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Baghdad Stampede Kills Hundreds

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  • #46
    Perhaps people wouldn't have been so panicked if national security wasn't such a disgrace with a number of suicide bombs previously killing hundreds during such religious gatherings - ultimately the blame for the security situation lays firmly at the door of the US...


    urgh.NSFW

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    • #47
      Aren't MOBIUS' powers amazing?

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      • #48
        Originally posted by Kuciwalker
        Aren't MOBIUS' powers amazing?
        Yeah, it's called common sense - something that is woefully lacking on the Poly OT...

        Would you care to refute my claim with a reasonable argument against it?
        Is it me, or is MOBIUS a horrible person?

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        • #49
          Originally posted by VetLegion
          I think children are more likely to survive the jump than grown men, due to their smaller mass.


          You can't be serious.
          "My nation is the world, and my religion is to do good." --Thomas Paine
          "The subject of onanism is inexhaustable." --Sigmund Freud

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          • #50
            Hell, I blame Eisenhower.
            urgh.NSFW

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            • #51
              Originally posted by Guynemer


              You can't be serious.
              Isn't the state of science education wonderful?

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              • #52
                Originally posted by Guynemer




                You can't be serious.
                I've missed this gem.



                .
                .
                .
                .
                .
                urgh.NSFW

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                • #53
                  In retrospect, that would have been a better smiley to use.

                  Az
                  "My nation is the world, and my religion is to do good." --Thomas Paine
                  "The subject of onanism is inexhaustable." --Sigmund Freud

                  Comment


                  • #54
                    Originally posted by VetLegion
                    Ouch. Survivable though, I think.
                    No. A fall from any height over 20 meters on something hard is almost always fatal. Water is not soft at that speed.
                    Christianity: The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree...

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                    • #55
                      No no no no no. YOUR smiley is the better.

                      Actually, it's possible that he's right. if we postulate spherical babies, equal density of babies and adults, and equal suseptability to damage of babies and adults per unit of mass, since IIRC air drag is proportional to the square of the radius, and mass, and thus gravitational force is proportional to the cube of the radius of the baby/adult, the babies will hit the water with a slightly lower speed.
                      urgh.NSFW

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                      • #56


                        But still, he said due to their smaller mass.

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                        • #57
                          Ignoramuses

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                          • #58
                            You're the one clinging to Aristotilian physics.
                            Christianity: The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree...

                            Comment


                            • #59
                              Let's start with STRAIGHT DOPE:

                              Scientists have long been fascinated by what happens to people who fall from great heights without a parachute. Unsurprisingly, most of them get killed; perhaps surprisingly, a few don't. A prime example of the latter was a 17-year-old male who in 1979 leaped off the Golden Gate Bridge from a height of 250 feet. According to one report, "he recount[ed] a slowing of time initially, and mid-fall, when fully realizing the oncoming impact, strove to adjust his attitude to the vertical feet-first position. An almost perfect entry was achieved. Although dazed, he swam to shore" and checked into a hospital, where his worst injury turned out to be several cracked vertebrae.

                              Walking away from something like that is rare. The Golden Gate Bridge is said to be the most popular suicide location in the world--at least 1,200 people had jumped as of 2003, of whom fewer than 20 survived. A more typical outcome was that of a stuntman calling himself Kid Courage, who jumped off the bridge in 1980 trying to set a free-fall record. He landed flat on his back and was dead when pulled from the water with massive internal injuries.

                              The key to survival appears to be vertical entry. Your little brain is right, Paul--there's a difference between landing on water and landing on concrete, namely you can't dive into concrete. The 17-year-old male survivor said he may have touched bottom, perhaps 20 to 25 feet down--plenty of room to disperse the force of impact. In contrast, Kid Courage's body never sank beneath the surface, meaning he'd gone from 75 mph (a Golden Gate leaper's peak speed) to zero in maybe six inches.

                              Beyond a certain point even Olympic form won't save you. One expert claims the upper limit for surviving water entry is around 80 mph. Presumably it's less if you're hitting something solid. Still, the literature teems with spectacular exceptions:
                              In a 1942 paper, physiologist Hugh De Haven told of eight people who survived falls of 50 to 150 feet on dry land, many with only minor injuries. The common denominator: something to break the fall or soften the impact, such as loose dirt, the hood of a car, or, in one astonishing but verified case, an iron bar, metal screens, a skylight, and a metal-lath ceiling.
                              In 1963, U.S. Marine pilot Cliff Judkins's chute didn't open after he bailed out of his crippled fighter. He fell 15,000 feet into the Pacific, suffered numerous broken bones and a collapsed lung, but lived.
                              U.S. Army air force sergeant Alan Magee fell 20,000 feet from an exploding B-17 in 1943 and crashed through the skylight of a French train station. (A lesson emerges: Aim for the skylight.) Though his arm was shattered, he lived too.
                              When his bomber was shot down in 1942, Soviet lieutenant I.M. Chisov fell 22,000 feet into a snowy ravine. He was badly injured but recovered.
                              Luckiest of all was RAF flight sergeant Nicholas Alkemade, who leaped from his burning bomber in 1944 without a parachute at 18,000 feet. After a 90-second plunge, he crashed through tree branches in a pine forest and landed in 18 inches of snow. His only injuries: scratches, bruises, burns, and, in some accounts, a twisted knee.

                              --CECIL ADAMS


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                              • #60
                                Nothing about mass there. And surviving from those thousands of feet isn't really that surprising, given terminal velocity.

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