Could someone survive falling out of a plane without a parachute into water?

Answer 1

Like any high-speed impact, it would depend on:

1) In what position you actually hit the water:

- feet first, perfectly vertical = better chance of survival...less trauma

- head first, perfectly vertical = fair chance of survival...more neck/head trauma

- flat (belly or back parallel to surface of water) = far less chance of survival

...but, more importantly...

2) How fast you were falling when you hit the water (which is determined by an acceleration of g = approx 9.8 meters per second per second on Earth...assuming initial velocity of 0 meters-per-second moving vertically when you fell out of the plane).

The human body reaches terminal velocity (highest speed at greatest air resistance) at about 120 mph. If you hit the water at this speed, you would most likely not survive...most of this would depend on (1).

If you were not falling flat, but head first, with arms straight or to your side (reducing your air resistance), you can continue to accelerate to a velocity greater than 120 mph.

All-in-all, if you fell from a height of 70 meters or greater and hit solid ground, statistics show that you would most likely die...or suffer massive trauma.

Falling from such a height and hitting the water would not be too different than hitting any other hard surface at high speed (as an approximation, of course).