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Ocean Mishap Stokes Aquaphobia

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Today’s post comes from Trail Baboon’s resident risk-minimizing maven Bathtub Safety Officer Rafferty.

At ease civilians!

But never feel SO at ease that you topple off your speeding boat and are left stranded in the ocean overnight, forced to tread water for 14 hours while praying that someone will find you even though you are miles from shore without a life jacket and have no means to call for help.

Farfetched?

Yes, it’s true I have been accused of less-than-positive thinking in a worst-case-scenario- worshipping kind of way. But before you call me a fantastical alarmist, know that this happened to some people over the weekend, and miraculously they lived to tell the tale, otherwise we might never know that any of this occurred.

And the tale is not finished. Yet to come – details on what they were doing when they fell overboard, and why they were not wearing flotation devices. One can only guess at the possibilities, and while all of the options I’ve imagined are foolhardy and some are downright embarrassing, none of them are worse than perishing in the sea at night.

See? That’s somewhat positive, thinking-wise!

And I hope this will be a powerful safety lesson to everyone – don’t ever go anywhere on the ocean. I know some people like to go there for fish and others for flotsam, but let’s face it – the ocean is too big and powerful and you can easily get lost out there. There is a reason humans don’t have fins, flippers or gills. Every time I notice these things about myself, I’m glad I didn’t join the merchant marine.

Plus, the ocean is packed full of scary creatures like stinging jellyfish and great white sharks. I happen to know from a careful examination of movies and TV shows that sharks are pretty much everywhere. You can’t go swimming in any kind of a movie without running into one, and they are especially fond of terrorizing us. Throughout my personal movie-viewing history, sharks have been the leading ominous music-triggering creatures, even more so than bears or Bigfoot.

Again, strictly from a safety-oriented viewpoint, it is crystal clear that we have no business on or near the ocean!

You may argue that a journey aboard a cruise ship is a fairly safe way to experience the sea but I would advise against it. A quick check online revealed that getting thrown off the back of a cruise ship by a nefarious stranger, while it is something that never ever actually happens, is still a vivid fear that requires, among other things, at least one what-to-do-if explainer from Wikihow.

If I were going on a cruise (which I would never do), I’d memorize this protocol because being heaved off the aft deck by a psychopath is almost certainly a death sentence. That said, making every move on the checklist is important and you should do it.

But note that by the time we get to step #10, you are being advised to “… console yourself with memories of good times.” There is very little hope left at this point, though the Wikihow authors are quite optimistic that in your final moments you’ll somehow be able to remember what they said about the proper frame of mind.

That’s positive thinking!

Yours in low-risk travel,
Bathtub Safety Officer Rafferty

How long can you tread water?

34 thoughts on “Ocean Mishap Stokes Aquaphobia”

  1. I can tread a long time…was a varsity swimmer in high school, was a lifeguard, did the mile swim in Boy Scouts. Also learned the technique of ‘drownproofing’ (look it up).

    But if I’m on a cruise ship, I’m more likely to be the thrower than the throwee. There are always some really annoying people on cruises.

    I was at a music festival yesterday, and listened to the reggae sessions. Got me thinking about going to Jamaica again. That means a cruise. Who’s with me?

    Irie, skip!

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  2. PS: Just don’t annoy me, or you’re swimming with the fishes. Of course, my tolerance for annoyance is pretty high. Hell, I lived with Dale for a few years in college.

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    1. Joe
      I’ll bet dale is wondering what great stories you have to share with us all.
      Why don’t you sleep?
      Where do you live, what do you do?
      Married ? Minnesota? You are kind of annoying.
      Give us some info…who was the regea band.
      C’mon mon Jamaican water is easy to tread water in but you need some munchies hey

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      1. I sleep, but am currently in Romania, which is probably 8 hours ahead of Dale Central Time.

        I’m only *kind* of annoying? Now I’ve got bring my ‘A game’, I guess.

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      2. The people I’ve watched it with seem to favor Germany. Maybe coincidence, but Germany is Romania’s top trade partner.

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  4. Treading water is ok if you know there is an end to the activity. To be left to go until you are found would be hard. In a group….the focus changes to keep others going. I would be thinking that overnight might be a one night thing, the second might might be too much. Get er done on day one. The art of floating on you back would be the main prescription here. On my own I’m good for overnight… The second night I need a little help
    Dale did you read the book? Skinny dip was the bbc choice yesterday ( the play didn’t get over until 530) and the story is about a woman who get thrown overboard by her husband out in the ocean off the Florida coast.
    Remember he bill Cosby bit from the 60’s?

