Interview request from Slate: The Diving Bell Effect and Oxygen Diffusion

[RachelNuwer]

Hello ScubaBoard,

My name is Rachel Nuwer. I'm a New York-based freelance science journalist. I was hoping to find an expert here who could help me with a story I'm working on for Slate. I'm looking for someone who can briefly explain the basics of how diving bells work and also tell me about Henry's Law, specifically how CO2 and oxygen are dissolved and diffused in ocean water. This will be for a short explainer story on Slate.com about underwater air pockets, based on a recent news story describing how a man survived for nearly three days trapped under water (Nigerian sailor 'a phenomenon' for surviving in air pocket for 60 hours | World news | guardian.co.uk).

There was a lively discussion on this topic here: diffusion - Surviving under water in air bubble - Physics Stack Exchange

Please reach out to rachelnuwer at gmail dot com if you might be able to help me answer this question!

Thank you
Rachel

 

[boulderjohn]

I talked with Rachel and gave her the basics of decompression theory and why a long decompression process was required in this case. It would be helpful if someone with experience in saturation diving (of which I have none) would contact her.

 

[knotical]

Volunteering any assistance I can provide as well. No saturation experience, though.

And for those who missed it, here's the thread on the incident currently running on ScubaBoard: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/basic-scuba-discussions/457022-accidental-saturation-diver.html

 

[Griffo]

All I know is that those answers on the physics site all seem to ignore the temperature of the water which may matter a great deal

Solubility pump - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[knotical]

Here's the article:
Harrison Okene?s shipwreck air bubble: How could he survive underwater for three days? - Slate Magazine