🚀 go-pugleaf

Eastmer@yang.earlham.edu writes:

>You WILL however die, the reason for this is that gas(most notably in
>this case N2) are much more soluble in liquids(blood) at higher
>pressures.  Thus when the pressure is dropped rapidly bubbles of gas
>will be in your blood stream where they will make their way to your
>heart and deprime it.(It won't pump an more)

This is known as "the bends" and is one of the most common accidents
that befall scuba divers. The symptoms of this are itches, cramps,
lameness, dizzyness, tunnel vision, pain in the joints (the bends), 
unconsciousness (sp) and death. If I remember my scuba diving course correctly.

In diving, it is generally considered "safe", if the pressure drop is
less than 1 atm. This mmeans that if your depth is less than appr. 10
meters, you can always go directly to the surface (a drop from 2 atm
to 1 atm). I don't know if this means that a 1 atm drop is safe (in
which case 1 atm -> vacuum would also be safe WRT the bends) or if it
means that it is safe to drop to half pressure. I'm afraid the latter
is the case.

For divers, the symptoms of the bends usually appear after within 24
hours.  A friend of mine, who had a very mid case of the bends felt
the first symptoms 8 hours after diving. But in more severe cases, the
symptoms will appear more rapidly. In scuba class we saw a movie of an
instructional experiment: They sedated a cat and pressurized it to
appr. 8 atm. for half an hour. Then they depressurised it to 1 atm. in
a minute or so.  Half a minute later, it was dead. They proceeded to
dissect it immediatly.  The blood of the liver and the heart was
foaming, ind bubbled forth like champagne (sp).

Disclaimer for the animal lovers: The cat was sedated and felt
NOTHING. The movie was from the 1960's and that one cat had been used
as a warning example for thousands of human cats. And I don't like
cats much (flame suit on).

   Niels Ull Jacobsen, Dep. of C.S., U of Copenhagen (null@diku.dk)
   Adaz sighed.  "So how long will this journey take?" 
   "A month?" Sutekh shrugged.  "Depends on when the horses die." 
     -- from "Adaz & Sutekh" by Jeff Stehman

-- 
   Niels Ull Jacobsen, Dep. of C.S., U of Copenhagen (null@diku.dk)
   Adaz sighed.  "So how long will this journey take?" 
   "A month?" Sutekh shrugged.  "Depends on when the horses die." 
     -- from "Adaz & Sutekh" by Jeff Stehman