I have seen and read all the posts and TV shows about getting out of wet clothes as fast as possible when it is cold out- and they all make sense as far as they go.

Stupid Question- If I get into a plastic bag/garbage bag, am I better off being naked or still wearing the wet clothing? What is freezing me most about being wet- conduction/evaporation....
If what is killing me is evaporation, would i be better off:
a) wrapping myself in a trash bag (dressed)
b) wrapping myself in a trash bag (naked)
c) not wrapped in anything

while I start a fire?

not trying to troll, i have a trash bag in my kit, big enough to get over me, not sure which is optimum.


Thanks for input

I believe there is some room for variation.

What material is the clothing that you are wearing? For example-

If you are wearing fleece/wool it is fairly easy to wring out the clothing and maintain some degree of warmth. Placing a bag over this damp clothing would seem best.

If the clothing is cotton, it might be better to remove and wear just the plastic bag until you can dry out your clothing.

Pete

some eye opening advice i got some years ago was that drying fleece by wearing it uses up a lot of calories.

1. Consider putting a heatsheet-type bivy in your kit in place of the plastic bag. Heatsheet-type material reflects back a high percentage of your body heat and will act as a relector to trap a fire's heat.

2. I am going to assume you would not usually be far from your camp, or someplace with more resources, if you are encountering a hypothermia hazard equipped only with a garbage bag for spare clothing. RTB instead of staying in place and trying to build a fire.

3. Going with the scenario, however, perhaps you should build a large fire [or two] right away, then huddle naked at [or between] the fire[s] while drying clothes. Whether naked in a plastic bag without insulation or in wet clothes, you are losing body heat fast. You may not remain functional for long without replacing heat - get the heat source[s] going!

4. If there is no realistic hope for large fire[s] and all you have is the garbage bag, then consider stripping, getting into the garbage bag, wringing out your clothes, and hope you are wearing some high-tech stuff that absorbs little or no water so that it makes sense to put them back on.

This is 1/2 real/ 1/2 not-

I almost fell in the lake 1 mile from our house, in suburbs- I was just out for a walk, hit a patch of ice, almost went off trail.

In real world I would return home very cold.

Guess what I was wondering- Is it the evaporation of the water that would make one get so cold so fast? If so, would wrapping myself in the garbage bag stop the evaporation, and help me stay warm long enough for fire?

Or would the water in the clothes conduct too much heat away anyway?

If this helps I will give you my experience from this past Saturday. I knew rain was in the forecast, that it could at times be significant and our team might be dispatched for some swiftwater rescue calls. I decided to wear a synthetic t-shirt, nylon pants, wool-blend socks, cotton underwear and a cotton overshirt thinking I would strip off the cotton shirt and don a long-sleeve Nomex t-shirt and my dry suit.

Unfortunately, when we got hit out for our first call, I forgot my Nomex t-shirt and did not have time to put on my dry suit before responding. At one point I had to exit the unit to check a flooded roadway to see if we could safely proceed. I got quite drenched, even under my PFD.
Just as we finished with that call we got dispatched to another call so I could not change. We put the heater on high to try and stay warm and dry out a little. We got a break in running calls and stopped for gas and dinner. I removed the cotton shirt and tried to air dry my remaining clothes while eating, but did develop a chill.

Just as we finished dinner we got another call and this time due to having to enter deep moving water I put on my dry suit over my wet/damp clothes. We ran calls for several additional hours wearing my dry suit the remaining time and was warm the entire time. When we finally got back to the station, I hit the couch for an hour still in my dry suit and was warm. After an hour of not running any more calls, I decided to call it a night and head home. As soon as I removed my dry suit, I got cold.

While a dry suit is thicker than a plastic bag, it is not insulated. Based upon my experience, I think if you had to be wet, it would be better to try and remove the excess water from your clothes and place the plastic bag over your damp clothing.

Pete

This has been my experience.

I was in a survival class a few years ago where we did this for real. The air temp was about 45 degF, and it was breezy. I don't know what the lake water temp was but it felt cold. Wearing what we would normally wear for a dayhike in those temps, we did this drill:

1) Walk out to the end of a 100' dock on the lake

2) Jump in the water fully clothed and swim to shore

3) Wait a few minutes while standing in the breeze

4) Remove clothes, wring them out & put them back on (no George Constanza jokes allowed!)

5) Put on our emergency plastic bags (cutting a face hole in one corner and wearing it like a poncho)

6) Put our hands in a bucket of icewater (with ice cubes!) and hold them in for 1 minute

7) Jog over to another area and start a fire with the gear in our pockets

I recall that by the time I was sparking my fire, my long underwear and Patagonia fleece jacket were only damp and they felt very comfortably warm. It took longer for my thin Ex Officio nylon pants to dry but since I had a fire going by then it was OK.

However I've not tried this drill with cotton clothing. So in that case it might be best to ditch it, I'm not sure.

BTW in this drill I learned that the container I used for my Spark-Lite was not really waterproof and the Spark-Lite wouldn't work. The REI Storm matches saved the day. The vaseline cotton balls worked great.

From my Siberian childhood experience:
1. Take off your wet clothes immediately, put shoes back on though.
2. Run around and swing your arms to warm up and to dry out (don't forget to wring and dry your long hair too if any );
3. Put on your bag when the skin is dry (poncho style is the best, but if the bag is large enough - don't cut the top use it as a tent for now, breathe inside).
4. Wring out or press your clothes vigorously (I've been jumping on mine at the stage 2 above).
5. Put them on, bag on top (cut the face opening now), and then take care of the fire, or run for shelter.

My expereince is that fleece is great in these kinds of scenarios. The fiber does not retain water, and can be easily wrung almost dry. If shielded from the wind by a plastic bag or a good windproof shell, you will warm up fairly quickly.

Build a fire or light your stove ASAP!

It's the air inside the insulation of your clothes (e.g. fleece) that provides the real barrier against heat conduction. If you get the clothes wet, you will lose heat fast. Watch Bear Grylls on some of his videos in places like Siberia. As soon as he gets out of the water - he rolls around in the snow to dry his skin. Then he puts on fresh dry clothes.

I have never immersed myself in ice water. But I have been pretty soaked in the mountains and seriously chilled out. If you don't have some fresh dry clothes to put on pretty fast - then you better have another source of heat ... like a good roaring campfire. Plastic bags and mylar are not going to do you any good if your body is already seriously chilled. You'll get hypothermia really fast.

I suggest that you go and experiment. It's still cold in most parts of the country. Pick a snowy area beside the road, or do it late at night. Either way - leave your car running and the heater on inside. It would be smart to take a friend with you :-)

cheers,
Pete #2

a little physics...it takes an additional 540 heat calories (1000 heat calories = 1 food calorie) to evaporate 1 gram of water to a vapor if the water is already at 100C... so for every 2 grams of water you evaporate using your body as a heat source, you are using up a little over a food calorie of energy... there are about 20 drops in a gram (ml) of water

I don't remember where I read this, don't know if it's true, don't know how it would be an option if there was no snow...

The advice was to roll in the snow in your wet clothing, as the snow will absorb the water. Or most of the water. If it does work, would it work well enough so you wouldn't have to undress to wring out the clothing?

Any thoughts on this? True? False?

Sue

The purpose of rolling in the snow while wet is exactly that,the snow will absorb alot of the water,& It will also create a Barrier for cold wind to penetrate,so you are warmer than otherwise.It actually works as,I've done it some many yrs ago in the Military for Survival training,& though it worked,I still froze up quite a bit,until we huddled together to create more warmth.

It helps a lot if you work to aggressively remove as much water as possible from fleece before putting it back on. Wringing doesn't work too well but spinning it over your head, letting centrifugal force remove water, and whacking it down hard on a flat, dry surface, both remove a considerable amount of water. Work it for a minute or two and you can get fleece remarkably dry. That and the exercise helps build heat.

You still will have some moisture left but far less than what you have with just a quick shake.

just my thoughts from a "dip" in the Mississippi River at 10 below zero.it's a long story i have told here but it involved saving our dog,a happy go lucky retriever,who busted thru the edge of an ice sheet with fast moving water very close.i chose to make the 20 minute walk back to the car and the five minute ride home rather than wait for the 911 gang to show up,people were getting cell phones out and i waved them off.if i had been alone in the woods a i would have used a trash bag like a poncho to hold as much heat in as possible while i gathered wood to make a fire.i would not want to loose any heat to the air.two fires to stand between and dry my clothes would have been my first thought but any sort of fire would work.on the walk back the clothes froze but the only part that was too cold to stand were my hands in wet nylon gloves,i used my Wife's,small but enough to keep the cold air off them.
now the follow up is something to think about.at home the dog and i got onto a hot shower,i had to wait until my jacket thawed a bit before i could get it off.our dog was in no better shape and just sat under the hot water in a heap...now when it was over and i had a cup of hot coco and my Wife toweled the dog off i went to bed and slept for hours..note that,slept for hours.i would think anyone who get wets and comes out of hypothermia is going to be in the same situation and not have a ounce of energy left to do very much of anything except recover.now i'm talking about the real thing here,not getting damp on a hike and standing by a fire to warm up before heading off to camp down the trail someplace...so now you have two problems to think over.not just what order your going to use the trash bag in but what your going to do when you saved yourself but have no energy to much else...and yes,the dog spent the rest of the day sleeping....

Consider carrying a backpackers towel to dry off. Even a tiny one 12 x 18 will do

Spoken as someone who had to rescue my (just married) wife's dog from drowning because he "JUST would not let go of that stick wrapped in lake weeds", I empathize.

The question I have is did someone accompany you on your walk back to the car, and the subsequent drive home? I would be worried if you took off on your own for the walk and then had problems.

If you did have company, would it have changed your mind regarding waiting for 911 if you had to go it alone?

