” As a drop in the ocean you take part in the current, ebb and flow. You swell slowly on the land and slowly sink back again…you wander vast distances in blurred currents and wash up on strange shores, not knowing how you got there. You mount the billows of huge storms and are swept back again into the depths….You had thought that your movement came from you and that it needed your decisions and efforts….but with every conceivable effort you would never have achieved that movement and reached those areas to which the sea and the great wind of the world brought you..
From endless blue plains you sink into black depths; luminous fish draw you, marvelous branches twine around from above. You slip through columns and twisting, wavering, dark-leaved plants, and the sea takes you up again in bright green water to white, sandy coasts, and a wave foams you ashore and swallows you back again, and a wide smooth swell lifts you softly and leads you again to new regions, to twisting plants, to slowly creeping slimy polyps, and to green water and white sand and breaking surf.” ~ Carl Jung
Image Source: South Shields Daily Photo
Lion's Gate Bridge, Vancouver, B.C.
Image: McCord Museum
Opened in 1938, the elegant Lions Gate Bridge is a Vancouver icon. Celebrated from the beginning for its grace and beauty, it spans the First Narrows of Burrard Inlet, marking the entrance to Vancouver's harbour and connecting the North Shore to Stanley Park and the city centre.
In the last six years, 26 people have leapt to their death from the iconic Lions Gate. More than three years ago, the B.C. Coroners Service recommended installing barriers on that bridge and four others in the Vancouver area that are also suicide magnets. [read more]
Brown Pelican dives
Image: Kelpscape
"Some people seem to think that jumping off the bridge is a light, airy way to end your life, like going to join the angels," said Marin County Coroner Ken Holmes, talking in the reception area of the coroner's office in San Rafael. "I'd like to dispel that myth. When you jump off the bridge, you hit the water hard. It's not a pretty death."
The impact is tremendous. The body goes from roughly 75 to 80 mph to nearly zero in a nanosecond. The physics of inertia being what they are, internal organs tend to keep going. The force of impact causes them to tear loose. Autopsy reports typically indicate that the jumpers have lacerated aortas, livers, spleens and hearts. Ribs are often broken, and the impact shoves them into the heart or lungs. Jumpers have broken sternums, clavicles, pelvises and necks. Skull fractures are common.
Which means you die one of two ways, or a combination of both. One, you hit the water and the impact kills you. Sometimes the jumper is knocked unconscious. Other times, the jumper survives for a time. The person can be seen flailing about in the water, trying to stay afloat, only to succumb to the extensive internal bleeding. Death can take seconds or minutes. Two, you drown. You hit the water going fast, and your body plunges in deep. Conscious or otherwise, you breathe in saltwater and asphyxiate.
You can usually tell which bridge jumpers drowned: Frothy mucus bubbles from the nose. [...]
For finding and retrieving bodies, time is of the essence. The sea reclaims bodies quickly. Fish eat them. Not just sharks, but little fish. They eat the eyes and other tender parts. As the body decays and opens up, all manner of sea creatures move in to feed. Eventually, the body comes apart.
A body floats because decay causes gases to form within its cavity. If that cavity is breached for any reason, the gas escapes and the body sinks.
And no one will ever know what happened.
[read more]
Shorebirds kelp feast
Image Kelpscape birds
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