I like to see a man who immerses himself in his work!

'MAN OVERBOARD!' At least the life vests worked and there isn't a need for another battleship curator. And, his neighbors are saying 'Ryan's dressed as a sailor again.' Thanks for your dedicated service as a curator with great interpretation. You are a credit to the state of New Jersey, the USS New Jersey, it's past sailors and overall history.

Might want to wash those in tap water or even distilled water to get all the lingering chlorine out. Thanks for the video!

Its getting uploaded so presumably it works & Ryan didn’t drown.

Remember that saltwater is denser than freshwater so things (including pelople ) have more buoyancy in it.

I wasn't expecting to see Ryan just chilling in a pool, its strangely funny, but hey! Interesting!

The dog in the background just wants to remind everyone to thank the owner of the pool for facilitating the video. Thank you pool owner!

So you threw Ryan in the pool..... FOR SCIENCE.

being found face down in the pool is usually a pretty good clue at a hard night of drinking!! LOL we had life belts still in 95 when i got out. id bet they still use them.

Ryan is rocking his man over board cosplay.

Hahaha that intro was gold, pretty impressive they still work as well as they did. Very cool!

The inflatable model was known as a "Mae West". The male end of the belt buckle had to be on the right. Otherwise it would deploy around your knees.

My father had a pleasure boat when I was small 50+ years ago, and I remember that we had life jackets which were still filled with kapok but the kapok was sealed in plastic under the nylon outer cover. There were cautions in large type to avoid any damage to the plastic covering. An intermediate stage between the waxed canvas of the WWII jacket and modern jackets made entirely of closed cell foam.

Don’t forget to use your Dixie cup, shirt and pants as a floatation device.

"I'M A TURTLE" I gotta make a gif out of that

I don’t know if they still teach it, but when I was in the Marines, we had to climb up in the rafters over the swimming pool and jump off a platform into the water simulating jumping off the side of a sinking ship. They taught us the proper technique for entering the water. It was a long drop! They also warned us about those kapok life jackets, if not properly put on, could break your neck when you hit the water because the vest could be forced up under your chin when you hit the water.

Ryan you look like Shipwreck from the cartoon G.I.Joe just missing the bird lol

Ryan has to be one of the top ten museum curators out there. It's nice to know that ancient kapok life vests still work, at least for a few minutes... some of the older ferryboats I travel on retain Mae Wests in their abandon ship gear. The placards about donning them are the same ones that were printed with the vests in the 1950s or 60s. To my knowledge, no vessel in the fleet relies entirely on Mae Wests, and I think only three active vessels in the fleet still carry them. I get the feeling that replacing them with modern gear might not have been geometrically possible, as they are generally stored in the bench lockers in passenger seating if they're retained at all. Also, unlike the vest Ryan wore, they will have received regular maintenance and inspection from the crew. During Desert Storm, did the crew use those hilarious miniature work vests like I used? The ones with the 8" by 8" square of solid orange material and lots and lots of straps? Those things are hilarious, but you gotta admit they don't get in the way...

Best type of history is living history. Thanks for this.

A testament to how things were made back then they still work.

Yup, watched the whole thing Ryan is just enraptured and I can't get enough of his enthusiasm

Not in the Blue Jacket's Manual. Thank you for the demonstration. When I was on active duty in the Marines, I didn't have the opportunity to train with the life jackets, life vests, and lifeboats.

I love Ryan's hands-on approach, yeay!

i often fly on a 75 year old c 47 bet you want try an old parachute packed then

I really like these hands-on videos.

In one book about the Indianapolis sinking, it was stated that life jackets in WW2 were only designed for 72 hours of continuous immersion, so many of the sailors who were in the sea ended up sinking and drowning.

Swimming lesson also how turn your White Hat or your trousers into an emergency flotation device.

Possibly your best video yet! Curator going the extra mile!

That intro is straight out of "Sunset Boulevard"! Esther Williams eat yer heart out!

