Description:

One hundred and forty thousand people a year pass away due to drowning, and more than 20% of those deaths are due to shallow water blackouts.

A SWB, or Shallow Water Blackout, is when a diver passes out due to a lack of oxygen in the brain. This usually occurs when a diver does too many breath holds in a short period, as well as other factors such as water pressure around the body, as it compresses the lungs and the air molecule within.

At 20 meters, you have around 2 to 3 times the atmospheric pressure on your body. As a diver returns to the surface and their body starts decompression, their brain doesn't register the amount of oxygen that is lost through decompression and they blackout on the surface or close to it. It wasn't until I had a friend come very close to suffering from a SWB while we were freediving, that I knew there was an opportunity to design a product that helped freedivers survive these events.

After talking to freedivers that had used the existing products that were big and bulky, creating a lot of drag in the water, it became apparent they weren't only charging thousands of dollars for a product that negatively affects the diver's performance and experiences, but also creating a hazard by having the product worn externally, adding the risk of getting stuck or caught on rocks while going for crayfish.

I aimed to design a product that used a piece of standard freediving equipment as its base, to justify pricing, while making sure it was highly hydrodynamic while still being comfortable and stylish. It was also essential the device had a connection with the diver to monitor their vital signs during the dive. 

What I came up with is the Hutchwilco Ascend, a spearfishing wetsuit containing an inflation bladder that connects to a CO2 module located on the shoulder, which is injection moulded out of recycled high-impact rubber.

It is autonomously triggered by a pulse-oximeter situated in the diver’s ear called the Ascend Pulse Oximeter, which will produce a high pitch alarm at the time of inflation, to aid in keeping the diver conscious. The wetsuit will inflate autonomously once sensors detect the diver's blood oxygen percentage drops below a 65% threshold.

This threshold is when the body starts to lose basic motor skills, the autonomous systems take away the need for the diver to pull a rip cord or physically engage with the suit when in a life-threatening situation. The inflation bladder is located on the chest wall and wraps around the back of the diver's neck, this is designed to deliver the unconscious diver safely to the surface on their back, with their head supported and out of the water.

The wetsuit is also made completely out of Yamamoto neoprene, which is a limestone-based neoprene offering a more sustainable, warm and durable product.