why is jumping off a bridge often fatal, but people are rarely injured in high diving?
In: Physics
I used to go swimming at this big “Olympic sized” (probably not—probably about half the size of a football field—but big to a kid) pool that had a diving board, a high (10’?) diving board, and then 3 higher cement platforms.
One day I when I was there, a girl went off maybe the lowest or middle platform and landed bad—like ended up belly-flopping on her back.
Everyone in the whole huge pool area heard this huge ***SMACK!*** and looked over to where she hit. She was maybe 8 feet from the edge and she slowly, painfully made it to the edge and somehow pulled herself out of the water and up onto the poolside. There was a second or two for her to catch her breath, then the screaming started.
Everyone was evacuated and medics ran in and carefully strapped her—still screaming—to a back board, where her body and head were all secured against moving by straps.
Now imagine someone falling *many times that distance* into cold, choppy water, fully clothed, and probably 100-300 feet from the shore.
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