Eli5: why is impalement with rebar more survivable than a shot from a .50 BMG round?

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How is it that a bullet that is 12.7 mm in diameter can kill somebody with so much more bodily damage than a 20mm rebar rod that is impaled through the body? I see stories of people surviving impalement all the time, but a shot with a .50 cal to the same area almost always results in instant death. Shouldnt the bullet just go through its target because it travels so fast?

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Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s the speed that makes all the difference. Bodies being mostly water, and water being mostly incompressable, when a bullet flies through you in less then the blink of an eye, it essentially creates something close to a sonic boom in your body. Everything that was in the bullets way is forced to move at insane speeds, transferring that energy into everything around it.

Buck/bird shot from a shotgun within like 10′, acts as a solid object even though it’s a spread of pellets for the same reason.

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