Problem: a mariner is overboard, and the sea is deadly cold. Solution: a survival suit—or, as it’s less optimistically known, an immersion suit. The reason for hedging is because of a further problem: the standard Gumby suit can provide buoyancy and warmth for a limited time, and help is sometimes too far away in Alaska waters, or rescuers must wait hours until dawn’s early light.
Further solution: an innovative suit that functions more like a person-shaped life raft that extends the time for rescuers to arrive from hours to literal days. This month’s cover story “Not Your Grandfather’s Immersion Suit” by Jamey
Bradbury meets the inventor of the Arctic 10+ and the Alaskans testing its capabilities to the extreme. It’s just one part of the state’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.
