God damn Australian wild life sucks.

Never get out of the boat.

*

In before the "would you pee on me crowd".

/fresh water activates the nematocysts
//as does urine
///sand and sea water work pretty well though

"You'll never guess where a tiny jellyfish the size of a peanut, delivered its near fatal sting"

It...fixed the cable?

His butt ?

He kept screaming at me...do it now, do it now

Irukandji jellyfish are taking over... PANIC

Piss on it! Piss on it!!

Tense continuity

The usage of 'worldwide' in that article leads me to believe they don't understand the definition.

that headline made me feel like a jellyfish was stinging my brain.

As a precaution, he was wearing a full-length "stinger suit," a lightweight version of a wetsuit that covers everything but the face, feet and hands and helps protect against venomous jellyfish

Sounds like he was throwing a bone to Darwin on this one. Why would you cover your entire body, but not your face, feet or hands? The Dumbass tag would have been more appropriate here.

The sting was near fatal, wherever that is. Perhaps he got stung in the hyphen.

Irukandji have nematocysts... when they fire the acceleration is equal to 40,000 times the force of gravity. The toxin enters the skin within a fraction of second, making the jellyfish sting one of the fastest mechanical events observed in nature.

watch them fire: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zJiBc_N1Zk (new window)

I saw a documentary on the irukandji recently. A guy was researching them and while taking off his wetsuit got stung by one that was stuck to it. His assistant hurried to help him and got stung by one that was also stuck to her suit. He recovered after 3 days but her symptoms persisted for two weeks. They were both literally writhing around in pain. The real bastard is that even morphine can't alleviate it. Nasty, nasty things.

UJIA?

DNRTFA.

Pffff... lightweight

Only lesson here--Stay the F*** out of the water.

rogerklotz: Irukandji have nematocysts... when they fire the acceleration is equal to 40,000 times the force of gravity. The toxin enters the skin within a fraction of second, making the jellyfish sting one of the fastest mechanical events observed in nature.

watch them fire: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zJiBc_N1Zk (new window)

Wow!

this is why i only swim in the great lakes.

Magorn: Okay that's farking it! Box Jellies and Portugese Man O'Wars are at least big enough that you can see them coming, blue-ringed octopi do that flashy thing to get you to back the fark off and Cone snails at least tend to leave you alone unlees you bother them.

But this little farker? Impossible to see, you don't even realize you've been bitten and delivers a sting that is so painful it makes you (literally) beg for the sweet release of death, even with a near-fatal dose of morphine in your system.

That's just not farking fair. It's time to nuke the Indian Ocean from orbit, it's the only way to be sure

I wonder, would an induced coma be a viable treatment? Obviously not of the sting, but at least the symptoms?

another little segment on them from nat geo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ws5hImeonEA (new window)

Apparently they are making there way over to the US as well, its not just Australia that is in trouble...

"A box jellyfish sting results in pain and welts forming immediately. These signs result in first aid being quickly applied and treatment begun which reduces the imminence of death and must have kept the death toll low.

A sting by the Irukandji jellyfish, on the other hand, is often felt as nothing more than a painful irritant with a rash akin to that of prickly heat. By the time more serious symptoms appear, it may be too late to save a life. "

rogerklotz: Irukandji have nematocysts... when they fire the acceleration is equal to 40,000 times the force of gravity. The toxin enters the skin within a fraction of second, making the jellyfish sting one of the fastest mechanical events observed in nature.

watch them fire: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zJiBc_N1Zk (new window)

40,000g?!?

As a physicist, I'm calling BS on that.

Farkwaddle: ///sand and sea water work pretty well though

Any sort of acetic acid is good too. I like vinegar.

idrow: Sounds like he was throwing a bone to Darwin on this one. Why would you cover your entire body, but not your face, feet or hands? The Dumbass tag would have been more appropriate here.

You can't cover your whole face. You need somewhere to put your regulator. I don't know why he wouldn't cover his hands and feet though. That's weird.

From wiki, descriptions of the pain of Irukandji syndrome:

"Even under the "maximum dose of morphine" Teresa remarked that she "wished she could rip her skin off", and is later seen writhing uncontrollably from the pain while lying on her hospital bed... Jamie said he wished that he was stung by Chironex fleckeri instead since "the pain goes away in 20 minutes or you die".

"a woman compared her pain from childbirth to her experience with Irukandji syndrome. "It's like when you're in labor, having a baby, and you've reached the peak of a contraction, that absolute peak, and you feel like you just cant do it anymore, that's the minimum that (irukandji) pain is at. And it just builds from there."

reason #124 why not to go to Australia

Magorn: Okay that's farking it! Box Jellies and Portugese Man O'Wars are at least big enough that you can see them coming, blue-ringed octopi do that flashy thing to get you to back the fark off and Cone snails at least tend to leave you alone unlees you bother them.

But this little farker? Impossible to see, you don't even realize you've been bitten and delivers a sting that is so painful it makes you (literally) beg for the sweet release of death, even with a near-fatal dose of morphine in your system.

That's just not farking fair. It's time to nuke the Indian Ocean from orbit, it's the only way to be sure

What a flashy thing may look like:

8.5 tailed fox: The sting was near fatal, wherever that is. Perhaps he got stung in the hyphen.

^Nice.

Hey, has anyone ever been on vacation, having a nice time, going with the flow of a great day, so you decide to throw caution to the wind and you know, just enjoy life?

My girlfriend and I were doing that a couple years ago while traveling through South East Asia. We found ourselves on the tiny Indonesian Island of Dabo Singkep. We took the ferry from Singpore to Tanjung Pinang to Dabo, the whole point of it all was so she could cross the Equator for the first time.

