How to Fall 35,000 Feet—And Survive

[n2doc]

You're six miles up, alone and falling without a parachute. Though the odds are long, a small number of people have found themselves in similar situations—and lived to tell the tale. Here's PM's 120-mph, 35,000-ft, 3-minutes-to-impact survival guide.

By Dan Koeppel
Illustrations by Nanospore
Published in the February 2010 issue.




35,000 Feet
You have a late night and an early flight. Not long after takeoff, you drift to sleep. Suddenly, you’re wide awake. There’s cold air rushing everywhere, and sound. Intense, horrible sound. Where am I?, you think. Where’s the plane?

You’re 6 miles up. You’re alone. You’re falling.

Things are bad. But now’s the time to focus on the good news. (Yes, it goes beyond surviving the destruction of your aircraft.) Although gravity is against you, another force is working in your favor: time. Believe it or not, you’re better off up here than if you’d slipped from the balcony of your high-rise hotel room after one too many drinks last night.

Or at least you will be. Oxygen is scarce at these heights. By now, hypoxia is starting to set in. You’ll be unconscious soon, and you’ll cannonball at least a mile before waking up again. When that happens, remember what you are about to read. The ground, after all, is your next destination.

Granted, the odds of surviving a 6-mile plummet are extra ordinarily slim, but at this point you’ve got nothing to lose by understanding your situation. There are two ways to fall out of a plane. The first is to free-fall, or drop from the sky with absolutely no protection or means of slowing your descent. The second is to become a wreckage rider, a term coined by Massachusetts-based amateur historian Jim Hamilton, who developed the Free Fall Research Page—an online database of nearly every imaginable human plummet. That classification means you have the advantage of being attached to a chunk of the plane. In 1972, Serbian flight attendant Vesna Vulovic was traveling in a DC-9 over Czechoslovakia when it blew up. She fell 33,000 feet, wedged between her seat, a catering trolley, a section of aircraft and the body of another crew member, landing on—then sliding down—a snowy incline before coming to a stop, severely injured but alive.

more:

http://www.origin.popularmechanics.com/science/air_space/4344036.html

[Arctic Dave]

1. I thought you were referring to some thing like this.

Will "Flying Squirrel" Suit Let Skydivers Jump Without Chutes?
Sean Markey
for National Geographic News
February 9, 2007
It sounds crazy, and it probably is: Skydive from 15,000 feet (4,600 meters) and land safely—without a parachute—wearing a getup that resembles a flying squirrel costume (wallpaper: flying squirrel).

"It's pretty much considered impossible," said Maria von Egidy, a designer with Jii-Wings in Cape Town, South Africa.


http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/02/070209-wingsuit.html

[zipplewrath]

2. Only a few options

1) Hit something big, soft, and flexible.

A STEEP snow covered hill side is a good target. Men in WWII fell out of planes and survived when they hit snow covered hillsides and slid for a good long time to slow down. Think ski jump.

2) Water.

No, it's not "just like concrete" at those speeds. It's gonna hurt yeah. Probably break both your legs. But especially if there is some "chop" on the water, and you can make like a lawn dart, entering feet first will give you a chance. The worst problem is if you slap your head on the water as you enter. You actually want shallow water, about 10 feet deep and close to shore. Well, as long as there are no rocks under there.

3) Trees

Thick forest with trees with thin to medium branches. Aim between the trunks and hope you hit enough branches to slow you considerably prior to reaching the ground. If you have ANYTHING to get tangled in the branches, all the better. Something like a rope, a big sheet, a bunch of cabling/wiring from the plane that just exploded, etc.

4) Marsh.

Probably your worst option. You're gonna shatter both legs and probably run the bones up into your internal organs. But a really wet marsh with alot of grass and mud with some shallow standing water.

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

3. Concrete.

The only option with 0% probability you'll be a vegitable the rest of your life.

[zipplewrath]

4. Yup

We used to discuss these options back when I did alot of skydiving. More than one person said "aim for the rock". Look you're probably screwed. Don't swim up stream and save yourself for the quadriplegic chair.

[eppur_se_muova]

5. Easy. Jump from 35,001 feet.

You'll survive the first 35,000 feet without even half trying.

[Ganja Ninja]

6. You could always try the Gomez Addams theory.

Go parachute jumping and use a smaller chute every time. According to Gomez pretty soon you won't need a chute at all.

[Chemisse]

7. I read the whole article

Very interesting! Thanks. :)