What is Red Bend

[detroit diver]

That is interesting. What is the origin of these terms (dexter, sinister,chief, etc)?

GlockDiver once bubbled...
A Bend is a term often used in heraldry to denote a stripe that crosses from top right to bottom left (or from the dexter chief to the sinister base if you want to be exact). A coat of arms that has such a strip would be described as having such a bend.

A bend that crosses from top left, to bottom right, such as the white stripe on a dive flag does, is callled a Bend Sinister (sinister chief to the dexter base).

The red may reference the color of the dive flag. Of course, the proper heraldic term is gules, but that may have just confused people.

I've never heard of the dive flag being referred to as a red bend. While my interpretation may be totally off, I can't think of anything non-disgusting that it could mean. :wacko:

 

[GlockDiver]

The etymology of those words are probably latin, perhaps middle french in the case of GULES. However, keep in mind that this was the common language of those times. Language has evolved to a point where those words are unfamiliar.

Many amatuer geneologists who are into heraldry (family crests/arms, whatever) seem to love to use those old words.

 

[GlockDiver]

It's like using thy and thou. It's nice in shakespeare, but go on a dive trip and announce "Thy air pressure is 3000 PSI", and see how fast they put you on O2.

 

[detroit diver]

Thanks!

 

[devilfish]

Actually the term "red bend" comes from ancient greek divers who would use a sheep skin bag to breathe from while repairing their sea fearing vessels. Since most were heavy pipe smokers, the bag was filled with second hand smoke. When the diver was down too long breathing from the bag they came up bend and also their lips were red from all the CO they were breathing. Thus the "red bend" term came to be.

 

[SeaJay]

"Red Bend" is a place associated with diving? As in, a place between two islets with fast moving, bending currents, which leads out of a harbor into the ocean? I can envision sailors using the term, "Red Bend."

Certainly you know the diver term, "the bends?" The proper term for the illness is "decompression sickness," or "DCS." Simply put, it's when the gasses in a diver's bloodstream and body tissues precipitates out due to a relatively quick reduction in pressure (too-fast of an ascent). Like a cold soda being opened on a hot summer day, the drastic reduction in pressure creates bubbles in a diver's blood that are notoriously painful and can very easily be lethal. To prevent DCS, divers are trained to ascend on a certain schedule... Such that the body never "fizzes."

Jacques Cousteau himself coined the phrase "the bends" after the painful situation happened to him, and his body reacted with painful convulsions... Resulting in a "bending and thrashing" of the body.

(Actually, for you really anal history buffs, the phrase was actually coined when Cousteau used pure oxygen in his first "aqualung." At 42 feet, his body went through what we now call, "oxygen toxicity," or "oxtox," and convulsed painfully. Seeing as he had no buddy to depend on (hey, there was only ONE aqualung in the whole world, after all!) he was very lucky to get out of the situation alive. Remember, there were no BC's invented yet. The event was later televised (reinacted) and the convulsions became known as "the bends." Since there was little understanding at the time that DCS and oxtox were different problems, the term, "the bends" was used to describe all scuba-related illnesses. Thus, the term became widely used to describe DCS, the most common and most feared scuba-related illness.)

Certainly calling a company "Red Bend" with this indication can't possibly be good.

But the term, "Red Bend" wouldn't really make much sense in that light. Instead, it would make considerably more sense that it was the name of a favorite dive site or perhaps the name of a favorite sunken wreck... If it has anything to do with diving at all.

Good luck figuring it out. Let us know. The mystery sounds intriguing.

 

[Wendy]

I think the term "the bends" was coined before our friend Jacques. I had heard (think I was watching PBS or something) that they used 'divers' when building the Brooklyn Bridge or some bridge. The divers were used to weld/install/whatever the pilings and they often suffered from decompression sickness and were all bent up in pain. Gee i'm really bad at repeating stories huh, maybe someone on the board has a clue about what I am talking about.

 

[SeaJay]

I dunno. I always believed that story, which I read in a Cousteau biography when I was a child.

Perhaps someone was crediting him with something that he really didn't invent?

The Brooklyn Bridge welders must have been using a bell... Right? How fascinating... Can you imagine working in a bell, a hundred feet below the surface, lit only with a candle?

Yeesh. Freaks me out, man. hno:

 

[Arnaud]

SeaJay once bubbled...
I dunno. I always believed that story, which I read in a Cousteau biography when I was a child.

Perhaps someone was crediting him with something that he really didn't invent?...

Wouldn't be the first time...

 

[GlockDiver]

This is one heck of riddle. We have heraldry, greek divers, Jacques Cousteau, the Brooklyn Bridge, and now how about this one:

In high pressure tubing, black bend restrictors denote tubing rated for 3000 PSI, while RED BEND restrictors denote tubing rated for 4500 PSI.

Perhaps RED BEND refers to some sort of super high pressure scuba tanks that only those who know about ultra super top secret military projects<TRAPPED BY CARNIVORE>