Washington Mud Slide <actual loss of life>

[jack c]

As terrible as the event was, it is interesting to hear the major media outlets try to draw the distinction between deep mud and quicksand. They say it "acts like quicksand, sucking you down." Perhaps some physics lessons or more research might help. Still, a sad occurrence with all the loss of life.

[Fred588]

As terrible as the event was, it is interesting to hear the major media outlets try to draw the distinction between deep mud and quicksand. They say it "acts like quicksand, sucking you down." Perhaps some physics lessons or more research might help. Still, a sad occurrence with all the loss of life.

Its odd the way things get described. Often there is a grain of truth but it gets scrambled. When I was trained to be a lifeguard, way back in the middle ages, every time someone drowned in a local pond the story from witness almost always involved a "stomach cramp." The truth is there is no such thing as a stomach cramp that can double a person over and cause them to drown. Almost certainly what happened was the person choked and their frantic efforts to communicate or to clear their throat was seen in the light of what people had been taught (you'll get a cramp and drown if you don't wait an hour after eating to swim). What people probably observe with things like mud flows is that the mud liquefies and then locks up. That actually IS a characteristic of quicksand but what people see is what they have been taught to expect (can't free the leg = its sucking the leg down).

[nachtjaeger]

From what I saw, the slide that destroyed the hamlet also dammed the river. The water eventually found a path across the mud, but there is water backed up behind it. This is most likely inducing hydrostatic pressure on the entire slide area in the riverbed, and actually making quicksand. That type of mud is bad enough on its own, without adding the "quickening" factor to it.

[clayboy]

I've witnessed a few mudslides and they're nothing to mess around with. In just seconds, they can swallow you up, then crush and suffocate. They're something like a quicksand pit that attacks. Usually, there's little time to escape as we saw in the Oso disaster. Very sad.

[dlodoski]

I've witnessed a few mudslides and they're nothing to mess around with. In just seconds, they can swallow you up, then crush and suffocate. They're something like a quicksand pit that attacks. Usually, there's little time to escape as we saw in the Oso disaster. Very sad.

Indeed.

Does anyone besides me feel that we should not reference incidences involving loss of life on this board?

I realize that folks posting may have a myopic view of an event, but many folks reading it may have already come to a completely empathetic feeling about the same event, and be very uncomfortable with it being mentioned here, a place that's more or less for 'mental recreation'.

[Fred588]

I've witnessed a few mudslides and they're nothing to mess around with. In just seconds, they can swallow you up, then crush and suffocate. They're something like a quicksand pit that attacks. Usually, there's little time to escape as we saw in the Oso disaster. Very sad.

Indeed.

Does anyone besides me feel that we should not reference incidences involving loss of life on this board?

I realize that folks posting may have a myopic view of an event, but many folks reading it may have already come to a completely empathetic feeling about the same event, and be very uncomfortable with it being mentioned here, a place that's more or less for 'mental recreation'.

It would be my opinion that this is a major and traumatic news event. It is worthy of discussion and the deaths are part of that. Discussing it in an inappropriate way would be inappropriate but mentioning factual details is not, in my view. It should perhaps be in the "off topic" sub forum.

[dlodoski]

....Does anyone besides me feel that we should not reference incidences involving loss of life on this board?...

It would be my opinion that this is a major and traumatic news event. It is worthy of discussion and the deaths are part of that. Discussing it in an inappropriate way would be inappropriate but mentioning factual details is not, in my view. It should perhaps be in the "off topic" sub forum.

Then, in the spirit of 'Spoiler Alert', perhaps we should adapt a policy of 'Real Life Death Alert' warnings on such posts.

I really think any reference on this sexually orientated board to such tragedies is wrong, regardless of how academic the interpretation.

[jack c]

I should have posted this in Off Topic - almost did. My apologies to the board.

[dlodoski]

I should have posted this in Off Topic - almost did. My apologies to the board.

Hi,

It's not really off topic, more like off-color.

And I certainly don't mean to single you out, or make you feel bad. As it happens, there was an earlier topic similar to this (in Nuggets no less) that was quietly removed, but brought to the attention of the moderators.

It's just an icky factor that is hard to deal with in an absolute way.

[Chimerix]

Does anyone besides me feel that we should not reference incidences involving loss of life on this board?

I realize that folks posting may have a myopic view of an event, but many folks reading it may have already come to a completely empathetic feeling about the same event, and be very uncomfortable with it being mentioned here, a place that's more or less for 'mental recreation'.

I do share your feelings, Dave. The tag line at the top of the screen does say "The home for quicksand fetishism..." I don't see this topic as being particularly fetishistic, and as such, I do see it as inappropriate to its current location. I think that it would be more at home in Off-Topic, even though there is mud/quicksand involved. I do appreciate the warning "actual loss of life" though! It definitely changed my frame of mind before I clicked to read. Had I popped in here unawares, I'd have been shaken.