Saturation Diving: With an example ...

How does saturation diving work?
The Kursk sank in over 300 feet (91 m) of water. When a SCUBA diver makes a dive to that depth, he experiences the pressure of the water around him, which is approximately 10 times the pressure at sea level. At this pressure, the gasses that make up the air in his lungs, particularly nitrogen, dissolve into his blood and tissues. With the gasses in his blood and tissue, he can remain at that depth for a short period of time -- less than 5 minutes. If he stays down longer than that, he runs the risk of developing decompression sickness, also known as "the bends," when he surfaces, and he'll have go through the decompression process to avoid getting sick. Because the Norwegian divers knew they would have to stay longer at that depth, and therefore would have to undergo decompression, they used a technique called saturation diving.

Saturation diving is based on the principle that the pressure of the dissolved gas in the blood and tissues is the same as that of the gas in the lungs. Basically, a diver goes down to a depth, perhaps 300 feet, and remains there until no more gas can dissolve in the tissues -- the tissues are saturated with nitrogen. Once the saturation point has been reached, the time required for decompression will be the same no matter how much longer the diver stays at that depth, whether it be a minute, an hour, a day or a week. This principle has been used for divers who live and work in undersea habitats. It was used by the divers in the submersible oil rig in the film "The Abyss."

One idea that is being researched to prevent the need for saturation diving and decompression at great depths is liquid breathing, which was also shown in "The Abyss." Instead of breathing gas, the diver breaths a non-compressible, liquid perfluorocarbon compound that contains oxygen. Because no gas phase is in contact with the blood, and nitrogen is not used, the danger of forming nitrogen bubbles does not exist. In the 1960s, it was shown that rats could survive for up to 20 hours when immersed in such a mixture. Potentially, liquid breathing could allow a diver to reach depths of up to 3000 feet (914 m). Liquid breathing is still under research, and has been focused on helping to save pre-mature infants and patients with acute lung injuries.

 

Insurance----hell he has Parkinson Disease.....

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One cannot paint Parkinson's Disease with a broad brush and say that people with this condition should not dive. In some cases, the body is affected very little by the disease in it's early stages and a person should not be deprived of this pleasure. Of course, there are those in the later stages of the condition who certainly should not dive for several reasons. These include tremor, muscle rigidity, ability to task adequately; medication effects are other factors that need to be considered, as some side effects are adverse to diving (confusion, drowsiness, hallucinations).

There is no ill effect of depth or pressure on the condition itself, but there might be serious consideration of the additive effects of increased partial pressures of nitrogen on the medications used to treat the disease.

http://scuba-doc.com/Parkinsons.html

 

It was pretty hot here today. After reading your post I dug out my gear and spent the afternoon snorkeling around the lake. The big male Smallmouth Bass are still guarding their nests and they're up pretty high on my beach this year with the high water levels. I've spent many hours in the summer months enjoying this pastime over the years .
When I was young I found a stone I thought looked like a little fish. I sent it to the Royal Ontario museum. It turned out to be a Huron Indian arrowhead the type used for fishing. They figured it was about 10,000 yrs old. That was my best find but I still keep looking. Really who needs all that gear? Naked Snorkeling is way more fun.

 

When I was in college in the mid seventies they were studying liquid breathing, and I got to sit in on several of the tests because I as an active diver at the time. The college was still in the rat testing phase at that time, but the very idea of drowning in order to breathe gave me the willies, yet I wanted to try it. The college was no where near human testing so it was a no go. It sure was interesting though.

 

So I see our resident ADHD freak RandyKnight thinks he is a doctor now LMAO !!!

One shouldn't do a lot of things and if I listened to every bit of advice from doctors I would be a shut in and you have to die sometime so throw caution to the wind and live for today ... people can recommend that you don't do something but they can't stop you from living unless you let them !!!

Thanks for contributing to those that has and hopefully Tyche will shine down on us and if there was ever a day to believe in the Greek Gods, today is that day.

AND here we go ... Good Day Peeps.

 

Hey stupid, what's your point ??? You also shouldn't fly or limit your flights but that never slowed me down.

