Personal flotation device
A personal flotation device is a flotation device in the form of a vest or suit that is worn by a user to prevent the wearer from drowning in a body of water. The device will keep the wearer afloat with their head and mouth above the surface – they do not have to swim or tread water in order to stay afloat and can even be unconscious.
PFDs are commonly worn on small watercraft or other locations where accidental entry into deep water may occur in order to provide immediate support for the wearer should they end up in the water. PFDs are also kept on large vessels for passengers to wear in an emergency in order to help them stay afloat should they be forced to enter the water or accidentally fall overboard during an evacuation. PFDs are commonly worn for swimming and other activities that require an individual to be in water. This is for reasons such as safety, to make swimming easier and less demanding, to allow someone who is unable to swim to safely enter water, or as assistance for activities such as water skiing.
PFDs are available in different sizes to accommodate variations in body weight. Designs differ depending on wearing convenience, the activities and conditions they are designed to be used in and the level of protection the wearer needs. There are three main types of PFDs: life jackets, buoyancy aids and survival suits; PFDs are most often constructed out of foam pieces, with the exception of some life jackets which are inflated with air. Other highly specialized forms of PFDs include buoyancy compensators used for scuba diving, and submarine escape devices.
History
The oldest examples of primitive life jackets can be traced back to inflated bladders, animal skins, or hollow sealed gourds for support when crossing deep streams and rivers. Purpose-designed buoyant safety devices consisting of simple blocks of wood or cork were used by Norwegian seamen.In a letter to the Naval Chronicle, dated February 1802, Abraham Bosquet proposed issuing Royal Navy Ships with "strong canvas bags of dimensions, when filled with cork shavings, equal to about that of a bed bolster, coiled in manner like a collar, and sufficiently wide for the head and shoulders to pass through."
In 1804, a cork life jacket was available for sale in The Sporting Magazine.
In 1806, Francis Daniel, a physician working at Wapping, exhibited an inflatable life preserver, mounting a demonstration in which a number of suitably equipped men jumped into the Thames below Blackfriars Bridge, and variously played musical instruments, smoked pipes, discharged guns and drank wine, as the tide took them upstream. Daniel pursued his idea for some years, by his own account receiving a gold medal from the Royal Society of Arts after surrendering the idea to them.
Personal flotation devices were not part of the equipment issued to naval sailors until the early 19th century, for example at the Napoleonic Battle of Trafalgar, although seamen who were press-ganged into naval service might have used such devices to jump ship and swim to freedom.
Following the 1852 sinking of the troopship Birkenhead, Ensign G.A. Lucas of the 73rd Regiment of Foot wrote "Cornet Bond, 12th Lancers, was...the only person to have a lifejacket – a privately owned Macintosh Life Preserver and seems to have got ashore fairly easily."
It was not until lifesaving services were formed that the personal safety of lifeboat crews heading out in pulling boats in generally horrific sea conditions was addressed. The modern life jacket is generally credited to the Inspector of Lifeboats at the Royal National Lifeboat Institution in the UK, Captain John Ross Ward. He created a brown cork vest in 1854 to be worn by lifeboat crews for both weather protection and buoyancy. They would be worn over the blue/grey waterproof oilskins.
In 1900, French electrical engineer, Gustave Trouvé, patented a battery-powered wearable lifejacket. It incorporated small, rubber-insulated maritime electric batteries not only to inflate the jacket, but also to power a light to transmit and receive SOS messages and to launch a distress flare.
In 1904 the rigid cork material was supplanted by pouches containing watertight cells filled with kapok, a vegetable material. These soft cells were much more flexible and comfortable to wear compared with devices using hard cork pieces. Orpheus Beaumont created the Salvus life jacket which was approved by the British Board of Trade in 1918. Kapok buoyancy was used in many navies fighting in World War II.
In 1972 yellow or red Beaufort synthetic foam life jackets supplanted kapok for 'inherently buoyant' flotation. These modern jackets could support not only the rescuer but the rescued at the same time.
The University of Victoria pioneered research and development of the UVic Thermo Float PFD, which provides superior protection from immersion hypothermia by incorporating a neoprene rubber "diaper" that seals the user's upper thigh and groin region from contact with otherwise cold, flushing and debilitating water.
