Question Holding one's breath

[jedidia]

what if I breath pure oxygen before holding my breath? It certainly would increase the time, wouldn't it?

Hyperventilating usually helps more.

 

[Linguofreak]

By the way: what if I breath pure oxygen before holding my breath? It certainly would increase the time, wouldn't it? That would also be a nice cheat for freediving in the ocean :lol:

It would increase the length of time you could hold your breath before blacking out, but not the amount of time you could hold your breath before your breathing reflex started to kick in, since the breathing reflex is triggered entirely by CO2 concentration in the bloodstream.

Hyperventilating usually helps more.

It does help suppress the breathing reflex, but can be dangerous for exactly that reason: If you're not careful you can black out before you feel the need to breathe.

 

[Spaced]

edit*
Searching for the world record I came across : "Peter Colat, a Swiss freediver, has held his breath underwater for 19 minutes and 21 seconds, smashing the world record" 2010 - Daily Telegraph.

Blimey, 19minutes! Last I heard it was around 11 minutes.

 

[mojoey]

I just held my breath for 2:01, and suprisingly, the reflex to inhale/exhale kicked in at about 1:50

 

[MattBaker]

Searching for the world record I came across : "Peter Colat, a Swiss freediver, has held his breath underwater for 19 minutes and 21 seconds, smashing the world record" 2010 - Daily Telegraph.

He was probably sitting with an oxygen bottle for several minutes or hours and hyperventilating before they sat him in a pool. I doubt that anything more than 10 minutes is possible in "normal" conditions.

 

[Spaced]

He was probably sitting with an oxygen bottle for several minutes or hours and hyperventilating before they sat him in a pool

Indeed, that's what the article stated.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...rld-record-for-holding-breath-underwater.html

Still..... to ignore the urge to breathe for that long is astounding. That's cetacean territory.

 

[Sky Captain]

When diving I can hold my breath ~1 minute. When relaxed and doing nothing hard around minute and 30 seconds.

But remember if you get caught in vacuum without spacesuit don't try to hold your breath!!!

 

[TMac3000]

I've found that the secret is to not take a big breath before you go under. That makes your chest burn like fire, and the reflex will kick in quicker. I just simply close my trachea and quit breathing. I've found that I can stay under for about a minute or so like this without discomfort.

 

[MattBaker]

But remember if you get caught in vacuum without spacesuit don't try to hold your breath!!!

If I get thrown out of the ISS I have other problems than lack of oxygen:lol: (actually, to visit the ISS would compensate it)

 

[jangofett287]

actually, Oxygen is a very major problem, the only other problem is radiation from the sun. You can spacewalk with nothing but a full face mask and earplugs. It would hurt, but you could theoretically survive.

 

[Donamy]

actually, Oxygen is a very major problem, the only other problem is radiation from the sun. You can spacewalk with nothing but a full face mask and earplugs. It would hurt, but you could theoretically survive.

That would be one big hicky.:rofl:

 

[TMac3000]

actually, Oxygen is a very major problem, the only other problem is radiation from the sun. You can spacewalk with nothing but a full face mask and earplugs. It would hurt, but you could theoretically survive.

:huh:
I'll let you be the one to test that theory

 

[Jarvitä]

But remember if you get caught in vacuum without spacesuit don't try to hold your breath!!!

If you get exposed to vacuum in space, something has clearly already gone wrong to the point that you're as good as dead. The extra ten seconds or so of consciousness, for all intents and purposes, useless. This is only a matter of cadaver aesthetics, and trying to hold a lungful of air in could result in your lungs being turned inside-out and blown out through your mouth, resulting in what's known as a "christmas tree corpse".

:tiphat:

 

[APDAF]

If you not hold your breath in a vacuum you have 90 seconds to live.

If you hold your breath your lungs come out of your mouth and you choke to death on your own lungs.

 

[RisingFury]

actually, Oxygen is a very major problem, the only other problem is radiation from the sun. You can spacewalk with nothing but a full face mask and earplugs. It would hurt, but you could theoretically survive.

You could survive for a few seconds, yes. Then your blood would begin to boil because the nitrogen dissolved in it would turn to bubbles, your blood vessels would begin to break, your skin would freeze and crack. I also imagine you'd feel quite inflated, because your lungs would be pressurized by 1 bar or so with no pressure outside.

Fun way to die...

 

[jangofett287]

Your blood vessels are a sealed system, if your breathing 1 Atmo Pressure, you will not have a problem.

Until they all start bursting and breaking and it becomes a not so closed system.
You wouldn't freeze, for the only way the heat could escape would be radiation. Heat and such from the sun would give you a pretty major suntan though...

I suspect I might be explaining this badly. The bottom line is if you find yourself sucking vacuum, your dead, its just a matter of how long. No protection would give you approx. 90 sec. My method gives you the amount of time it takes for sufficient capillaries to burst that the pressure in your blood drops sufficiently for the bends or the internal bleeding to kill you. Or the time it takes for the sun to cook you, whichever is less.

 

[FADEC]

At NASA's Manned Spacecraft Center (now renamed Johnson Space Center) we had a test subject accidentally exposed to a near vacuum (less than 1 psi) in an incident involving a leaking space suit in a vacuum chamber back in '65. He remained conscious for about 14 seconds, which is about the time it takes for O2 deprived blood to go from the lungs to the brain. The suit probably did not reach a hard vacuum, and we began repressurizing the chamber within 15 seconds. The subject regained consciousness at around 15,000 feet equivalent altitude. The subject later reported that he could feel and hear the air leaking out, and his last conscious memory was of the water on his tongue beginning to boil.

http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/answers/970603.html

And it wasn't even a total vacuum. Not to mention space.

 

[Sky Captain]

At least in leaking spacecraft you would survive longer than in your deep diving submarine that develops a major leak at 1000+ meters.

 

[mojoey]

At least in leaking spacecraft you would survive longer than in your deep diving submarine that develops a major leak at 1000+ meters.

I would rather it be quick, and not know that I'd be compressed into the space of a pen head, than be turned inside out

 

[N_Molson]

actually, Oxygen is a very major problem, the only other problem is radiation from the sun. You can spacewalk with nothing but a full face mask and earplugs. It would hurt, but you could theoretically survive.

The other very major problem is the cold. Sure you wouldn't ice in a few seconds like it has been shown in some movies but you're going to loose consciousness quickly. The radiation problem is secondary I think, it's more that you are very likely to develop some cancer in the following months/years. Pressure is not that much a problem - it has been proven that the human skin is elastic enough to hold the organs in place (of course you need to protect the face, because in vacuum, all exposed body fluids immediately sublimate).

I've found that the secret is to not take a big breath before you go under.

Exactly. For two reasons. First, full lungs act as buoys, so you need more muscular effort to dive. Secondly, there is the pressure problem. Pressure rises very quickly underwater (even as low as 1 meter deep), and it is not a good idea to have a ballooned chest.

What works well is to expel the air you have in the lungs in small quantities, at regular intervals, as you dive.

Record is just over 3 minutes, then the pool lifeguard came around and started tapping me on the shoulder.

lol, I guess it is pretty scary for a pool lifeguard to see someone that does not move and has the nose into water :lol: