First Day of the WMRC

The first day of the congress and the "amazing-factor" is still rolling along. The line-up of compelling speakers was impressive and to top that off, there was tons of good information and networking from the trade show floor.

The opening speech was from the secretary general of the IMO and he sang the praises of the IMRF but also added a lot of compelling thoughts for all SAR crews. There was a lot of that today coming from the IMO chairman, Minister of communications from China, President of the Maritime Rescue Japan Association and others. The Head of the Assistance devision of the International Red Cross was also there to discuss possible cooperation with the IMRF and gave a great overview of all the inter workings of the ICRC - I actually think I finally understand it!

The three really compelling talks today were all in the afternoon. The first was from a member of Sweden´s SAR crew that traveled to Africa and helped set up a lake rescue group as an IMRF project - taking them from the point of never having seen a Compass - through to being an effective SAR resource with 50 rescues under their belts so far - very inspiring.

Next was another IMO - type chat - but based from the perspective of someone from the MCA (Maritime Coastguard Agency - Britian´s Coast Guard Government group) He spoke About mass rescue incidents - basically how poorly the world is equipped to deal with the fallout should one of the newer massive cruise ships ever have a problem - even for the best trained and equipped SAR groups - it would overwhelm any resources currently available. He also looked at the problems facing recovery of persons from the latest big-ships with Freeboard that is Starting to exceed 15-20m

The final talk was the most compelling - I can now officially say I´ve met someone that had been dead for several hours and we had a very good chat! DR. Anna Bagenholm holds the world record for surviving the lowest body core temperature after falling into an icy river in Norway, being sucked under the ice by the Current, and getting stuck there for almost 40 minutes. Her heart stopped and it took almost 5 hours to revive her. Her body core temperature dipped Below 14°C.
Her and her husband gave an awe inspiring talk About Hypothermia, and both being doctors from northern Norway, could provide very specific information for SAR crews - above and beyond her personal experience. Both Kellei and I, and everyone else in the room, were rapt throughout this talk and learned some valuable new information. The critical bit was this - if someone is hypothermia and they seem to be dead - NEVER assume they are - Anna is living proof - but the science behind it is clear as well keep up with CPR - they noted the Current record in Norway of a hypothermic person being revived was after 5 hours of CPR!

There has been a lot of interest in the SAR Management System I developed - but it´s all networking based - a spoke at length with a group from the KNRM (Netherlands) and should be meeting with their database project manager some time tomorrow - he is also a crew member and we couldn´t pry him off the rescue runner training to chat About computer stuff - go figure :)

Kellei and I skipped the formal dinner tonight (no appropriate attire and way too tired) but we did enjoy a beer at the waterfront kafe and now have some time to leaf through the talks tomorrow ans choose which ones we can attend - there are 4 rooms going at once so we have to pick which talks we can attend.

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