One of my favorite channels... always creative and interesting ways to explain the history of battle ships and naval history in general... appreciate your efforts very much

Putting in the Junior Officer barking orders is realism I could have done without 🤣.

LMAO, we should have gotten the man overboard siren as you went into the water!! Very educational and Ryan takes his work very seriously and personal. One big difference, being in a calm pool versus the open ocean is not even in the same category. Still glad for the demonstration though.

Not going to lie, watching somebody test out floatation devices from WWII is a lot easier on the stomach than watching a KZfaqr taste test MREs and rations from WWII and earlier... lol

Ryan looks like SpongeBob's "Barnacle Boy", voiced by Tim Conway, the famous side kick of Mermaid Man who of course was voiced by the one an only Ernest Borgnine.

Fascinating! These were built to last.

There are so many fantastic out-of-context clips in the video

Another great video from the battleship. Thanks

fantastic and not surprised they still worked

Excellent video Ryan!

Fantastic vdeo again Ryan, cheers...

Both the KPOC and the inflatable were used in the 1980's. KPOCs were for people who had GQ duties that had them or could have them on the weather decks, the inflatables were for people who would primarily be inside the ship. At least that was my experience.

Self- inflating works, Army used on river crossing, bridge crews. Iwas 12B -17+ years and we helped bridge company, and grunts loaded down with gear, so they became a human anchor, put in a few puffs 'pf air, gave them some buoyancy till they blew it up.

Great job again, I wondered if they would still work too!

Excellent

This is some top content right here.

It's very impressive that you got 2 for 2 successes. Very cool!

It’s really impressive that those still work. They’re a testament to the men and women who designed and built them.

MOM there's a man in our pool dressed like a sailor from an old movie!!!!

3:36 Hey! That's my friend in blue!

Best upload yet be sure to log a man overboard drill!

Floats like a Battleship curator!

Not too surprised that the Mae West still worked. With how they're built, until they've been out in water for an extended period, I wouldn't think they'd deteriorate that much. The inflatable, I'm slightly impressed with, but without knowing exactly how old it is, it's hard to say for sure.

My aunt talks about collecting milkweed as a child to make the life preservers. The kids would go out after school and collect bags of the whole plant. Evidently the gooey stuff that is in the stems and leaves when you break them open, can be used to make an ersatz rubber.

We had both types of life vest on our ship in the 80s. The inflatables were issued to those whose battle stations were belowdecks. The reason was that wearing the kapok type made getting through a 21 inch escape hatch a much more difficult and time consuming task. And if the ship is sinking, that is a real problem. All of them also had a battery powered flashing light or chemlight, a dye marker packet, and a whistle.

With modern materials, fishing vests are wonderful flotation devises, and don't hinder movement while fishing and other work. I wonder if the services have looked into those for modern use?

Bought 2 towels they are great please buy one.

The opening reminds me of Sunset Boulevard with William Holden floating in the pool.😂

Those Kapok type life jackets are still used by line handlers and are now Orange in color. There were the belt inflatable types for abandoning ship drills and air crew types had our own inflatable life vest that were color coded to our jobs. And you didn't demonstrate turning your dungarees into a life vest (something we had to do in boot camp while in the pool).

06:05 I like that you saved the hat haha! :D

Later kapoc devices had the kapoc sealed in plastic, which increased the life expectancy in the water, but you had to take care, just like the waxed canvas only versions, perforations and abrasions.

I was in the navy in the 70's and 80's. I was first issued the more modern orange kapok life jacket (they had plastic covered inserts that were replaceable) but, when my GQ station became the 5 inch magazine, I got the life belt. Long hours of sitting around in the magazine, the life belt became our pillow that we'd lay on and sleep because there was nothing else to do unless we were loading the gun. We were told to always wear it in front since that was how it had to be to put it on once you were in the water.

Pretty cool on a hot day

We had a set of US surplus Mae Wests at the cottage, complete with CO2 cartridges. Being curious I tried one out a few years ago and they still worked despite the canvas breaking down slightly.

