Navy Skills for Life – Water Survival Training – Clothing Inflation

I’m HM1 Richard O’Dell, search-and-rescue medical technician at Naval Survival Training Institute Pensacola. And this is Petty Officer Trejo. Trejo is performing drown proof
which he’s going to lead into the floatation of his trousers. So, before we begin, it’s very important that you see on land
the knot that must tied on the pant legs in order for the flotation to work. As you see, I took the pant legs and crossed them over; then bring it through, creating that knot. Now, what you do is bring that leftover slack and push it through,
pulling that nice and tight. That’s going to hold the air in. Now, Petty Officer Trejo, as you see, he took his boots off and he’s removing his trousers right now. After tying the ankles together, he will then zip up the zipper and button the button. Once he completes that, the first one he will use is the overhead method. He will try and inflate, in one motion, both trouser pant legs so that he doesn’t have to use as much energy. Placing the pant legs around his neck he’s able to then float without using any energy. The second method is the splash method. He’s holding the trouser waist wide open while he splashes air into the trouser pants filling up both legs. And the final method is the underwater breathing.
So he’s going to take his breath hold and use that to fill up both trouser pants. By him continuing to blow into both trouser legs, this allows the floatation to hold
for extended periods while waiting for a rescue vehicle to arrive.