6 ms·

Woman survives fall from plane after parachute fails

64 points by myth_drannon 7y ago

dsfyu404ed 7y ago
There's many recorded instances of stuff like this happening (mostly during WW2 since that was the last time we had large numbers of people falling out of planes). If you hit things that let you decelerate over enough distance to not go splat then you can survive. IIRC one guy landed in water at terminal velocity and only broke his ankles because he landed feet first instead of belly flopping. Obviously there is some luck involved.
- riffraff 7y ago
  I remember reading about someone jumping from a big height and purposefully going in feet first to break his legs and not his back, but I've always wondered how deep you would actually go if you hit the water hard enough to break your ankles. I mean, it's already a slightly terrifying experience to jump from a tall trampoline and go a few meters deep, if you're not used to it.
  - noir_lord 7y ago
    Not that deep, water is massively higher density than air (imagine the Column of air above you when you stand outside that goes up for miles and miles, you only need to go 10m under water to equal that weight, i.e. 10m ~ 1atm). There is footage of people firing guns into water and you can see the bullets deceleration.
    - throwaway8941 7y ago
      >There is footage of people firing guns into water and you can see the bullets deceleration. Mythbusters did an episode on this one. Bullets shot out of high-powered rifles simply shatter on contact with the water, turning into a bunch of shrapnel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvSTuLIjRm8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvSTuLIjRm8
      - JustSomeNobody 7y ago
        This is also why you should not try and land in water at terminal velocity.
        Nightshaxx 7y ago
        Darn it, I guess I'll have to change my plans for Sunday if that's the case....
        joncrane 7y ago
        So let's say I'm falling at terminal velocity and I'm falling to a point roughly at the shore of a deep body of water. I have just enough control to deviate so I'm landing completely on (hard, dry) land, or completely in water that is over 20 feet deep. You're saying I shouldn't try to land in the water? (Let's assume there is no beach of sand. This is at a dam or something)
        JustSomeNobody 7y ago
        If those are your options, then you should go head first into the dam. You're not going to survive, so you want to die quickly, not suffering in pain for a few minutes.
      - jerf 7y ago
        Mythbusters also did an episode where they compared dropping (dead) pigs onto concrete and dropping pigs on to water, from a height where they reached terminal velocity comparable to a humans. Both pigs were Very Dead. IIRC, the pig dropped into water was slightly less Very Dead, but it was still Very Dead. They weren't actively guiding themselves to land feet first but I wouldn't expect much out of that. Water could be a component of a survival plan (e.g., "my partially deployed parachute is slowing me down enough to make this the equivalent of a high dive"), but "just land in water" is not a survival plan on its on from terminal velocity.
        blktiger 7y ago
        How you land in the water is key. In the Navy they teach us to point our toes, cross our arms, and basically make ourselves hit as little of the surface as possible when jumping from the top of a tall ship.
  - 9192631770_Hz 7y ago
    Related, I wonder how high the risk of drowning is in a situation like that. I expect I would impulsively gasp from the shock/pain and inhale a lot of water.
    - PeterisP 7y ago
      We had a nearby case where two special forces dudes drowned in parachute training exercise because due to wind changes they landed on a major river. Water landing is not safe even if you're an experienced skydiver, you may have to swim quite far to get to the shore while not really prepared for long-distance swimming, with all your clothing, boots, parachute and all that.
- ssully 7y ago
  I feel like landing in water could be just as dangerous, because if you do survive the fall, you then have to make sure you don't drown.
RealityVoid 7y ago
Interestingly, this is NOT the first time tings like this happened. There are a few people that survived freefall from absurd heights [1] My favorite website that documents all these things is the Free Fall Research Page [2] that to my dismay now seems to be on the bottom of the second google search results page. Most people have this image about falls that you fall from heights you die, but some people are lucky and it really depends on how and where you fall. I was with some friends once and was mentioning about all these people that survived free fall and I was surprised to get some really incredulous looks of the type "Sure they did buddy, do you believe everything you read?" even tough these cases are well documented. I think it just goes to show that if something is deemed impossible in popular culture it might as well not happen at all, ever. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fall_survivors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fall_survivors [2] http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/ffresearch.html http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/ffresearch.html
- stanski 7y ago
  And of course the manual on how do it: http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/carkeet.html http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/carkeet.html
  - jenscow 7y ago
    Well, I would have thought there'd at least be a TL;DR - time is of the time is of the essence when you need to consult that.
    - Insanity 7y ago