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  5. Husband has been treading water, needing to retire, for several years. Now the moment has arrived, and I can’t wait for him to be done so he isn’t so glum and grumpy. I have to work for another 7 years, but I don’t feel like I am treading water yet.

    I had a swimming instructor in college who told us of the time she was in deep water in a Minnesota lake and had to tread water for several hours and finally got to the point where she knew she was spent and she couldn’t do it any more, so she let her legs drop, ready to drown, and her feet hit lake bottom so she could stand and walk to shore. She had probably been treading water in the shallows for a long time.

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  6. I’d like to believe I can tread water for as long as I need to, but a real situation might be different.

    As far as treading water in everyday life, I’ve got that one aced. I”m not quite a creature of habit, but I can certainly get into a groove (rut?) of doing pretty much the same things every day.

    Chris in Owatonna

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  8. I have sufficient body fat to keep me afloat for a very long time. No treading water needed, just flip on my back and float. I just hope that if it ever happens, it’s in relatively warm water without sharks, jellyfish, or heaven forbid, water moccasins.

    When I show people the pictures from our whale watching trip earlier this year, they inevitably ask if we weren’t afraid of the whale flipping over our small boat. The truth is, it never occurred to me. I think both Charlotte and I were so excited to be touching these huge mammals, we would have gladly jumped in the water to be closer to them.

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  9. Good morning. I suppose I could tread water for at least a few hours. I think it would only take a little effort to keep from sinking if I laid back in the water with only my nose and my mouth above water. I could stay in this position and just paddle enough to move very slowly through the water.

    I have never tried to tread water for more than a few minutes. I hope I never need to do that. However, it could happen. I am sure I will not be able to follow Rafferty’s advice about never going out on a boat into deep water.

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  10. I think it is amusing that as part of her summer job, daughter has to help people water ski. She hasn’t water skiied in her life. I haven’t had a chance to ask her how it is going.

    After he was sent back to the states but before he was discharged from the Army Air Corps in 1945, my dad was made a swimming instructor at an air base in Montgomery, AL. It was a sham assignment, as they only wanted him there so he could play football for them. He couldn’t swim a stroke and never taught anyone to swim, although he was trained in swim instruction pedagogy.

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    1. when my mother was going to college at Mankato State to be a teacher, part of the degree was passing swimming. She has never had a bit of body fat and sank like a rock. I have never seen her swim, but somehow, she must have passed, as she has had a very long and successful teaching career.

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      1. My undergrad college had a swimming test requirement for graduation. It was mostly about treading water (you had to show you could float for long periods of time without dying). Everyone seemed to pass the test (which was mostly about mind control), everyone except Joe, a handsome African-American basketball star who was unquestionably the most athletic guy on campus. Joe swam like a bag of hammers. Every time they tested him they had to line the pool with guys who could rescue Joe before he went down for the third and last time. I think I heard they had to fudge that requirement to graduate him.

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  11. This is a new thing for BSOR to worry about-Can your swimming instructor really swim? What if they can’t and you don’t know it?

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  12. I think many folks are aware of my general situation. I was contentedly treading water for several years. For various reasons, I dove off the boat I’d come to associate with safety and comfort. I’ve been trying to swim for a distant shore ever since. I was never much of a swimmer, but when you are in the water you tend to think of the alternative, and that is a motivating notion.

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  13. It has been a very long time since I was in water deep enough to tread in, so not sure about that.

    Metaphorically, I am no good at it. Sitting around waiting for whatever to happen is not part of my skill set. I tend to choose a direction and start thrashing towards it.

    I don’t necessarily recommend this, but it is the only way I know.

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  14. I must be able to tread water for quite a while, as I got my Senior Lifesaving certificate in high school. Not sure what “quite a while” is, but like PJ, I can float, so it’s a moot point.

    Metaphorically, I’m kind of like mig – not sure how long I could languish without doing something. Thrashing is good word.

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  16. I tread water for 25 years with wasband #2 and wish I could have those years back. I’ve always thought that it’s unfortunate that, by the time most of us figure it all out, we’ve only got limited years left.

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