Abstract: A transportable self-contained life support apparatus steadily reduces in temperature whole blood collected from donors to a predetermined temperature range. The whole blood is kept live by maintaining the temperature of the blood within such range through conductive heat transfer to an adjacent coolant. The coolant, in a frozen state and having a freezing temperature just below the predetermined range, absorbs heat commensurate to/with its latent heat of fusion and precludes temperature excursion of the blood until all of the coolant has become liquid. Similarly, platelets, extracted from the blood, can be maintained at the predetermined temperature range during storage and transport. Over chilling is precluded by limiting the low temperature of the coolant to its freezing temperature and a life destroying temperature rise is self-evident by and can only occur after a complete change in the state of the coolant.