      Ideally you look this up before getting started. But I feel like I am just missing a joke you are making :p
- lettergram 7y ago
  It’s actually pretty interesting, but to your point, apparently children can tolerate a higher fall. Here’s a reddit post where a kid falls from a window and a lady is trying to help her back home: https://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/c0j87k/kid_falls_from_window/ https://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/c0j87k/kid_falls_from_... It’s largely due to their lower mass and flexibility. It’s all about deceleration. Depending how they (and adults) fall how their chances of survival are impacted.
somelollygag 7y ago
Whenever I read a story like this, I immediately think of this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy5xLVx2NGY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy5xLVx2NGY
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
anthonybsd 7y ago
The article is somewhat scarce on details but it sounds like both of her pilot chutes opened while failing to deploy main/reserve chutes. Pilot chutes alone will push your terminal velocity way down. If she fell in wooded area those chutes were likely to catch on branches which again would have been hugely helpful in slowing her down. I find that [1] Vesna Vulović case is a lot more curious in terms of miraculous survival. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulovi%C4%87 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulovi%C4%87
- tim333 7y ago
  Having a read of the wikipedia it says she was discovered screaming amongst the wreckage so maybe was attached to some part of that that descended slower than human free fall speed?
  - anthonybsd 7y ago
    This one goes into a bit more detail regarding how she managed to survive the fall: https://allthatsinteresting.com/vesna-vulovic https://allthatsinteresting.com/vesna-vulovic "While many other passengers were sucked out of the plane after the explosion, Vulović became pinned by the cart. The small section she was in fell to the ground on a heavily wooded, snow-covered hillside. Vulović’s doctors concurred with the air investigators and added their own conclusions. They claimed that the very thing that almost kept Vulović from being a flight attendant is what ultimately saved her life. Her physicians believe her low blood pressure kept her heart from bursting on impact with the mountainside. "
- bujak 7y ago
  It's not much of a miracle. The official version of the event is probably false. The aircraft was likely shot down by czechoslovak forces at a low altitude in a monumental fuckup.
kzzzznot 7y ago
Immediately thought of this, similar case but turned out to be pretty sinister! https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-44241364 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-44241364
- joelx 7y ago
  This is scary. I wonder how many people each year are murdered by their spouses who make it look like an accident?
cruhstaller 7y ago
Related study: Parachute use to prevent death and major trauma when jumping from aircraft: randomized controlled trial https://www.bmj.com/content/363/bmj.k5094 https://www.bmj.com/content/363/bmj.k5094
- SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
  I feel like there might be a methodological problem there.
- tim333 7y ago
  That's quite funny.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
yomly 7y ago
Shower thought: after some inflection point, does your likelihood of survival actually increase with altitude? With the additional height you gain additional time to plan and travel to fall more optimally, while your acceleration should fall to nearly zero. Of course, there may well be a secondary ceiling (pun) where air pressure and O2 create new complications...
- kibwen 7y ago
  There's some evidence that this is true for cats at least, where falls above a certain height begin to cause fewer injuries, presumably due to giving the cat time to twist their body around into a legs-down parachute-like shape. http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2010/11/domestic-cats-can-fall-from-any-height-with-a-remarkable-survival-rate/ http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2010/11/domestic-cat...
- daveoflynn 7y ago
  > after some inflection point, does your likelihood of survival actually increase with altitude? For humans, no. After ~10sec you’re falling at terminal velocity, which is generally 2-300km/h, and your odds of survival are extraordinarily close to zero. This lady had a double malfunction, where there were issues with both main and reserve parachutes, but per a police report (1), she was descending at 60km/h, so she must have had at least some parachute material out and slowing her fall. She’s very lucky, despite what’s likely to be a shitty next couple of years of rehab, but this isn’t a “fell from an airplane without a parachute and survived” miracle. (1) https://www.lenouvelliste.ca/actualites/une-parachutiste-gravement-blessee-apres-une-chute-144ab252158928367b84d336c0ebe5c2 https://www.lenouvelliste.ca/actualites/une-parachutiste-gra...
  - Insanity 7y ago
    I wonder if psychologically this ended up being a good thing. As in, physically the rehab might be bad but mentally.. it's bound to put things into perspective.
  - 725686 7y ago
    "For humans, no. After ~10sec you’re falling at terminal velocity" That means that falling higher will not increase your already slim chances of survival, and might well increase them, if ever so slightly. No?
edgarvaldes 7y ago
Somehow related: Speed skydiving https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_skydiving https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_skydiving

