Of course, there may well be a secondary ceiling (pun) where air pressure and O2 create new complications...
Of course, there may well be a secondary ceiling (pun) where air pressure and O2 create new complications...
For humans, no. After ~10sec you’re falling at terminal velocity, which is generally 2-300km/h, and your odds of survival are extraordinarily close to zero.
This lady had a double malfunction, where there were issues with both main and reserve parachutes, but per a police report (1), she was descending at 60km/h, so she must have had at least some parachute material out and slowing her fall.
She’s very lucky, despite what’s likely to be a shitty next couple of years of rehab, but this isn’t a “fell from an airplane without a parachute and survived” miracle.
(1) https://www.lenouvelliste.ca/actualites/une-parachutiste-gra...
More time can increase the likelihood that you can get some piece of parachute fabric above your head. And if you can do that, the odds go way up. There’s a saying I was taught on the first jump: “keep fighting until your goggles fill with blood.”
But if you cannot get a parachute out for some reason, a longer freefall will only give you more time to contemplate your fate.
In any case a fun thought experiment
[0]https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-average-horizontal-distanc...
Largely, you can measure the height of the airplane in mistakes.
It takes time to fix a mistake. You have to first realise you are in a mistake, then you have to take in information, then you have to decide what to do, then you have to do it (the OODA loop). Since you reach terminal velocity rather quickly, it's all about the time you have left before you reach the ground and die.
So in airplanes, the higher you are, paradoxically, the safer you are.