Coast Guardsmen float with "water wings" during WWII (27164412900)

Lot-741-3: U.S. Coast Guard, WWII. Coast Guardsmen Learn to Swim For Lives. Preparing for the day when they may have to swim for their lives from a torpedoed ship, U.S. Coast Guardsmen learn to make “water wings” from their trousers. Here Coast Guardsmen in the functional swimming course taught at Miami, Florida, float about with the bottoms of their trousers tied securely to retain air forced in through the open waist by swinging the trousers overhead. U.S. Coast Guard Photograph. Courtesy of the Library of Congress. Photographed through Mylar sleeve. (2016/06/03).