Oxygen saturation on normal skydives

[kallend 2,027]

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bill,

do your figures have any corolation into starting out at diffrent elevations or does it even matter say wheni was jumping colorado with a field elevation of 6k msl or utah witha elevation of 4.5k msl does it not mater once a person has aclimated to the higher altitude, when we would go to 12.5k agl in utah wer were right at 17k msl but used no o2 ever, and never felt hypoxic (that i knew of for myself) does the o2 levels decreas at a set rate so that whenyou are "normal" at a set altitude when you go up an equal altitude as some one say 4k lower the numbers would be the same?

www.princeton.edu/~oa/safety/altitude.html

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[billvon 3,006]

>does the o2 levels decreas at a set rate so that whenyou are "normal" at
>a set altitude when you go up an equal altitude as some one say 4k lower
>the numbers would be the same?

I think your question is - "If I'm acclimated to 5000 feet, is going to 15,000 feet for me the same as going to 10,000 feet for a sea level jumper?" And I believe the answer is no. You will do better at 15,000 feet than the sea level jumper does at 15,000 feet though.

We all have similar chemistries when it comes to hemoglobin's affinity for oxygen, which sets the maximum altitude we work well at. Acclimation can shift the curve a little, and making more red blood cells can help make up for a partial lack in oxygenation - so you'll always be better than a sea level jumper. But it's not 1:1.

[wingnut 0]

thanks

______________________________________
"i have no reader's digest version"

[SCR10480 0]

I cannot thank you enough for this! I too thought that I was "just getting old" and needed to step up my workout routine.

[dorbie 0]

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>Your body cannot "store" oxygen.

Well, that's probably an issue of semantics. As I'm sure you're aware, we regularly jump from 25-26K without bailout oxygen. The way it works is that you remain on oxygen before the jump, then go off it and jump. The O2 stored in your lungs/blood/tissues are sufficient to keep you going until you descend to about 12,000 feet, at which point your lungs can once again give you enough O2.

True Bill... There is supersaturation. As an example. One day I was breathing 100% O2 for about 4 hours straight at 25,000 feet. Decided to see how long I could hold my breathe. (Now my normal sea level ambient air breathhold is about 1 min 30 sec.) That day, due to supersat, 3 minutes easy... There ya go...

Interesting, I've been trained that the impetus to breathe is actually caused by the buildup of CO2. If for example you hyperventilate & purge as much CO2 as possible from your body it's possible for someone (an active swimmer for example) to hold their breath and actually black out before they fully feel the urgent need to breathe.

Holding your breath and needing to breathe indicates you have a buildup of CO2. Blacking out indicates you're low on oxygen. Quite what you demonstrated in your experiment therefore isn't as clear as you may think.