BBC Worst Case Scenario: "Can You Survive If You Run Out Of Air?"

Blizzard

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The BBC is running a new column titled "Worst Case Scenario". They describe it as a look into "extremes of the human experience and the remarkable resilience people display in the face of adversity. It aims to look at ways people have coped when the worst happens and what lessons we can learn from their experiences."

This was their latest story:
Can you survive if you run out of air?
BBC said:
There was a sickening crack when the thick cable connecting Chris Lemons to the ship above him snapped. This vital umbilical cord to the world above carried power, communications, heat and air to his diving suit 100m (328ft) below the surface of the sea.

While his colleagues remember the terrible noise of this lifeline breaking, Lemons himself heard nothing. One moment he was jammed against the metal underwater structure they had been working on and then he was tumbling backwards towards the ocean floor. His link to the ship above was gone, along with any hope of finding his way back to it.

Most crucially, his air supply had also vanished, leaving him with just six or seven minutes of emergency air supply. Over the next 30 minutes at the bottom of the North Sea, Lemons would experience something that few people have lived to talk about: he ran out of air.
We hear of these stories now and again but I still find them rather fascinating. Crazy stuff. It's amazing how the human body and our physiology can still be such a mystery.
 
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