It was just the two of us on a very secluded beach, splashing around and swimming in the water, having fun, until I issued the order; "Out of the water. NOW." She got to the sand only a second before I did and then asked why.

As I was swimming, I saw a jellyfish about the size of my head floating about a foot away from me. It was red. Red is nature's way of saying "Don't touch." It could have been harmless, but trapped on a tiny Indonesian island miles from any kind of decent medical care, we weren't about to take the chance.

We did not go back in the water that day.

/Long story, bro.

My brother was stung by a jellyfish in Hawaii when he was 10, and spent 2 days unconcious. I don't think he'd be getting a kick out of of these replies.

/Dunno what kind of jellyfish it was

idrow: As a precaution, he was wearing a full-length "stinger suit," a lightweight version of a wetsuit that covers everything but the face, feet and hands and helps protect against venomous jellyfish

Sounds like he was throwing a bone to Darwin on this one. Why would you cover your entire body, but not your face, feet or hands? The Dumbass tag would have been more appropriate here.


A few possible reasons:

Full face masks are pretty uncommon for sport divers.

I'm sure his feet were covered by booties and fins. It's just the suit that ends at the ankle.

Lot's of places won't let you dive in gloves. (but most likely not this one)

It's not that it matters anyway. I dive in a full drysuit and face mask and have still been stung by jellies that cling to the gear and get you when you take all that crap off.

The Envoy

I saw that same thing, and it freaked me out. Just watching how much pain those poor people were in was amazing. Didn't it take the woman something like 6 months to recover, and she wasn't even stung DIRECTLY by the little bastard; she only rubbed up against it when taking off her wetsuit? Unbelievable.

The Envoy: I saw a documentary on the irukandji recently. A guy was researching them and while taking off his wetsuit got stung by one that was stuck to it. His assistant hurried to help him and got stung by one that was also stuck to her suit. He recovered after 3 days but her symptoms persisted for two weeks. They were both literally writhing around in pain. The real bastard is that even morphine can't alleviate it. Nasty, nasty things.

Saw the same documentary. Heard somewhere that an Irukandji sting is worse than a Taipan bite. I think I'll just keep my butt out of the water if I make it to Australia. Got hit by a Sea Nettle last summer and that was enough to make me look a little closer before going back into the water. Felt like a series of bee stings when it happened and then like a really itchy sunburn for a few days.

Kwisatzhaderach: rogerklotz: Irukandji have nematocysts... when they fire the acceleration is equal to 40,000 times the force of gravity. The toxin enters the skin within a fraction of second, making the jellyfish sting one of the fastest mechanical events observed in nature.

watch them fire: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zJiBc_N1Zk (new window)

40,000g?!?

As a physicist, I'm calling BS on that.

Call BS all you want, Mr. physicist....

The externally-oriented side of the cell also has a hair-like trigger called a cnidocil. When the trigger is activated, the shaft of the cnidocyst penetrates the target organism, and the hollow thread is everted into it. This discharge takes no more than a few microseconds, and is able to reach accelerations of about 40,000 Gs


G. Kass-Simon and A.A. Scappaticci, Jr. The behavioral and developmental physiology of nematocysts. Can. J. Zool. Vol. 80, 2002, pp 1772-1794

Man, FARK Australia

karatekitten13: Farkwaddle: ///sand and sea water work pretty well though

Any sort of acetic acid is good too. I like vinegar.

idrow: Sounds like he was throwing a bone to Darwin on this one. Why would you cover your entire body, but not your face, feet or hands? The Dumbass tag would have been more appropriate here.

You can't cover your whole face. You need somewhere to put your regulator. I don't know why he wouldn't cover his hands and feet though. That's weird.

But who carries vinegar with them to the beach? I just rubbed some sand over my leg real hard and soaked it in a bucket of seawater. A few beers later and everything was alright. And that was just from a sea nettle. They're equipped with what is the pea-shooter nematocysts of the jellyfish world.

In his pee pee place?

Come to Australia.

Billzebub: As I was swimming, I saw a jellyfish about the size of my head floating about a foot away from me. It was red. Red is nature's way of saying "Don't touch." It could have been harmless, but trapped on a tiny Indonesian island miles from any kind of decent medical care, we weren't about to take the chance.

The big globby red ones usually are harmless. Many of them you can play with since their stingers can't penetrate human skin. The reason people are scared of jellyfish more than wasps or bees (which provide similar stings) is because they are such an 'alien' form of life. That, and people generally aren't well adapted for the ocean.
Now the box jellies freak me out more than the tiny jelly in this article. The boxes are active predators and have actual 'eyes' to see and pursue you.
/been 'stung' by many jellies before
//usually just an annoyance
/// surfaced under a Man-O-War once - won't forget that experience

I was stung by tiny strips of Portuguese Man o War tentacles that washed up on shore due to a storm a couple of miles out. The tentacles probably lost 90% of their stinging power but damn I still remember that.

/ the wikipedia entry on this jellyfish makes me never want to see the ocean again

Australia, about the only thing that isn't poisonous there is the crocodiles.

Sooo, the suit made him like 99.99% indestructible ?

lelio: I was stung by tiny strips of Portuguese Man o War tentacles that washed up on shore due to a storm a couple of miles out. The tentacles probably lost 90% of their stinging power but damn I still remember that.

/ the wikipedia entry on this jellyfish makes me never want to see the ocean again

Man o Wars aren't actually jellyfish which, to me, is even scarier. It's a friggin colony of zooids. It's like a venomous coalition of the sea.