Once you've gotten into the life raft that life vest has served its purpose, now the challengs it so stay alive for weeks if necessary.
So a water purification kit and a life vest made out of waterproof, floating basic nutrition pellets could make a big difference. Could make something like malted milk balls so they floated and are waterproof until you peeled off the protective wrapping. That or candy bar shaped.
These would be crammed with as much nutrition as possible and I'm guessing since you need about 1,000 calories a day to survive, and using the malted milk ball candy as a model, each being 140 calories, just a handful of these a day could keep you alive, and a life vest could carry hundreds of hands full.
This with a rudimentary fishing kit in one pocket and a water purification device in the other your odds of surviving could be greatly improved.
There's no reason these couldn't even be tasty and sweet like a candy.
(Inspired after watching the movie Unbroken)-- doctorremulac3, Feb 02 2022 Unbroken https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1809398/This would have helped these guys. [doctorremulac3, Feb 02 2022] Monty Python lifeboat sketch https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2rsmd7 [doctorremulac3, Feb 03 2022] A few reasonably recent (within the last decades) lost at sea stories. https://www.popular.../g2770/lost-at-sea/Really not too common. Thank god. [doctorremulac3, Feb 07 2022] Drowing death statistics https://www.who.int...deaths%20worldwide. [doctorremulac3, Feb 07 2022] [+]!!-- Voice, Feb 02 2022 Thank you Voice.
And the thing to consider, when you're jumping out of a sinking boat or airplane, you don't have time to grab a lot of stuff and even if you did, you'd have to carry an additional huge backpack full of food to get all the calories you could get from this thing. That would most definately add to your peril, not subtract from it.
You've got a big bulky life jacket on already, why not have it do the two most important jobs necessary to save your life, short term and long term? Keep you afloat till you get to your life raft, and alive till you get rescued.-- doctorremulac3, Feb 03 2022 Stitch this croissant into the lining [+].-- pertinax, Feb 03 2022 Good idea but I'm still sticking to bringing edible companions as well.-- AusCan531, Feb 03 2022 [+] Even an inflatable life vest like they have on airplanes could have a small amount of survival gear and a little food attached.-- scad mientist, Feb 03 2022 +++ genius idea!-- xandram, Feb 03 2022 //Good idea but I'm still sticking to bringing edible companions as well.//
LOL. See link.-- doctorremulac3, Feb 03 2022 ^Heh, I don't remember seeing that one.-- AusCan531, Feb 07 2022 Don't you think that all the edible filling would likely attract bears?-- pocmloc, Feb 07 2022 I've heard there's good eating on a bear.-- pertinax, Feb 07 2022 I think at the point you're so unlucky that you're on a life raft in the middle of the ocean and get attacked by a bear there's very little technology can do for you.
"I've been on this life raft for 3 weeks, at least these life jacket bars are delicious. Life's not that bad... WHAT THE HELL!!!!!" RRROOOOAAAARRRRR!-- doctorremulac3, Feb 07 2022 Defeating the bear wasn't that big of a deal. Richard Parker was, after all, famished. And now that he's satisfied, I'm a little more safe...-- RayfordSteele, Feb 07 2022 Great idea! [+].
//I'm guessing since you need about 1,000 calories a day to survive,//
Maybe at the start, and maybe if the environment is stressful. But otherwise the body quickly realizes what's up and efficiency rises. The best strategy is really about dragging out starvation, when you already have 10-40 days to play with.
I think a big part of nutrition is neglected. Macronutrients/energy is at the forefront of people's thinking, then it jumps off into micronutrients. The micronutrients are named so for a reason, you really don't need very much of them. Life at a basic level is just ion gradients. You can tell, because dead things don't have them. Most of your energy expenditure (at rest) is just maintaining Na+/K+ separation across plasma membranes. Doing work, is just deliberately de-separating those ions and having to fix it repeatedly. Anyhow, my point is, that just calories might not be the best way to delay starvation, it's not very well researched as far as I can tell. A combined Na/K/Ca/Mg pill might be a good way to go, especially as lots of energy is expended by organs like the kidney trying to hold onto those salts.
Perhaps the salts can be manipulated a little, Mg is the default "Off" ion, having plenty might be a good way to lower the energy expenditure floor.-- bs0u0155, Feb 07 2022 All that is definitely waaaaay out of my area of expertise.
Presumably these would be designed by nutritionists to have all those life saving goodies, vitamins n stuff.
I'm curious, how often, in this age of satellite communications, GPS, etc do people get stranded at sea with nobody knowing where they are? Is this even a thing any more?-- doctorremulac3, Feb 07 2022 If you're an orphan off some third-world location without any of that tech available, sure.
Most life rafts have GPS trackers these days, but I'm not sure if they come with cellphone rechargers. Maybe that should be a thing...-- RayfordSteele, Feb 07 2022 Yea, I'm not sure if the people who could afford this would even need it. I dont' think there's ANY way to cross the ocean without massive amounts of redundant technologies tracking your location.
Found an interesting page on the subject. (link)
Now you could say that the reason there are so few stories is because these are the ones who survived making it notable. A better stastic might just be people lost at sea every year that AREN'T saved.
Found that drowning is a major cause of death world wide. Not just in the ocean, wells etc. See link.-- doctorremulac3, Feb 07 2022 No one's gonna mention the issue with shelf life? According to a cursory Google search, malted milk balls have a shelf life of about 10 months properly stored at room temperature. In a hot, humid environment typically found at sea where such strandings seem to occur, I imagine that shelf life will be rather shorter. Could cause issues keeping edible ones in inventory. That, and if you get even a small tear in one, suddenly you've got a pest problem on board.-- 21 Quest, Feb 08 2022 Maybe freeze-dried food packs such as what astronauts eat? Doesn't help the water situation.-- RayfordSteele, Feb 08 2022 //malted milk balls have a shelf life of about 10 months properly stored at room temperature.//
I was only referring to the buoyancy of that particular product. Plus malted milk balls probably aren't the greatest survival food. This would be designed to give the maximum survival benefit by volume meeting the floatation, shelf life and nutrition needs.-- doctorremulac3, Feb 08 2022 random, halfbakery