Falling From A Very Great Height

[Booldawg]

I've heard that if you fall from a great height you die of a heart attack before hitting ground. Urban myth or some truth in it? Either way I'm not prepared to find out first hand!

[ummmm]

Not sure. Sky divers manage but that might be the knowledge they have a parachute that prevents heart attacks.

[wolf63]

Maybe seems to be the answer


http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=42

[Booldawg]

yes a parachute would make me feel alot happier too1

[ummmm]

Do you ever fall in your dreams? Have you ever landed?

[VHG]

If the person dies anyway how do we ever know if it was the heart attack or hitting the ground that killed them?

[Brinjal]

It's not the fall that kills you it's the sudden stop at the bottom.

[mazie]

or the impact of hitting the ground bringing on a heart attack. (Yes, I do all the time ummmm....I haven't landed yet!)

[LazyGun]

I would say almost certainly not. Wolfs link is a good one.....

[Sqad]

The most interesting thing about wolf's link is that when a member posts, it signifies if the poster is a Moderator.

take note AB.

I would have thought that a Pathologist would be able to give some idea if the heart was or was not beating on impact.

But I do not know.

[ummmm]

Same Mazie...

[mazie]

well fingers crossed it stays that way ;o)

[LazyGun]

Cardiac Enzymes for a start. One would expect to see elevated levels of CK and troponin, probably myoglobin too had someone suffered a fatal cardiac arrest on the way down.......

[Sqad]

Lazygun...good point.

If one survived long enough for the enzymes to "spew" into the blood stream.

[SeaJayPea]

Certainly not in this case.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juliane_Koepcke

[wolf63]

SeaJayPea

That wiki entry was very interesting. I think that I would have just given up on day one but she survived and was rescued.

[SeaJayPea]

An inspiring story, indeed. This wasn't where I remembered reading it (just the other day, as it happens). I think the suggestion was that several people survived the actual crash, but succumbed to hunger and their injuries.

[craft1948]

The most interesting thing about wolf's link is that when a member posts, it signifies if the poster is a Moderator

And you find that interesting................

[Arksided]

Craft, hurtling toward the ground at terminal velocity, I'd be thinking Moderator's erm... how interesting they are.

[Sqad]

crafty

\\\The most interesting thing about wolf's link is that when a member posts, it signifies if the poster is a Moderator

And you find that interesting......\\\\

By goodness you are quick on the uptake tonight......YES I do.......

[boxtops]

I don't find it that interesting, I'd be a bit put off by it, everyone being classified straight away as a Newbie or a whizz or whatever. I don't want to know who the mods are, it's not significant to me when I post.