Anti-Drowning Mask

To ocean-flying airmen, one mental hazard is the fear of being trapped in a submerged plane after a crash landing at sea--as many an airman has been trapped and drowned. Last week the Army's Air Technical Service Command announced an ingenious device to help trapped flyers: an oxygen mask for breathing under water while they fight clear of the plane.

Captain W. C. Kulesz, of A.T.S.C.'s aeromedical laboratory at Wright Field, had a bright idea: why not use an ordinary portable oxygen cylinder and mask, such as bomber crews wear in high-altitude flight? The captain promptly donned a mask, jumped into a swimming pool. It worked. Further tests showed that with such a mask a man could breathe for 6 minutes at 10 ft. under water, for 3 1/2 minutes at 50 ft. Normally this should give a man, unless he is too badly injured, time to break out of a plane cabin or turret.

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