64 points by myth_drannon 7y ago

There's many recorded instances of stuff like this happening (mostly during WW2 since that was the last time we had large numbers of people falling out of planes). If you hit things that let you decelerate over enough distance to not go splat then you can survive. IIRC one guy landed in water at terminal velocity and only broke his ankles because he landed feet first instead of belly flopping. Obviously there is some luck involved.

riffraff 7y ago
I remember reading about someone jumping from a big height and purposefully going in feet first to break his legs and not his back, but I've always wondered how deep you would actually go if you hit the water hard enough to break your ankles. I mean, it's already a slightly terrifying experience to jump from a tall trampoline and go a few meters deep, if you're not used to it.
- noir_lord 7y ago
  Not that deep, water is massively higher density than air (imagine the Column of air above you when you stand outside that goes up for miles and miles, you only need to go 10m under water to equal that weight, i.e. 10m ~ 1atm). There is footage of people firing guns into water and you can see the bullets deceleration.
  - throwaway8941 7y ago
    >There is footage of people firing guns into water and you can see the bullets deceleration. Mythbusters did an episode on this one. Bullets shot out of high-powered rifles simply shatter on contact with the water, turning into a bunch of shrapnel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvSTuLIjRm8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvSTuLIjRm8
    - JustSomeNobody 7y ago
      This is also why you should not try and land in water at terminal velocity.
      - Nightshaxx 7y ago
        Darn it, I guess I'll have to change my plans for Sunday if that's the case....
      - joncrane 7y ago
        So let's say I'm falling at terminal velocity and I'm falling to a point roughly at the shore of a deep body of water. I have just enough control to deviate so I'm landing completely on (hard, dry) land, or completely in water that is over 20 feet deep. You're saying I shouldn't try to land in the water? (Let's assume there is no beach of sand. This is at a dam or something)
        JustSomeNobody 7y ago
        If those are your options, then you should go head first into the dam. You're not going to survive, so you want to die quickly, not suffering in pain for a few minutes.
    - jerf 7y ago
      Mythbusters also did an episode where they compared dropping (dead) pigs onto concrete and dropping pigs on to water, from a height where they reached terminal velocity comparable to a humans. Both pigs were Very Dead. IIRC, the pig dropped into water was slightly less Very Dead, but it was still Very Dead. They weren't actively guiding themselves to land feet first but I wouldn't expect much out of that. Water could be a component of a survival plan (e.g., "my partially deployed parachute is slowing me down enough to make this the equivalent of a high dive"), but "just land in water" is not a survival plan on its on from terminal velocity.
      - blktiger 7y ago
        How you land in the water is key. In the Navy they teach us to point our toes, cross our arms, and basically make ourselves hit as little of the surface as possible when jumping from the top of a tall ship.
- 9192631770_Hz 7y ago
  Related, I wonder how high the risk of drowning is in a situation like that. I expect I would impulsively gasp from the shock/pain and inhale a lot of water.
  - PeterisP 7y ago
    We had a nearby case where two special forces dudes drowned in parachute training exercise because due to wind changes they landed on a major river. Water landing is not safe even if you're an experienced skydiver, you may have to swim quite far to get to the shore while not really prepared for long-distance swimming, with all your clothing, boots, parachute and all that.
ssully 7y ago
I feel like landing in water could be just as dangerous, because if you do survive the fall, you then have to make sure you don't drown.

RealityVoid 7y ago

Interestingly, this is NOT the first time tings like this happened. There are a few people that survived freefall from absurd heights [1] My favorite website that documents all these things is the Free Fall Research Page [2] that to my dismay now seems to be on the bottom of the second google search results page. Most people have this image about falls that you fall from heights you die, but some people are lucky and it really depends on how and where you fall. I was with some friends once and was mentioning about all these people that survived free fall and I was surprised to get some really incredulous looks of the type "Sure they did buddy, do you believe everything you read?" even tough these cases are well documented. I think it just goes to show that if something is deemed impossible in popular culture it might as well not happen at all, ever. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fall_survivors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fall_survivors [2] http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/ffresearch.html http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/ffresearch.html

stanski 7y ago
And of course the manual on how do it: http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/carkeet.html http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/carkeet.html
- jenscow 7y ago
  Well, I would have thought there'd at least be a TL;DR - time is of the time is of the essence when you need to consult that.
  - Insanity 7y ago
    Ideally you look this up before getting started. But I feel like I am just missing a joke you are making :p
lettergram 7y ago
It’s actually pretty interesting, but to your point, apparently children can tolerate a higher fall. Here’s a reddit post where a kid falls from a window and a lady is trying to help her back home: https://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/c0j87k/kid_falls_from_window/ https://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/c0j87k/kid_falls_from_... It’s largely due to their lower mass and flexibility. It’s all about deceleration. Depending how they (and adults) fall how their chances of survival are impacted.