During World War II, research to improve the design of life jackets was also conducted in the UK by Edgar Pask, the first Professor of Anaesthesia at Newcastle University. His research involved self-administered anaesthesia as a means of simulating unconsciousness in freezing sea-water. Pask's work earned him the OBE and the description of "the bravest man in the RAF never to have flown an aeroplane".
M1926 Inflatable Life Preserver Belt
The M1926 Life Preserver belt was issued to US infantry where they were on ships or near the water, in particular amphibious landings such as D-Day. The belt had two bottles that could be activated to inflate the belt if needed, or it could be blown up manually with a tube, if the bottles failed.Admiralty Pattern 14124 inflatable life ring
The Admiralty Pattern 14124 inflatable life ring was the main life preserver issued to British sailors at the start of World War II. It provided about of buoyancy. Its inherent flaw, and an issue with many life preservers at the time, was that it did not keep the wearer's head back out of the water while they were floating. This meant if they went unconscious they would roll forward and end up face down in the water and drown.Mae West
The Mae West was a common nickname for the first inflatable life preserver, which was invented in 1928 by Peter Markus , with his subsequent improvements in 1930 and 1931. The nickname originated because someone wearing the inflated life preserver often appeared to be as large-breasted as the actress Mae West. It was popular during the Second World War with U.S. Army Air Forces and Royal Air Force servicemen, who were issued inflatable Mae Wests as part of their flight gear. Air crew members whose lives were saved by use of the Mae West were eligible for membership in the Goldfish Club.British pilot Eric Brown noted in an interview that the Mae West device saved his life after he was forced into the ocean following the sinking of the aircraft carrier he was on, HMS Audacity, by a U-boat in WWII. Out of the twenty-four crew in his group in the water, the only two who survived were two pilots wearing Mae Wests, the rest were sailors wearing more basic flotation devices that kept them afloat, but did not keep their heads out of the water.
Specifications
Devices designed and approved by authorities for use by civilians differ from those designed for use by passengers and crew of aircraft and of commercial vessels. Devices used by government and military generally have features not found on civilian or commercial models, for example compatibility with other items worn, like a survival vest, bulletproof vest/body armor, equipment harness, rappelling harness, or parachute harness, and the use of ballistic nylon cloth to protect pressurized canisters used for inflating the vest from injuring the wearer if struck by a round from a firearm. The ballistic cloth keeps the fragments from the canister from becoming shrapnel injurious to the user.Design and regulation
Life jackets or life vests are mandatory on airplanes flying over water bodies, in which case they consist of a pair of air cells that can be inflated by triggering the release of carbon dioxide gas from a canister—one for each cell. Alternately, the cells can be inflated "orally", that is by blowing into a flexible tube with a one-way valve to seal the air in the cell. Life jackets must also be supplied on commercial seafaring vessels, be accessible to all crew and passengers, and be donned in an emergency.Flotation devices are also found in near water-edges and at swimming pools. They may take the form of a simple vest, a jacket, a full-body suit, or their variations suited for particular purposes. They are most commonly made of a tough synthetic fiber material encapsulating a source of buoyancy, such as foam or a chamber of air, and are often brightly colored yellow or orange to maximize visibility for rescuers. Some devices consist of a combination of both buoyancy foam and an air chamber. Retroreflective "SOLAS" tape is often sewn to the fabric used to construct life jackets and PFDs to facilitate a person being spotted in darkness when a search light is shone towards the wearer.
In the US, federal regulations require all persons under the age of 13 to wear a life jacket when in a watercraft under long. State regulations may raise or lower this number and must be followed when in that state's jurisdiction.
Types
Buoyancy aid (foam core)
Buoyancy aids are designed to allow freedom of movement while providing a user with the necessary buoyancy. They are also designed for minimal maintenance and as they are only constructed from foam and can be mass-produced inexpensively, making them one of the most common forms of PFDs.Some buoyancy aids also come designed especially for children and youth. These vests may include one or two understraps to be worn between the legs of the wearer and also a headrest flap. The understraps are designed to keep the vest from riding up when worn in the water and restrict the wearer from slipping out of the life vest. These straps are adjustable and are included on many different life vests designed to be worn by everyone from infants to adults.
The headrest flap is designed to help support the head and keep it out of the water. A grab handle is attached to the headrest to be used if needed to rescue or lift someone out of the water.
Buoyancy aids are rated by the amount of buoyancy they provide in pounds or Newtons - the minimum rating to be considered suitable as an adult life-jacket for offshore use is.