Survival Skills - Retaining Body Heat

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/....Nazi_human_experimen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/....Nazi_human_experimen

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/....holocaust/experiside

Freezing To determine the most effective means for treating German pilots who had become severely chilled from ejecting into the ocean, or German soldiers who suffered extreme exposure on the Russian front, Rascher and others conducted freezing experiments at Dachau. For up to five hours at a time, they placed victims into vats of icy water, either in aviator suits or naked; they took others outside in the freezing cold and strapped them down naked. As the victims writhed in pain, foamed at the mouth, and lost consciousness, the doctors measured changes in the patients' heart rate, body temperature, muscle reflexes, and other factors. When a prisoner's internal body temperature fell to 79.7°F, the doctors tried rewarming him using hot sleeping bags, scalding baths, even naked women forced to copulate with the victim. Some 80 to 100 patients perished during these experiments.



https://www.jewishvirtuallibra....ry.org/documents-reg

Report by SS-Untersturmführer Rascher on intense cooling experiments in Dachau, September 10, 1942
(Trials of War Criminals Before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals - Washington, U.S Govt. Print. Off., 1949-1953, Vol. I, p. 220):

The experimental subjects were placed in the water, dressed in complete flying uniform, winter or summer combination, and with an aviator's helmet. A life jacket made out of rubber kapok was to prevent submerging. The experiments were carried out at water temperatures varying from from 2.5 to 12 Centigrade. In one experimental series, the occiput (brain stem) protruded above the water, while in another series of experiments the occiput (brain stem) and back of the head were submerged in water.

Electrical measurements gave low temperature readings of 26.4 in the stomach and 26.5 in the rectum. Fatalities occurred only when the brain stem and the back of the head were also chilled. Autopsies of of such fatal cases always revealed large amounts of free blood, up to one-half litter, in the cranial cavity.

Report by Prof. Dr. Holzloehner, Dr. Rascher & Dr. Finke regarding cooling experiments, October 10, 1942
(Trials of War Criminals Before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals - Washington, U.S Govt. Print. Off., 1949-1953, Vol. I, p. 226-243):

If the experimental subject was placed in the water under narcosis, one observed a certain arousing effect. The subject began to groan and made some defensive movements. In a few cases a state of excitation developed. This was especially severe in the cooling of head and neck. But never was a complete cessation of the narcosis observed. The defensive movements ceased after about 5 minutes. There followed a progressive rigor, which developed especially strongly in the arm musculature; the arms were strongly flexed and pressed to the body. The rigor increased with the continuation of the cooling, now and then interrupted by tonic-clonic twitchings. With still more marked sinking of the body temperature it suddenly ceased. These cases ended fatally, without any successful results from resuscitation efforts.

Letter from SS-Untersturmführer Dr. Rascher to SS-Sturmbannführer Rudolph Brandt, October 3, 1942
(Trials of War Criminals Before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals - Washington, U.S Govt. Print. Off., 1949-1953, Vol. I, p. 221-222):

The Reich leader SS wants to be informed of the state of the experiments. I can announce that the experiments have been concluded, with the exception of those on warming with body heat. The final report will be ready in about 5 days. Prof. Holzloehner, for reasons I cannot fathom, does not himself want to make the report to the Reich Leader Himmler and has asked me to attend to it. This report must be made before 20 October, because the great Luftwaffe [German air-force] conference on freezing takes place on Nuernberg on 25 October. The report on the results of our research must be made there, to assure that they be used in time for the troops. May I ask you to arrange for a decision from the Reich Leader regarding the final report to him, and the submission to him of the relevant material? Today I received your letter of 22 September 1942, in which the Reich Leader orders that the experiments on warming through body heat must absolutely be conducted. Because of incomplete address it was delayed. Today I asked Obersturmbannführer Sievers to send a telegram to the camp commander immediately, to the effect that four Gypsy (Roma) (Roma) women be procured at once from another camp. Moreover, I asked SS Obersturmbannführer Sievers to take steps to have the low pressure chamber ready for use.

Source: Shamash


https://archive.org/details/is....bn_9781585444397/pag
Testing the limits : aviation medicine and the origins of manned space flight


https://associationofanaesthet....ists-publications.on
The Nazi Hypothermia Experiments: Forbidden Data?

These abominations were carried out in the name of racial purity. The doctor responsible for the hypothermia experiments, Sigmund Rascher, was working towards a more pragmatic purpose, the survival of Luftwaffe pilots who were shot down and had to bail out over the North Sea. Some 300 prisoners were immersed in ice-cold water, or strapped naked to a stretcher in the Polish winter, while rectal temperature, heart rate, level of consciousness and shivering were meticulously monitored and charted. Most were allowed to freeze to death; in some resuscitation by various methods was attempted, with active reheating in a warm bath proving the most effective. The results were presented at a medical conference in Berlin in 1942.


https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/....10.1056/NEJM19900517

Discussion

This review of the Dachau hypothermia experiments reveals critical shortcomings in scientific content and credibility. The project was conducted without an orderly experimental protocol, with inadequate methods and an erratic execution. The report is riddled with inconsistencies. There is also evidence of data falsification and suggestions of fabrication. Many conclusions are not supported by the facts presented. The flawed science is compounded by evidence that the director of the project showed a consistent pattern of dishonesty and deception in his professional as well as his personal life, thereby stripping the study of the last vestige of credibility. On analysis, the Dachau hypothermia study has all the ingredients of a scientific fraud, and rejection of the data on purely scientific grounds is inevitable. They cannot advance science or save human lives.

In the light of these findings, attempts to use the data from the Dachau experiments have been puzzling. The persistence of the claim that the work offers usable or valuable information is difficult to understand. One probable reason is the extremely limited availability of the Alexander report and the tendency of investigators to use secondary citations without consulting the primary source. Wider circulation of the Alexander report would thoroughly expose the true nature of the work and put an end to the myth of good science at Dachau. Future citations are inappropriate on scientific grounds.

Inferior science does not generally come to the attention of the ethicist because it is usually discarded by scientists. Ethical dialogues deal with work of sound scientific but controversial moral content, and the mere fact that a debate is conducted implies that the subject under consideration has scientific merit. If the shortcomings of the Dachau hypothermia study had been fully appreciated, the ethical dialogue probably would never have begun. Continuing it runs the risk of implying that these grotesque Nazi medical exercises yielded results worthy of consideration and possibly of benefit to humanity. The present analysis clearly shows that nothing could be further from the truth. Although the Dachau experiments opened the dialogue about an important ethical issue, the discontinuation of debate about these experiments should not bring an end to exploration of the larger subject —the implications of the use of ethically tainted data. But the Dachau study is an inappropriate example for that purpose.