somelollygag 7y ago

Whenever I read a story like this, I immediately think of this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy5xLVx2NGY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy5xLVx2NGY

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

anthonybsd 7y ago

The article is somewhat scarce on details but it sounds like both of her pilot chutes opened while failing to deploy main/reserve chutes. Pilot chutes alone will push your terminal velocity way down. If she fell in wooded area those chutes were likely to catch on branches which again would have been hugely helpful in slowing her down. I find that [1] Vesna Vulović case is a lot more curious in terms of miraculous survival. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulovi%C4%87 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulovi%C4%87

tim333 7y ago
Having a read of the wikipedia it says she was discovered screaming amongst the wreckage so maybe was attached to some part of that that descended slower than human free fall speed?
- anthonybsd 7y ago
  This one goes into a bit more detail regarding how she managed to survive the fall: https://allthatsinteresting.com/vesna-vulovic https://allthatsinteresting.com/vesna-vulovic "While many other passengers were sucked out of the plane after the explosion, Vulović became pinned by the cart. The small section she was in fell to the ground on a heavily wooded, snow-covered hillside. Vulović’s doctors concurred with the air investigators and added their own conclusions. They claimed that the very thing that almost kept Vulović from being a flight attendant is what ultimately saved her life. Her physicians believe her low blood pressure kept her heart from bursting on impact with the mountainside. "
bujak 7y ago
It's not much of a miracle. The official version of the event is probably false. The aircraft was likely shot down by czechoslovak forces at a low altitude in a monumental fuckup.

kzzzznot 7y ago

Immediately thought of this, similar case but turned out to be pretty sinister! https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-44241364 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-44241364

joelx 7y ago
This is scary. I wonder how many people each year are murdered by their spouses who make it look like an accident?

cruhstaller 7y ago

Related study: Parachute use to prevent death and major trauma when jumping from aircraft: randomized controlled trial https://www.bmj.com/content/363/bmj.k5094 https://www.bmj.com/content/363/bmj.k5094

SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
I feel like there might be a methodological problem there.
tim333 7y ago
That's quite funny.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

yomly 7y ago

Shower thought: after some inflection point, does your likelihood of survival actually increase with altitude? With the additional height you gain additional time to plan and travel to fall more optimally, while your acceleration should fall to nearly zero. Of course, there may well be a secondary ceiling (pun) where air pressure and O2 create new complications...

kibwen 7y ago
There's some evidence that this is true for cats at least, where falls above a certain height begin to cause fewer injuries, presumably due to giving the cat time to twist their body around into a legs-down parachute-like shape. http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2010/11/domestic-cats-can-fall-from-any-height-with-a-remarkable-survival-rate/ http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2010/11/domestic-cat...
daveoflynn 7y ago
> after some inflection point, does your likelihood of survival actually increase with altitude? For humans, no. After ~10sec you’re falling at terminal velocity, which is generally 2-300km/h, and your odds of survival are extraordinarily close to zero. This lady had a double malfunction, where there were issues with both main and reserve parachutes, but per a police report (1), she was descending at 60km/h, so she must have had at least some parachute material out and slowing her fall. She’s very lucky, despite what’s likely to be a shitty next couple of years of rehab, but this isn’t a “fell from an airplane without a parachute and survived” miracle. (1) https://www.lenouvelliste.ca/actualites/une-parachutiste-gravement-blessee-apres-une-chute-144ab252158928367b84d336c0ebe5c2 https://www.lenouvelliste.ca/actualites/une-parachutiste-gra...
- Insanity 7y ago
  I wonder if psychologically this ended up being a good thing. As in, physically the rehab might be bad but mentally.. it's bound to put things into perspective.
- 725686 7y ago
  "For humans, no. After ~10sec you’re falling at terminal velocity" That means that falling higher will not increase your already slim chances of survival, and might well increase them, if ever so slightly. No?

edgarvaldes 7y ago

Somehow related: Speed skydiving https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_skydiving https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_skydiving