Life Jackets

Author's Note: This piece was something that I originally started writing in Science class and I wanted to continue it, but I didn't really know how before my conference, so my teacher gave me suggestions in how to finish it.

"Help! Help! I can't---swim---please---help---somebody--I can't---bre---" As you may or may not know, drowning is one of the many dangerous effects of not learning how to swim and choosing not to wear a life jacket. Thousands of people die every day because of it. Most die because they think they don't need a life jacket, and then they go and jump in and quickly figure out that they don't know how to swim and there is no one to help. Life jackets really are a huge help when learning how to swim, or even just in case. Knowing what kinds of places have life jackets, learning how they really work, and learning what the best types of them are, are key in knowing what a life jacket can do for you.

You don't realize that your drowning until it actually happens. That moment when your body goes into panic mode, and life slowly slips away. Life jackets do many things to prevent this from happening. Say you are camping and there is a lake. If you want to go on a canoe, yes you are in a boat, but you could still fall in. Even if you are a good swimmer, they make you wear a life jacket as a precautionary measure. Every place with some type of water sport, makes you wear a life jacket. You don't realize what things different places do to keep us safe using life jackets, even if we think we don't need it.

Buoyancy is the force that pushes an object up when it is surrounded by water. Life jackets work by using different materials that are light enough to keep the life jacket and the person in the life jacket, afloat. It helps the person stay up because the life jacket's weight, plus your weight, is less than the weight of the water itself. It depends too, on how much matter you contain and how much you are displacing the water. If you weigh say, 400 pounds, the life jacket might have a harder time keeping you up because bigger objects have more gravitational pull to the earth because they are larger, plus you take up more space in the water. The lighter the object, the less water it needs to displace to be able to float.

I learned that there are two different, main types of life jackets that are used. One is a foam vest. Foam vests are used because they don't absorb water and if it did, it would then have the same weight as the water around it, therefore, it would sink, and it would bring the person right down with it. Another type is and air-filled vest. Air-filled vests are used because compared to water, air weighs nothing. Water is very heavy, being that the air vest would help the person float. The most commonly used vest is foam, because you don't have to blow it up right away or release a string that will fill it up. It is quick and ready to be used. 

Before doing this research, I never knew that there was science behind something as simple as a life jacket. I just thought that it floated because, well, it floated. I didn't even know why things float or how. Now I know that there are many different ways that life jackets benefit people and sometimes save a life thanks to science. If things as straightforward as a life jacket never would've been invented, there would be many problematic incidents in the water that sometimes could lead to death. Science really makes a huge difference in our lives whether we notice or not.