follow the debate on what should the limit be with great interest. IHMO, we are getting a little bit more conservative than really needed (by trying to set max ppo2 to 1.3-1.4ata and max ead to 130 feet). Sincerly, Michel Therrien m.therrien@ne*.qc*.ca*
Navigate by Author:
[Previous]
[Next]
[Author Search Index]
Navigate by Subject:
[Previous]
[Next]
[Subject Search Index]
[Send Reply] [Send Message with New Topic]
[Search Selection] [Mailing List Home] [Home]