Debunking Hypothermia Myths

I can't help wondering what that material is in the tarp (burrito wrap). Cuben? Of course the other issue is that the helpers might also be vulnerable to hypothermia at the same time. I had an interesting situation once where a lady got stressed out when we arrived in a cold hut mid-winter. It was very overcrowded in the hut and after a wee while she mentioned that she was feeling terrible and complained of tingling fingers. She'd had this experience once before in an overcrowded cold hut. I told her she was hyperventilating due to stress and got her to lie on her sleeping bag on her bunk and covered her with another bag. Someone was getting the fire going and after about 5 minutes she emerged feeling completely normal. Obviously not hypothermia of course but a different condition that was reversed by getting her a bit warmer with her own body heat loss being insulated within and reducing her stress. One time our tramping club mentioned an incident of a cold person arriving at the hut with hypothermia. She was bundled up, I think with another person and emerged chatty and normal after around half an hour. To my mind this was clearly a case of someone being very cold and feeling miserable (boyfriend talked her into going on the trip). The loving attention and acknowledgment of her distress shown by the group probably bucked up her spirits considerably. Again I believe this can't have been hypothermia b/c as the video states, hypothermia victims don't recover this quickly. It will take at least a day to normalise as wierd difficult to treat biochemistry changes occur. I've probably mentioned on this site that a combination of hypothermia and a serious injury such as a fractured femur requires main centre intensive care management e.g. Christchurch, not Timaru. That's why we always need to carry sufficient shelter to survive a night out in the conditions we face as per Ian_H's prescription on another thread here on emergency shelters. His weighs 500g all up including the insect net!

That's really interesting. Look our for the "umbles"! I had read before that the "shared body heat" treatment method is over-rated. Dry clothing just as good? I'd be interested in y'alls opinions about a prioritised list for an action plan for treating a hiker with suspected hypothermia (or trying to treat yourself too I suppose).

I was always under the impression that once hypothermia gets to the point shivering stops the body cannot create enough heat to warm itself. This would suggest that with enough insulation it can

i think what honora is describing with people having hypothermic like symptoms may be to do with fatigue... towards the end of the day your body hormone levels get out of balance, your heat production drops. nutrient levels drop. toxins have built up in the body, brain isnt coping properly. adrenals arent working properly and your brain can get overloaded by a stressful day walking... and as Honora has noted some of these people can be relatively easily revived by a short rest. food drink, warming up. unlike hypothermia which can take a lot longer to recover from and it can be a more difficult operation to get recovery i had hypothermia , i developed it around 5ish in the afternoon. it took food and 12 hours sleep before i recovered

A few years back I got a mild case of hypothermia doing sedentary work in a cold place that was around about 3 - 5 degC. After about for about 4 hour I very clearly remember my brain just slowly closing down, and having to be driven home and put to bed for the rest of the day. Deep fatigue and slowness of thought were the main symptoms. Didn't come right until the next day.

I work in an environment that is 4-8 degrees Celsius all day everyday. A few days a week I am in a freezer that sits around -18 degrees Celsius. I can be in there for an hour at a time. Ive done it for years. You just get accustomed to it. It's surprising. I almost never get colds or anything. I do notice occasionally that when I'm in the freezer my brain can slow a bit. It's like the Inuits you just adapt .

The body cant adapt to those temperatures It has to have added insulation. A while ago TipTop had a huge freezer in Johnsonville I had a quick tour once. -18 in there and 10 minutes in t shirt and shorts was enough. The workers were in there several hours at a time driving forklifts Very heavily dressed. At -18 for an hour frost bitten faces can happen

Frost bite is frost bite, but you CAN acclimatise. Different for different people, but some people can tolerate cold more-so than others. :)

as far as animals go as a whole. humans are very poorly adapted to conserve body heat, and very well adapted to shedding it in hot environments. even if your ancestors have lived in an arctic environment for thousands of years, you are still far better adapted to living in the tropics and sub tropics where humans evolved. some arctic animals like polar bears have evolved for hundreds of thousands of years to adjust to the cold. Operating in a commercial freezer at work is seldom like being in the outdoors where you have additional factors of wind chill, rain, cooling sweat... prolonged exposure to the elements and limited ability to remove yourself from the weather, limited ability to reduce fatigue.