Why is it that when you sit still in cold water and you get used to the temperature, but when you move it feels cold again?
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If the water is not moving, your body is warming the water around you. When you move, you also move the water, and that previously warmed up water is replaced with colder water and it also mixes with the colder water and dissipates and cools down again.
The water next to your skin warms up. When you move this water is replaced by the water that has not been warmed up.
This is why people wear wetsuits for some activities.
It’s all to do with your skin interacting with the surroundings. Your skin warms up the surrounding water to create a layer of warmer water. When you move, that warmer water flows away and is replaced by colder water.
If you ever find yourself in a sauna, the exact reverse happens. If you sit still, there will be a cooler layer of air near your skin and moving or blowing on your skin will blow that layer away, making the air feel much hotter.
Water is really good at soaking up heat.
Moving water soaks up heat more efficiently, because the bits of water that just soaked up some heat move on and are immediately replaced by bits of water which haven’t soaked up heat yet, and they immediately proceed to do so, and then are immediately replaced…
This is why you can defrost frozen foods very efficiently with running water, even if it’s running *cold* water. The fact that the water is *moving* is drastically more impactful.
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