busker

Why bodies in the water float facedown

Sorry to dwell on a topical subject but I've wondered about this all my life.

Back in my Hong Kong youth, sea bathing was enlivened at certain times of year by the prospect of coming across bloated wretches who hadn't made good their escape from the Mainland.

I forget which precise months, but there was a time when the tide from China was right to sweep them round and into Hong Kong waters. Of course, the Commies knew this too and would spoil-sportingly machine-gun them as they swam or clung to their rafts and rubber rings. Next was the sharks' turn, which left those that 'survived' intact to bob around into Gin Drinkers Bay or make messes of favorite paddling pools off Lan Tau or Ma Wan.

Come to think of it, this is just the sort of backwoods lore that Sedition will have known from tenderest age (if one can imagine him ever having  anything as foppish as a "tender age". )

He'd have worked it out around age 8 while wrasslin' toothsome scaley creatures in white waters off some New Mexican butte.

For the rest of us, there's Slate and the proximity of a civilised glass of chilled fino to cushion the grislier details.

Interesting. Apparently:

• L'eau for l'air: A cadaver in the water sinks as soon as the air in its lungs is replaced with water.
• Gas float: It's the bacteria in the gut and chest cavity that produce the gas that floats it to the surface.
• Rotation: The most buoyant body parts rise first, leaving head and limbs to drag behind the chest and abdomen.
• Forward drape: Arms, legs, and head are only able to drape forward from the body. Corpses tend to rotate so the torso floats facedown.
• Refloat: Decomposition continues underwater until the body becomes what rescue workers call a "refloat." (Splendid term to bandy). These being at a more advanced state of decay, they tend to be more evenly bloated and thus more likely to float faceup.

Well, I never. I'll be the Saloon Bar bore once I start trotting these gems out at cocktail hour down the Harbour.