Skill of the Week: Escape From Quicksand

A man's ability to adapt to any situation is an important part of his masculinity. We'll be republishing an illustrated guide from our archive every Sunday so that you can improve your manly knowledge week by week.

Quicksand has held an interesting place in our cultural zeitgeist. In the 1950s to 1960s, quicksand played an important role in Hollywood films. Lawrence of Arabia won seven Oscars in 1962 for a dramatic scene where Peter O'Toole raced across desert sands to try and save a boy from quicksand. Martin Luther King, Jr. used this line in 1963 to urge the nation and the crowd during his "I Have a Dream" speech. Many scientists argued against landing on the Moon because lunar quicksand would engulf the lander and destroy the mission. The Vietnam War has been compared and described as a pit of quicksand or a quagmire.

Quicksand used to be something kids feared and adults considered a dangerous situation. This is no longer the case, unless the child in question has been watching The Princess Bride over and over again. It's not known why this happened. It's possible the fear of quicksand ceased once it was over-represented in the media. People became accustomed to it and less and less movies starring this danger were produced. In the 1990s, quicksand fear was replaced by the fear of zombies and ghosts. After "peak zombie" was reached, this cultural fear also faded away. Listen to the Radiolab podcast for more information on this fascinating phenomenon.

Quicksand may be real, but it is not as dangerous as Hollywood made it seem. This natural phenomenon cannot occur everywhere. It requires an underground water reservoir. In the U.S. you are most likely to see it in the marshes and swamps of the Southeast or in the canyons of Utah, Arizona, New Mexico. You won't drown unless you panic. You'll be fine as long as you move slowly and are familiar with some basic escape techniques (listed above). Death by quicksand usually doesn't occur because the victim drowns in it but rather because they don't escape quickly enough. You can be sure that you won't fall victim to this fate if you follow the above tips.

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