eli5 why wouldn’t atronauts survive a fall from the ISS into the pacific?
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It isn’t possible to fall from ISS.
Being in orbit means they are already falling bit their horizontal speed keeps them in the same level. If they just walk out the airlock and push themselves towards the Earth nothing will happen – they will stay in roughly the same orbit. Forever.
So, first they need to slow down so they need a rocket. Usually rockets are only used to lose enough speed to touch the atmosphere, then the air drag does the rest. However, hitting atmosphere at such high speed means a lot of heat so they need a heat shield. In just a space suit they would evaporate.
It is possible to slow down enough that the horizontal speed becomes negligible but it would require a massive rocket – roughly as large as the one they used to launch, with all the boosters and thousand tonnes of propellant. But it is possible. You could even add a bit more fuel to slow them down vertically and eliminate the air drag burn until they hit the denser atmosphere.
If you could do all of the above then jumping from ISS would be no different than jumping from a tall building because air resistance creates a stable maximum speed, no matter how high you start the fall.
Then they would just die hitting the water.
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