> That is an impact about 10 times bigger as getting thrown out of a plane and hitting the ground at terminal velocity. Even without computing any numbers, pur

> That is an impact about 10 times bigger as getting thrown out of a plane and hitting the ground at terminal velocity. Even without computing any numbers, purely at the sanity-check level, this calculation is clearly wrong. Think about it. While there have been some recorded incidents of people surviving a free-fall impact to the ground, that's mostly a certain death impact. Even if survived, you are in very bad shape (understatement). An impact 10x worse than that would completely destroy your body. Then compare to race car drivers routinely having crashes at speeds higher than 74mph and most of the time hopping out of the car with no injury. Even at much much higher speeds. The flaw in the argument is summarized in the common saying "It's not the speed that kills you it's the sudden stop". If you hit the ground from an airplane, the stop is very sudden, leading to extreme instantaneous g loads. That's what kills, not the absolute value of the speed itself. In car crashes there is a lot of energy dissipation due to both structural crumple zones as well as motion of the car itself (it might spin, flip, skid more, etc). These factors lenghten the deceleration time and thus greatly reduce the g loads on the body.