this post was submitted on 11 May 2026
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me_irl
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The type of airplanes we jump out of only go about 80 mph. Passenger airplanes go about 800 mph. So if you jump out of a passenger airplane, the windspeed outside the door will rip your skin off.
I'm assuming if it's going down it's flying much slower.
Well there's basically no way to leave a typical modern passenger plane once it's in the air. The doors lock in the frame from the inside and once the cabin is pressurized the pressure difference between inside and outside makes them impossible to open.
Actually there is one way - some windows on the flight deck can be opened sometimes and apparently exiting a passenger plane at traveling speed is survivable.
There's the story of British Airways Flight 5390 where the flight deck experienced a explosive decompression due to a faulty cockpit window and the captain was ejected out of the window partially, his knees got caught on the flight controls while his upper body stuck out of the window. Unable to pull him back in flight attendants held onto his legs for 20 minutes until the First Officer was able to perform a emergency landing. The pilot survived with - for what he has endured - minor injuries, he returned to flying 5 months after the incident.