if your elevator cable snaps

[Tiggeroo]

and you are plummeting downward, and you jump up and grab onto an upper rail and hang on tight and don't fall, when you hit ground your feet don't feel the impact.
Do you survive the crash?
If so is your elevator then a crashing death machine or a fun ride? Just curious, this occured to me while riding a scary elevator today.

 

[Chuck S]

I doubt you could counter the force of the overall extreme downward momentum enough to avoid death.

 

[Tiggeroo]

suppose you were able to pull hard up with your arms at the exact moment of impact?
A physice person I am not, hehehe. so this is not really serious. Just curious.

 

[themarquis]

I don't think you'd live. With an impact that hard, you wouldn't be able to hold onto a rail, or if you did, you'd rebound upward and hit your head on the elevator ceiling hard enough to kill you instantly. I think they did something on this on Mythbusters once, only they were examining what would happen if you jumped up really high at the moment of impact. They used a dummy wired to "jump" using a giant spring. The dummy jumped ... and then broke into a million pieces.

 

[JMD]

I would survive, I always take the stairs.

 

[DaisyD]

No it won't work. You are still going the same speed as the falling elevator whether you jump before landing or hang onto the rail. When the elevator hits the bottom at maybe 200mph so will you.

 

[cardaway]

It's like saying you could jump off a crashing plane just before impact. You can't. You are moving just as fast and suffer the same fate.

 

[laurajetter]

Nah, you would still die, or at least be severely maimed. I know Mythbusters doesn't have the most scientific approach to proving/disproving theories, but I'm pretty sure the one they did with the elevator drop was correct!

Their theory was that if you jump at the moment of impact of a plummeting elevator you would walk away unscathed. I believe that the answer was that your body is still traveling at the same rate of speed as the elevator...you would hit the ground at that speed. Jumping would only delay your impact for about a second.

In other words, don't ride on any rickety elevators!

 

[keliblue]

I think I would just kiss my butt good-bye

 

[I'mNoPrince]

I think I would just kiss my butt good-bye

OMG thats just to funny.

But yes you would die unless you had some springs or something to counter the downward force .You could not do it on yopur own. I have never been in a falling Elevator but have been stuck in many on my daily travels. Tools are better then a Phone in most cases.

 

[Towncrier]

You would just delay the inevitible for a few microseconds.

 

[Annette_VA]

You need to watch Mythbusters!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uedp5Mmq4C8

 

[Ginamarie]

Actually, it depends how far you fall. I actually have a couple of cases where a person fell down an elevator shaft (in two seperate incidents). One of the people died. The other one fell about 2-3 flights and he lived. He was injured, but he's fine now.

It also depends on what kind of a surface is at the bottom of the shaft. The guy that lived narrowly missed a giant spike at the bottom of the shaft that could have easily killed him.

 

[Poohs Pal]

 

[Toby'sFriend]

yes, I was going to say that I was pretty sure Mythbusters took this one on.

But you know - I'm kind of the opinion that in cases like this - it's not going to hurt to try.

 

[Kimberle]

Elevators have a built in saftey devise. If your cable "snaps", your elevator will stop. Unless you are in an extremely old elevator that has never been brought up to code, you will be ok.