Real-Life Communication
A friend, who is a welder for cars and trucks, is impressed with
the money an underwater welder can earn. He tells you that he is thinking
about doing marine welding on the side.
"But you need training and
certification before you can go underwater," you say.
"What could be
so hard about scuba diving?" your friend asks. "You just put on a bunch of
equipment and down you go."
"There is a lot that can go wrong. It is
risky, unless you know all the safety procedures," you reply.
You continue:
"Scuba
diving can be dangerous for welders who are sometimes required to be underwater
for long lengths of time. When someone stays underwater for a period, they
can experience air embolism. They can also get the bends when resurfacing,
which is awfully painful. There is sometimes the danger of carbon monoxide
toxicity at a work site.
"A welder using scuba equipment can't do continuous
dives. After a dive, there is residual nitrogen, and a diver wouldn't want
to be a victim of nitrogen narcosis while underwater.
"When a diver
goes deep in the water, the air she breathes becomes more compressed. This
means that as the diver returns to the surface, the air expands. The air cannot
be allowed to expand too quickly. A diver should have decompression stops
on the way up, or she will develop decompression sickness."
Your
friend shakes his head. "What did you just say?"
Using the vocabulary
below, rewrite your information, making sure to explain each of the highlighted
words.
Vocabulary
Air embolism:
the blockage of blood flow in the body by air bubbles escaping into the blood
Bends:
another name for decompression sickness
Carbon monoxide toxicity:
a condition that results from breathing air contaminated with carbon monoxide
Decompression
stop: the time a diver stops and waits at a certain depth to allow nitrogen
elimination before surfacing
Decompression sickness: the formation
of bubbles of inert gas within the body of a diver
Nitrogen narcosis:
the narcotic effect nitrogen has at increased pressure
Residual
nitrogen: dissolved nitrogen remaining in the body as a result of an earlier
dive within 24 hours