Insurance is for many things including malfunctions, accidents from those in your dive crew and party, transportation and a host of other eventualities so WTF are you getting at ???

Any shortfall due to my condition will come from my own bank account but you aren't smarter than my lawyers so don't try to be.

Has anyone ever told you you shouldn't do something and you actually listened like the good little bitch you are LMAO.

I have those effects,conditions on a daily basis so why should that scare or slow me down dude ???

There is a full medical team that has matters well in hand but thanks for the cynicism and things aren't as complicated as you want to make them out to be so the people that will watch out for me/us will do what they are best at and all will be fine I'm sure, either that or it won't.

You only live once dude ... so go rain on someone else's parade you doom and gloomer.

 

Have fun today, JPT.

 

Having fun is NOT supposed to be so much hard work LOL ... it takes a lot of equipment to not only go deep but to stay there for extended periods as this image shows.



AND to the dummies that think they are doctors, once decompression was complete a series of tests showed a between 28-33 % decrease in the PD symptoms from the day previous and this is fast becoming a popular form of therapy/treatment for a variety of afflictions including PD. Hyperbolic Oxygenation Therapy is a way of getting some relief but it is pricey and be under no illusion that it is a be all end all cure, which it IS NOT. There are risks associated with this form of radical treatment and the benefits are positive in more than not but it is not recommended for all and a medical clearance MUST be done before you can put yourself in this situation ... granted they normally only take one to around 2 ATA during treatment and we went further but I have a strong ticker and lungs so the risk was worth the reward for me.

Doctors make suggestions but it is up to me or you to decide how much risk you are willing to accept in the end ...

 

Your sweetie is probably rolling her eyes while you post here. It's Santorini man, go show her a good time!

 

I can barely move today ... I am NOT going anywhere lol.

The Island is only 2 sq kms so not far to go to see stuff lol but she is at the Acropolis/Historical site here which is a smaller version of the Athens one with an excavated lost city ...

 

6:13 pm there time for a sunset dinner....

I once went to 130 feet and was miserable.....never again....

30 to 40 feet and warm water is what I liked.....

 

You are smarter than I am lol. We have this sickness where we need to push the envelope and a day of fun turns into a week of pain and torture and every time I do it I tell myself "never again" ... until the next time we do it lol.

I agree though that at 1 ATA you get the heat of the sun and warm water hitting you and it is crystal clear with sealife going about their day all around you and it can really be fun at lesser depths as my sweety found out as we started our dive together for the first hour but she wasn't allowed to follow us down into the abyss where it can get funky fast. We were around 250-300ish feet for a huge part of the dive and I will say that I don't think I will or can for that matter do that again.

I swear I can hear and feel the blood running through my veins today lol.

Just going to park my sorry ass on the veranda all day and enjoy the view.

 

One thing that people don't always take into consideration is the recovery period after a deep or extended dive and all that comes with it. I on the other hand knew what I was getting myself into and made contingencies for any eventuality with the full expectation that it was going to kick me square in the ass for at minimum a few days but the risk was worth the reward ...

Anyway today I has chills from breathing gases for extended periods and then pure oxygen while in decompression for almost half a day (plus the shear stresses the body and muscles endure and release their own chmemicals) and if you have ever had a flu and at 80 degrees thought you were going to free to death you will know how I feel today. Don't feel sorry for me, just pity my stupidity LOL. Welders might be able to identify with these chills if they have ever gotten "zinc chills/shakes" but it fades fast enough (a day or two).

The remedy is to sit/lay around and let the body do its job of healing itself after we abuse it ... I will just equate it to a week long hangover lol. It helps when you have the most beautiful woman you have ever seen at your side wanting to play "doctor/patient".

Just a sidenote to this post; it probably took me as long to edit out all the errors as it did to write it in the first place. Another hazard of both diving and PD ...

 

Music gets me through every day and I am never without it in my head ... I must have hummed this song for half the dive the other day lol.

 

We want to thank Aegean Divers, Santorini Diving and Meditteranean Diving Centers for all of their expert help and support as well as AquaViews Magazine for accepting our submission.

 

must be real boring in greece to keep fucking with this forum.....