Hannes Lindemann v. Alain Bombard: debunking a myth?

Alain Bombard, a French doctor who made the transition from Europe to America on an inflatable raft, was mentioned in a previous story . The tragedy on the ridge Ethel, where during the tests of an inflatable raft, in which Bombar participated, claimed the lives of nine people. He himself survived. The reasons for what happened are the coincidence of various adverse circumstances.



My opinion was that Bombar was not directly to blame for what happened. The escort rescue boat was not suitable for participation in the trials. It is possible that some of those who ended up in the water after capsizing the raft and got on the boat took off life jackets ( this was mentioned in Russian , though I did not find the original source.) And then the boat turned over.



German physician Hannes Lindemann knew about the passage of Alain Bombard through the Atlantic. Lindemann himself, a rather experienced yachtsman and kayaker, accepted Bombard's achievement as a challenge.



All this happened in the 50s, after the war ended not so long ago. Some Frenchman, even a doctor, without serious experience of sailing on the seas, and even claiming that he regularly consumed sea water, was recognized as a pioneer, and also claims that the method he tested gives hope to shipwrecked people ...



Lindemann, with the perseverance inherent in professionals, was preparing himself for a solitary transatlantic transition. He made a boat like African pies; it was assumed that on pies Africans could go far from the coast of the continent. After the manufacture of the first boat, which quickly fell into disrepair, Lindemann had to make a second, on which he made the transition across the Atlantic. The main test was the fight against psychological fatigue with extremely insufficient periods of sleep, which sometimes drove the traveler to despair.



And Lindemann decides to repeat the transition, but after a preliminary training of the psyche with the help of an autogenic training. He makes sailing in a narrow sailing boat, essentially a kayak (Klepper Classic).



In preparation for the transition, the bombard mainly studied the effect of sea water on the physiological state of the body. He drank seawater in several doses in small portions, with the obligatory combination with the intake of slightly salted liquid - juice squeezed out of fish - as well as rainwater. In addition, he was filtering out a placton for oral administration in order to prevent vitamin deficiency.



Checking on the recommendations of Bombard, Lindemann drank seawater, albeit in high doses, and after a few days noted that his legs were swollen. After stopping taking such an affordable remedy and switching to drinking from the available supplies, the swelling stopped, and the legs returned to normal. Squeezing juice out of fish, according to Lindemann, he did not succeed. And rainwater does not pour every day like a bucket. Bombara found rain only on the 23rd day ...



In the end, Lindemann accused Bombard of drinking and eating from a secretly loaded supply. He mentioned that, according to eyewitness accounts, supplies from one of the vessels were loaded onto the raft. It is also known that, shortly before the end of the transition, Bombar was boarding the vessel he met, had lunch there, after which he suffered from indigestion for several days. As he notes, due to a sharp change in diet.

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So what does science say, and what are the current recommendations of official organizations? While it’s clear what muck this sea water is. (I recall how it happened to me when I swallowed the Black Sea and the White Sea water - after all, there are two big differences.) The World Health Organization and NASA, in particular, taking into account the experience of Lindemann, categorically do not recommend consuming sea water.



An article in Spiegel, incidentally, mentions experiments conducted on prisoners of concentration camps at the end of the war. The subjects, according to the division into groups, were left without drinking, forced to take, only salt water, etc. The same article also mentions a report from the French army that a person can survive for six days using salt water for drinking.



Another source refers to the words of Thor Heyerdahl during his passage on the Kon-Tiki raft, that ancient travelers, sailing on rafts across the Pacific Ocean, could well catch fish falling between raft logs, eat it and its juice.

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What are the conclusions from all this? Which of the two doctors mentioned is right, and in what? In fact, both Bombard and Lindemann, above all, are advised not to lose their presence of mind. In this case, it will become possible to rationally dispose of available resources. Recommended: take drinking water, if available, regularly and in small doses. And also - to fish, hunt birds and mammals using improvised means. Juice from fish - squeeze or suck. The bombar ate a raw caught bait bird, although this seems disgusting. Lindemann in the first days killed a dolphin and drank his blood.

(I recall children's feelings from taking fish oil, this muck was recommended as a fortified remedy, because then we only ate bananas with oranges on New Year's Eve.)



As a result of the transitions, both significantly lost weight. Lindemann finished without any signs of serious harm to his health. The bomb, according to Wikipedia, at the time of the end of the experiment significantly undermined its health ... it lost 25 kg, the level of red blood cells and hemoglobin was on the verge of fatal, he had a serious visual impairment, his toenails fell out, his whole skin was covered with a rash and small acne. In general, his body was dehydrated and extremely depleted ...



Lindemann mentions evidence of the loading of water and food onto the Bombard raft, in particular in Las Palmas, in the Canary Islands, with more than 100 liters of water delivered on board. It is possible to ask yourself another bad question: If Bombar was sailing on a rubber boat manufactured by Zodiac, then this company, which soon began to produce the Bombard model, was not interested in accompanying the traveler? But why, then, are the differences in the state of the body of both testers at the finish so significant? Just because Lindemann periodically periodically used therapeutic agents - penicillin injections, tablets, etc., and did Bombar try to completely abandon such drugs? For example, I remember that he performed an operation to remove a tooth without any anesthesia, using a knife and a mirror.

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With all the speculations, as well as differences in the opinions of experts, both deserve all respect in view of, for example, the following cases. At Bombar an inflatable pillow fell into the sea, he jumped into the input, swam after it. Still an experienced swimmer, crossed the English Channel. At this time, the floating anchor refused, and the raft began to quickly carry away. The bomber was catching up with the raft, sailing with a crawl, he was able to return aboard with all his might ... devoid of a comfortable pillow. Lindemann's boat had a steering wheel tore off, and when he installed the spare steering wheel, he slipped out of his hands. Lindemann dived several meters deep, he managed to catch the steering wheel and get out to the boat.

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