How is it possible to survive a fall from the 4th floor?

[Tulipsxoxo]

While spending time with my family and two best friends just this Thanksgiving, stepping out briefly to buy an allergy medicine and coming back, I caught my family on a conversation was about an 10 month-old baby who once fell right on mud from the 4th floor. The baby only had minor scrapes, small bruise, a fractured left arm and obviously was crying from pain.

I was curious about said baby, asked about it. Then things got a bit awkward and silent for a couple seconds. My mother broke the silence and said I was the baby. I've survived the fall and my parents were overprotective until I was older.

It was shocking to hear death could've gotten me right there. How is it possible to survive that fall?

Updates

+1 y

I never knew this. They were talking about being thankful that I survived the fall and that I'm now healthy and strong. I'm just wondering how it was possible to survive that. At that young ago, I would've die or suffer brain damage.

[SwellStroke]

I have a cousin that when I was younger she feel into a local box canyon like the style of the Grand Canyon, not as deep or big. But she fell over 100 feet, though she had a long road of recovery after, she is still around to this day.

In regards to minimal injuries. There is reports of how people are during car crashes. If you look drivers that are sober tend to come out with more injuries as they tend to tense up their muscles right before impact. Where as in cases with drunk drivers, the drunk having minimal injuries because they were loose not tensing up.

Just a thought on how you were able to come out of it as you had. As I would think as a baby there wouldn't be that natural response to tense up, in addition to hitting mud rather than dry ground.

[Tulipsxoxo]

Sorry to hear about your cousin's fall. I'm glad to hear she survived and recovered. That was a very scary moment for my parents. The thing is they were very watchful parents and all it took is taking their eyes off me for a second or so. Then they turned back and I wasn't there anymore... I had fallen. It happened so fast. Afterwards, they become house proof and safety freaks for a while, putting gates on the windows, removing all plugs within my reach, placing a kitchen proof gate too, etc. They went overprotective till I was old enough.
Yeah luck was with me that day. That was scary.

[SwellStroke]

Thank you kindly.

Honestly I can't blame em, I would have likely done the same. In additoin to it really doesn't take but a few moments and it can result in lives being forever changed. We had recent reports here of babies drowning in pools having been able to sneak out. Honestly I would think a pool should just be a community thing and keep them in all residential areas, have it as like a community center, then you could have other activates associated with it also. Sorry random thought.

I am very happy they eased up as you grew older though. Also that you are doing well. I hope nothing but an amazing rest of your day :D

[NamerOfStars]

The lethality of toxins is listed in something called "LD-50", or the point at which the dose is lethal half the time. You can't really be much more specific than that, because sometimes people shrug off a dose of something that would've killed two or three other people.

It's also used as a measure of how lethal OTHER things are- including falls. The LD-50 for falling is... five stories. If it was only four, you're more likely to survive than to die- though possibly with some nasty injuries.

[Tulipsxoxo]

yeah I didn't get injured badly, only the fractured left arm which that still made me cry in pain. Lucky was with me that day I guess.

[Tulipsxoxo]

Yet I recovered fast

[dustybiker]

I know hitting water at 80-90ft will act like cement.

My guess Probably the same way drunks survive terrible vehicle accidents. You were too small to attempt to prevent impact. It’s those attempted protective measures that create damaging injuries. Also small children do not have completed skeletons as older children through adults. Little more give.

Sounds like you were very lucky.

[Tulipsxoxo]

yeah that was the scariest moment for my parents. They were good, watchful parents but it was only one moment of taking their eyes off me, only for a second and something like that happened.. too fast. They went on overprotective mode afterwards and buying all sorts of safe proof around the house, even gates for the windows.

[dustybiker]

Parents don’t get a handbook. Accidents happen.

Thanks for mho.

[Kaneki05]

People have survived worse. A tiny combinations of things can do drastic shifts into outcomes.
Some call it luck if you will. But it's just a collection of events so as for how? I don't know the exacts of events so cannot say.

To simplify it though, when a person flips a coin for heads or tails if not thinking about it you can just randomly get lucky with the correct one you wanted. However anyone can tell you the number of flips is actually what caused that outcome not some luck. And if you could repeat those flips in that same condition you would get the same result every time.

Now this would be fairly easy to replicate and figure it out. But on a much larger scale as falling from the 4th floor with tons upon tons of complications the way to repeat survival becomes a task of endless doubt to the accurate answer.

[Tulipsxoxo]

I think I would've been seriously injured or killed if I fell down now at that same spot. Like others said, my fragile, soft body also must have played a role in surviving that fall.

[Static_In_The_Attic]

Anything is possible & people including babies have survived a lot of things even though the odds were against them. Lucky you are.

[Static_In_The_Attic]

As for me I have a similar story but I didn’t fall & somehow luck was on my side.

[Tulipsxoxo]

Yeah I got lucky. As my parents told me, I literally scared the hell out of them. They weren't the same since and too measures into securing the house such was placing gates on all the windows, plugs removed, placing a childproof gate in the kitchen, etc. They turned into overprotective mode for a while, lol.

[Pyrofox]

In mud and water sure a 4th to a max of a 6 floor drop yeah sprained joins busted bone here or there I've rolled from a 5 stories back when I use to do parkour with my high school mates. But we would use a lot of fancy gymnastics to make the drops a less impactfull. Much higher unless your military dropping with crossed arms and feet first or diving are gonna be just about the only ways to hit a surface and not get hurt.

[BeMuse]

It's not the height that kills you, it's the impact... The lighter you are (your mass), the less impact force you will experience.

E=1/2mv^2

[BeMuse]

Height will influence velocity until you get to terminal velocity... 4th floor is something like 35 mph crash.

[Tulipsxoxo]

True. If an adult would've fallen they would've gotten seriously injured or killed.

[BeMuse]

Yeah a 5 lb baby would experience a lot less impact force than a 200 lb man... This is why they always want the baby in the back seat in a car seat. If a parent is holding the kid in a car accident, the impact force of the adult into the child would be very high.

[misogynistic_pig]

Babies have the most flexible bones, my histology professor said so.

[jayhams]

People have lived from falling from higher than that.

[Tulipsxoxo]

True. Needless to say that freaked them out so badly they acted overprotected (gates were installed on the windows afterwards, plugs from my reach removed, kitchen proof gate, etc) until I was older and knew better.