311–320 of 424 posts
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Drowning far outweighs all of those categories for ages 1 - 9 https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/pdf/leading_causes_of_inj... In the large majority of motor vehicle incidents the child is an occupant of the vehicle : https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/...
The graph in your first link is absolutely fascinating. I found the number of "Unintentional Poisoning" and "Suicide" deaths especially surprising (due to the high numbers)
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What kind of intuition do you have about 1%-2%? I've a crappy grasp of probability. I'd say 1-2% is like being quite certain that you'll experience this or that within 50-100 tries/repetitions. That sounds rare to me. In case of life or death it's not a risk I'd tolerate, but I'd call it rare.
Even with a 99% probability, there’s about one chance in three that you wouldn’t experience it if you tried a hundred times.
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>An exeption were these orange things you strap onto a child's arms, and inflate, which they can't really remove by themselves. Those are widely considered NOT safe, a non-swimmer child is probably much safer without them than with them, as using them lulls the caregiver into a false sense of security and they pay much less attention to them. They also teach children the wrong posture for swimming/floating, which can…
The problem there, though, is the lack of parental supervision, not the armbands themselves. The bands do keep the child's head above water. But no matter what, parents need to understand that you don't leave a small child alone near water.
Try to imagine if you were less buoyant like if you had ankle weights on and someone tied two empty milk jugs to your hands. Your hands are suddenly not useful at all for swimming and you can't pull them underwater so now you're forced to hold yourself up by pushing your arms out.
Here's how it can look, and this makes it a bit clearer why it can be a hazard. https://i0.wp.com/renomomsblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/0... If it slips down to the wrists like this it's arguably worse than having nothing at all.
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This is improper training. (Former WSI here) Especially in the ocean. The Salinity in the ocean makes it very easy for a well trained swimmer to float. People who sink on their back haven't been trained to maintain enough air in their lungs and/or use minimal arm/leg effort to assist. Also they are probably not leaning their head back far enough. (Head position being a massive component of the problem for non-swimmer…
And at Scout Camp each year we always had some. It doesn't go away with training. Whether its body fat or lung capacity, whatever, they simply sink to the bottom no matter how big a breath they take or the 'head position' explanation. They can be 'swimmer' and still not be physically capable of floating on their back. The ocean is a different matter I'm sure.
It's a tough problem to solve. I have no more than 10% body fat, I have no issues.
But I also taught adults who were similarly low body fat and some I succeeded in teaching and some I did not.
Consciously controlling your breathing is a big deal in many aspects of swimming & diving. It has a major effect on buoyancy. You can't breathe normally/unconsciously swimming/floating. It is always controlled. Likewise you must keep breathing when diving with compressed air.
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Drowning far outweighs all of those categories for ages 1 - 9 https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/pdf/leading_causes_of_inj... In the large majority of motor vehicle incidents the child is an occupant of the vehicle : https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/...
The graph in your first link is absolutely fascinating. I found the number of "Unintentional Poisoning" and "Suicide" deaths especially surprising (due to the high numbers)
It's funny because Niggers can't swim
Discussion from 2015: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9962185
When I was 12, I went on a week long hike as a scout. We decided to swim across a lake, and 1/2 way through, I got tired, and tried swimming back, but couldn't. I remember having the presence of mind to yell out help before blanking out. My closest friend in the troop luckily turned around, swam back to and drug me back to shore. I was scared of the water after that, but some how ended up fighting my fear and earning…
Something similar happened to me as a kid, I decided to swim from our boat to the shore of the lake, got exhausted 100 meters from the shore. Before going in full panic mode I remembered you can basically float indefinitely on your back with very minimal effort and did just that until I was calm and rested. Turns out our mandatory swimming lessons from the age of 8 weren't as useless as I thought.
In Toronto, children are tested for swimming ability at each visit to a public pool. Children are given wrist-bands corresponding to their age upon arrival. If a child wishes to swim in the deep end, he or she may ask a guard to give them a swim test (swimming a fixed distance without touching floor or wall). Upon passing the test, the child is given another wrist-band indicating that they may use the deep end. Paren…
One of the important lessons I learnt from a lifeguard is that movies depict a very inaccurate representation of drowning. The movies would have you believe that drowning is a violent and noisy event when in reality it is an inconspicuous and silent event. The victim cannot shout or call for help when they are struggling to keep their nose above the water level. Another important lesson I learnt that sometimes when s…
An important lesson to learn in general is that television and movies depict very inaccurate representations of everything .
