Sea spray icing on ships and marine structures depends on a complex correlation between metocean parameters and vessel characteristics. Sea spray icing rates have mostly been investigated and given as a function of general metocean parameters. The existing models suffer from lack of experimental data. More experimental data is required for better prediction models and understanding of the icing process. This paper presents results from a comprehensive cold laboratory study of the dependence and trends of sea spray icing rates related to 8 parameters. Experiments were performed simulating sea spray from a nozzle towards a vertical surface in freezing environment. This study presents 20 unique tests structured into 8 experiments, each of which focuses on change in icing rates due to one independent variable. Results showed that the sea spray rates dependence of the investigated parameters comply with existing knowledge, however preliminary analysis points out various unintentional covariates for most experiments which calls for further investigations. This is the greatest number of variables tested in one set of experiments to date and serve as valuable sea spray icing data experimental data – a limitation for the evaluation of previous models that pointed out to the lack of enough icing measurements in this field of research.

No abstract

INTRODUCTION: Trauma is the leading non-obstetric cause of maternal death with 5-8% incidence in the United States. We compared violence-related outcomes between pregnant women and their non-pregnant counterparts. METHODS: We studied 197 pregnant and 4658 non-pregnant women of reproductive age (14-49) who experienced violent trauma between 2005-2015 as captured in the Pennsylvania Trauma Outcomes Study. We used modified Poisson regression to estimate relative rates of trauma-related outcomes. All models were adjusted for injury severity score and age. RESULTS: Compared to non-pregnant women, pregnant women were younger (mean age=24.3 versus 30.6 years, p < 0.001), more likely to be African-American (54.3% versus 40.1%, p< 0.001), and to have Medicaid insurance (63.1% versus 57.6%, p=0.04). They were less likely to have preexisting psychiatric, drug use, and alcohol use disorders (18.8%, 8.6%, and 2.0% for pregnant women versus 30.1%, 14.2%, and 8.8% for non-pregnant women, respectively, p < 0.03 for all). Pregnant women had a mean injury severity score of 8.7 compared to 9.5 for non-pregnant women (p=0.3), and were significantly more likely to suffer trauma secondary to assault (adjusted relative rate-aRR)=1.06, 95%CI: 1.00-1.12, p=0.04). Pregnant women were more likely to require surgery (aRR=1.06, 95%CI1.01-1.12, p=0.03), and were 3.4 times more likely to undergo hospital transfer (aRR=3.41, 95%CI: 2.32-5.00, p < 0.001). Pregnant women had mortality rates twice that of their non-pregnant counterparts despite lower injury severity scores (aRR=1.98, 95%CI: 1.24-3.07, p=0.004). CONCLUSION: After violent trauma, pregnant women have twice the death rate of their non-pregnant counterparts. Screening for violence during pregnancy is paramount for prevention of trauma-related death.