Yeah I remember the sailors who escaped the Hood when she was sinking couldn't use their flotation gear because of heavy clothing, are US sailors instructed to remove heavy gear before putting on the flotation gear?

Very cool, thanks for sharing. :)

We used kapok life jackets with the head flotation extension when I grew up in the 60's. The thing I remember most is that the cotton tie straps would rot and break making them pretty useless other than as seat cushions. When used on children, they closely resembled the inflatable sumo wrestling suits.

I like this kind of content.

Nice reference to Sunset Boulevard. :)

Not surprised at all that they still work. We trained to float with just our dixie cups and dungarees too.

Kapoks are susceptible to "wilting" in storage where that storage goes really hot and/or really cold.

I thought he was going to jump off the New Jersey into the Delaware! LOL!

Gulligan is that You ? Skipper will Save You...LOL

I heard before the white cap of a sailor could also be used as a last ditch floatation device.

You should demonstrate jumping from a height into water while wearing the life jacket. There is a proper and wrong way in doing that.

My son (4 ) uses a lr 1 life raft same kind as in original topgun goose death scene It was made in 1988 and we use it all day at the beach

I missed my calling. I should have been a museum ship curator. Then I could play in the pool instead of really working. I kid. Your content is great.

A good video, but I couldn’t stop laughing when you went face down in the water!!!!

Requesting a Desalination/emergency distilled water device demo from lifeboats

This is the definition of "LOL"!

"Hey you two...get out of my pool! And what kind of sick video are you and the blond girl making?" I'm calling the police!

We had "working" PFT that were smaller, and presumed a conscious rescuee and personnel available to immediately rescue.

Is the kapok vest the type that you had to hold down on when jumping off a ship so that it doesn’t knock you out by striking your chin? Or is there yet another life jacket it applies to. When I was young I found a bunch of military instruction manuals that my dad had from WWII. It’s been a long time ago since I last saw them so I can’t remember which one it was. I think there’s one made of cork too now that I think some more. Great video! Glad to see you made it out of the water!🙃

When using the self-inflating tube, you are meant to use "circular breathing" as in in through the nose, and out through the mouth. Woodwind and brass players have a leg up on jack tars.

"Imma turtle" lmao

Excited you didn't try this in the river next to the Battleship...

I think the better video would have been watching Libby film this video !! Enjoy watching keep up with the content.

Bought 2 towles to support your ship.

Ryan seems deficient at the back stroke !. Too long ago - I think it was the side stroke I did not know until I was in the navy. I would have expected the camera person to have enjoyed making this video even more _ I only heard giggles once. So anyone know how the Blueberrys or BDU are versus dungarees if having to test your own flotation and swimming skills? I expect lifebelts are still around, really close to the Airliners emergency gear- just different packaging / readiness before use.

I'm surprised by how simple the second one is, i knew inflatable lifejackets existed but not that they can be stored so small as to fit into a small fannypack you can sling behind your back whilst working. Only issue i find with it compared to the kapoc vest is that with that one you're capable of being upright, not only allowing you to look around you but also to have a bit more distance from the water. Whereas the second one only allow you to lie down meaning you can't look around and are also at risk of constantly having waves flow horizontally across your face which is rather not good.

It seems like coating the lifevest with potentially flammable wax could be disastrous if there was an onboard fire

Does anyone know the fastest recorded time it took to reload the 16 inch guns?

all I was waiting for libby to have to fish you out.

In some videos I have seen life belts with tubes. What are those and how do they work,

Skipper of a PT boat hauled a badly burned crewman in a kapok from boat to island to island. Later became President

Ryan, your zipper's down. LOL

Ryan I read some stories about the life rafts our pilots and others used in WW2 that due to their color they attracted giant squids, they would grab the person out and take them under and gone, supposedly there were instances with the other occupant witnessing this, ever heard anything about that?

I'm pretty certain the life belt would have had a CO2 cartridge inflater like the May West life vest

I hope you had a rescue diver on standby while testing those off-date flotation devices. Cool video.

The life belt is suppose to have a little CO2 bottle that inflates it first.

👍👍👍👊