How many feet can you fall and live

Improve this answer. This seems to state the most litigate study, so you get the answer — user That should be legitimate BTW There are various documented cases of people falling from planes and surviving though so there is no definative height, it depends how you land and if anything you land on cusions your fall.

Do you have a reference for the water being best? Show 3 more comments. Robert Cartaino Robert Cartaino 1, 8 8 silver badges 16 16 bronze badges. MichaelBorgwardt Ivan Chisov supposedly survived a free fall from m. Of course you'd reach terminal velocity well before that. Alan Magee's 22, ft fall would make a better example since it was a true free fall without a parachute instead of in plane wreckage like MichaelBorgwardt pointed out.

Of course because of terminal velocity there isn't really a big difference between 22, ft and ft. ShawnHolzworth - Magee only survived because the glass roof of the railroad station he crashed into somehow mitigated some of the force of his fall. Had he hit solid ground he would have died instantly. The fact that he was unconscious during free fall probably saved his life too.

Hitting the ground like a limp noodle actually reduces the severity of your injuries. Show 9 more comments. ShemSeger ShemSeger That seems way too low. The crux of Midnight Lighting is at 4. It is not a fun fall, but it isn't lethal. StrongBad - Do you think you stand on top of that crux and fall over backward without a crashpad without getting seriously hurt? I didn't say it was going to happen every-time, I said it was when injuries can start getting serious enough to kill you.

When people rushed to help him, he got up and said, "Did you get that on camera? He died later in the hospital from internal injuries. He literally got up and walked after his fall, his frame survived the fall because he was a stocky rugby player, but his insides couldn't take the impact. FWIW, that's a fairly standard number in the rigging world.

You assume any fall over 15 feet is potentially lethal and take appropriate safety precautions. Since the question has no meaningful answer, this is as good as any. Interesting but I disagree with your opening comment "you're pretty much guaranteed to fall on rock Depends a lot on what you're climbing. Plus some have slopes rocks or not which are actually pretty good for you like a sky landing instead of landing on flat ground Show 1 more comment.

This doctor's blog claims that: The median height leading to death is about 49 feet 15 meters , or about 4 to 5 storeys. Michael Borgwardt Michael Borgwardt 5, 1 1 gold badge 21 21 silver badges 31 31 bronze badges.

It's not clear to me what the "median height leading to death" tells us; it would seem to be mostly influenced by the sorts of falls that people typically experience. See Paul Paulsen's answer. People who have fallen from higher and did not die, had something to break their fall trees, water, snow, etc There are recorded cases of people surviving falls of hundreds of feet onto solid surfaces.

One such example outlined here describes a 28yo man who survived a ft vertical drop onto solid rock. There is no such thing as this certain height. Paul Paulsen Paul Paulsen 4, 4 4 gold badges 21 21 silver badges 60 60 bronze badges. According to the article published in a vet journal out of 22 cats who fell from over 8 stories high only 1 died.

So, does that mean that the height doesn't make much of a difference? It's true that it's the impact that causes injury or fatality. But since higher falls have greater impact, they also have a higher potential for injury or death. The fatality statistics vary from year to year, but there seems to be a significant fatality rate increase after the foot threshold.

The Center for Construction Research states that:. After that, the numbers start to decrease. But that doesn't mean that workers are more likely to survive a fall from a greater height. What probably accounts for the distribution is that work at height is typically done at elevations between 10 and 20 feet. So, naturally, that's where the greater proportion of fatalities occur.

Heights over 30 feet also account for a large percentage of fall fatalities Moreover, since the researchers have determined only the percentage of fatalities for each height but did not record how many falls from the same heights have not resulted in a fatality it is difficult to say whether any particular height is deadlier than another.

These studies put a numerical value on a fact we have discussed at the beginning of this answer: the severity of an injury and probability of death increases with height. While it's generally true that the longer the fall, the higher the probability that it will be fatal, there are also other variables that can dictate the outcome.

These include:. Fall protection is required for anyone who is at risk of falling from more than 10 feet. That's the height at which falls become noticeably more dangerous. You begin to fall. What now? We know for certain a person can survive a fall of at least 20, feet. He crashed through a glass roof that likely helped spread out the impact. According to James Kakalios, Ph. The wall is rigid and the time of interaction is short so the force is large.

The other major factor? Slowing your descent. Increasing surface area means more energy is required to push air out of your way, slowing you down.