From: Eugene Leitl (eugene.leitl@lrz.uni-muenchen.de)
Date: Mon Dec 13 1999 - 13:41:47 MST
When we're talking about kilogees, remember car accident trauma. The
brain, despite floating, does not seem to tolerate orders of magnitude
more than ~10 g. It might be easier if this is not a violent twisting
motion like in a car crash but a linear acceleration in supine
floating position and with flooded lungs, but I very seriously doubt
you can beat (or even reach) ~100 g.
Also, fluorocarbons have roughly twice the density of water
(yoicks!). I see trouble both for the lung as a whole, and the
alveolae. Lots of petechiae. Never mind sinuses/darm gases.
Let's face it, squishyware just doesn't take kindly to
accelerations. It wasn't designed for space, after all.
Jeff Davis writes:
> The situation for humans is complicated by the problem of gas filled spaces
> in the interior of the body--lungs, sinuses, middle ear, semicircular
> canals of the inner ear, and bowel gases. Fill the lungs, sinuses and
> middle ear with fluid, and you probably wouldn't have a problem up to oh,
> say, a thousand gees. If the blastronaut were lying on a molded support,
> to evenly support the downward pressure of the bones, the only part of the
> skeleton not supported would be the anterior portion of the rib cage, and
> the bones of the middle ear.
>
> So, tentative conclusion, no big deal. Meanwhile, ten minutes at a mere
> 100 gees gives you 1,309,150 mph terminal velocity. One second at 1000
> gees gives you 21,800 mph. Whoa, Nellie, indeed!
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