"...i went to bed and slept for hours..note that,slept for hours.i would think anyone who get wets and comes out of hypothermia is going to be in the same situation and not have a ounce of energy left to do very much of anything except recover."

Very nice piece of information! And it sounds entirely logical. Another thing to be aware of, although it doesn't fit the TV/movie syndrome...

Sue

One of the things I carry in a vacume sealed bag is INstant Jello that is NOT the sugar free. That give you the sugars, carbs and the nutriance to comabat the sleepy feeling. Muscles twitching and shivering takes a lot of enrgy, and you have to feed that need and contend with the exhaustion that will follow.

From my expeiance taking a dip in the Ocean in Alaska, (sitka) It was the fact that I had fleece on and was able to get out of the watter fast. but I still had a few miles to kayak back to shore. In extreem cold you may and will need to shed the cotton but I have found that flece will evacuate to a damp state very quickly.

I've been running on the treadmill at the gym a few times a week and, when I do, I get my cotton shirt about 70% saturated (gross, I know). When I leave the gym, I toss on a fleece over the cotton t-shirt. 5 minutes later, I'm home and too hot in the 62* house to wear the fleece. Once removed, the cotton t-shirt begins to chill me pretty quickly, even with body temp up from the run, 62* ambient and no wind. If I take it off and stand around making the morning brew in just my shorts, I'm much warmer than with the wet shirt on.

All this to say, if you're wearing cotton and you get wet, I think you're better off removing it entirely. If I recall correctly, the aboriginals of Australia weathered generations of winters unclothed next to fires...

Don't ever wear cotton outdoors in the first place (except for bandanas and bandages - even my full brimmed has are now synthetic).

I'm not sure of the scientific explanation, but I can tell you from personal experience that certain fabrics remain "survivable" warm when they're soaking wet. Example...

I went snowboarding one time in Japan. I had to buy new gloves on the mountain. The labels were in Japanese, and I don't read Japanese. I decided to buy some gloves that were clearly fleece (polyester) on the inside. That day it started raining pretty hard on the mountain. The water went straight through my cheap-ass gloves. Although my hands were uncomfortable from the wetness, my hands were not unbearably cold. The glove exteriors, although worthless for waterproofing, must have provided a bit of insulation for warmth. The saving grace was the fleece insulation underneath the glove exteriors. By the way, I'm the type of person with hands that get cold easily.

During lunch time, I had a chance to wring out my gloves. They were completely full of water, but the fleece insulation did wring out more easily than other fabrics would have. It did stop raining, and I was able to continue snowboarding with gloves that were about 95% dry.

Bigtoe..my wife was with me and there were other people at this riverside free run dog park.in the summer it's wonderful in the winter it's very pretty but you have to watch your step.i was wet from the armpits down and had on the minus ten winter clothes,long johns,lined pants,heavy shirt,down vest under a 20-40 jacket,boots.
i knew if i stood around waiting for 911 i would be colder than a fast walk back to the car and a short drive home.my heart was pounding all the way back but i never starting shivering,just cold and wet.



this is the place,the brown dog was the one i went in after.this photo was taken later in the winter.

BEAUTIFUL DOGS!

But their manias will get them into trouble sometimes!

Sue

Thanks Sue!..we keep them away from the river in the winter if there is any kind of ice shelf they can walk out on,most time we just stay back in the woods.just as a side note,because the Mississippi and the dog park is just a short walk,and a couple minutes by car,from the house i never think about taking any sort of survival gear,i mean what could happen----

Only dry, powdery snow will absorb water - the kind of powder you find when the temperatures are well below the freezing point of water. If it is 0C/32F or above the snow will be wet and won't absorb anything. Snow that has transformed into larger ball-shaped crystals won't be of much help, no matter the temperatures.



Dunno, haven't actually tried it - but I seriously don't think so.

I think it is a 3-part problem

1) You have to heat the water next to your skin and the water in your clothes. Water has a very high heat capacity, requiring lots of energy to raise the temperature of said water.

2) Evaporation. The colder, the more pronounced effect. Wind increases the evaporation a lot.

3) I haven't the data to back it up, but my gut reaction is that heat conduction through the wet clothes is the least of your worries.

Anyway, I second the procedure outlined above by several others: Strip down, wring semi-dry, put back on, add vapor barrier. Then think about your options about evacuating, building a fire, bivuacking or just continuing your merry way, depending on circumstances.



Yes. Fleece is amazing stuff, but I really don't like it when it's wet. Wring it fairly dry, put it on. I am sure there must be more synthetic fibres with similar properties out there.

Wool is even more amazing, and my #1 choice for outdoor underlayer (with the exception of my cotton boxer shorts, which has been nowhere near of killing me - yet). For the middle and insulation layer I mix wool and fleece, depending on circumstances.

May help:

http://www.yukonman.com/cold_water.asp

"Consider carrying a backpackers towel to dry off. Even a tiny one 12 x 18 will do"

Very good suggestion.
I'll add a small towel to my rucksack this weekend. :-)

Pete #2

I'm thinking the same thing Pete. Think I'll store it in something waterproof.