Daily Arizona silver belt., 1907-08-23
DROWNING ACCIDENTS
Many of Them Due to Panic and Not
 Few to Ignorance

l Npl q utN HdNStS NilHpul ilS ItIulN
 of deaths by drowning. People stand
 "helpless on the bcach' and watch the
 victims go down to rise no more. A
 majority of people, l have learned by
 experience, are afraid of deep water; and so horrible are the accounts of the
 way drowning person grasps a would
 be rescuer around the neck in death lock, that even the bravest men hesitate
 to venture forth at the call for help
 "A drowning man catches at straws. "
 Yea, verify. And the weakest con sumptive is giant when he feels the
 tugging of the waters. His grip is as that of boa constructor. It is not for lack of courage that men do not always hurry to save, or try to save; but drilled-in knowledge of the uselessness of the effort.
 l should like to see every one that is inclined to take chances when bathing wear pneumatic corset. It could be made of feather weight, and would not in tie slightest interfere with perfect body freedom. 1t could be made to hold only half foot of cubic air and that would be sufficient to save many a life. The specific gravity of the body is slightly greater than that of water. A man weighing l45 pounds can be easily lifted when under water by the | tip of your little finger. I mean a live man, whose lungs have not been emptied of air and filled with water.
 Why do we drown? Simply because we allow our lungs to be completely deprived of oxygen. This causes as- phyxia. Human beings are not adapt ed to extract the oxygen dissolved in water; frst-beeause the amount is on. ly one-third of that required to supply the needs of the processes of diffusion, which takes place in the lungs; and secondly-because the air or fluid, taken in through the mouth must return the same way, there being no second open ing and rapid, constant stream like that by which in fishes a very great quan- tity of water passes over the gills in very short time.
 Complete deprivation of oxygen re- suits in death after from three to five minutes. Recovery is unlikely if the submersion has lasted longer than four minutes. The drowning person becomes panicly and sinks, at the same time drawing into the lungs a quantity of water. If he fights hard he will come to the surface and remain there until | exhausted, when he will sink a second | time and get more water into his lungs. This may be repeated several times, though our popular notion is that the third sinking is permanent farewell. |
 l saw a drowned boy on the sands. He | had simply gone under three times and | the crowd, after little rubbing (and rubbering) gave him up as positively dead beyond hope of recovery. A sen sible man, young doctor, an athletic fellow, happened to drop in. "Let me look; was this boy hurt! Any bones broken9 Did he have fall9" With out waiting for an answer he got busy. In fifteen minutes he had the dead boy breathing quietly-and that boy is now a great big, husky fellow, with money to burn or throw at the cats. He would give his right arm to find that doctor.
 You will understand, of course, that a man jumping off the Brooklyn bridge and smashing himself almost into jelly doesn' t die of drowning. Death in that case is due to shock. Also-a person in diving may hit a rock, or sunken beam, or may receive such in- juries in many ways that cause death, regardless of asphyxia. I cannot dwell on these accidents. But it is most dis tressing that so many drownings occur daily just because people will persist in filling their lungs with water, and can not be resuscitated because people will not work long enough to get rid of the water and reintroduce air.-New York Press.