It is unbelievable that someone could survive a fall from 8 stories. Under normal conditions your guts would be splattered all over the sidewalk.

"How could anyone survive a fall like that?"

Excellent writing.

it did look like he landed on the grass. usually in the movies you need an awning and a couple of branches, followed ultimately by some type of bushes

It is unbelievable that someone could survive a fall from 8 stories. Under normal conditions your guts would be splattered all over the sidewalk.


Seriously that fall was nothing. Yes it usually kills people but people could survive it. Remeber he did not fall on cement, he fell on grass which has give. Also skydivers and parachuters have survived much greater and faster speed falls.

Trust me, real people have survived worse falls and actually not been paralyized for life.

It's been known to happen....

People surviving free fall (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_fall)

JAT stewardess Vesna Vulović (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulovi%C4%87) survived a fall of over 10,000 meters on January 26, 1972 when she was thrown from JAT Flight 364 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAT_Flight_364) by a terrorist bomb. She broke several bones and was in a coma for 27 days.

It isn't unheard of, that is for sure. But this is a show where people survive a plan crash and see into the future, so we are suspending our disbelief already!

Right, first thing I thought of was that they all survived a fall from the sky so what's a fall from 8 stories. Still, for believability, I don't know why they didn't choose the magic number 4 instead.

Ah! EIGHT stories! Of course. . . .:rolleyes:

Nice camera work on the fall-from-Cooper's-eye-view, I gotta say!

It happens. I've heard of people falling out of windows from far up, people falling out of planes, etc. You see it on those amazing videos and the news quite often.

It all depends on how you land! Somehow I think the landing flat on your back would be one of the worst ways possible. Seems to me the probability of fracturing your skull and getting massive internal organ damage would be high.

It all depends on how you land! Somehow I think the landing flat on your back would be one of the worst ways possible. Seems to me the probability of fracturing your skull and getting massive internal organ damage would be high.


Actually the only thing on your back is your kidney's. Anything of major importance. Also unless he smacked his head full speed he would not crack his skull. It looks like the back to the brunt of the blast. Under his eyes and back behind his ears were bruised which means his brain did bounce around in his skull. So he likely was in a slight coma or had a sever concussion but since his back took the brunt of the blast he had no serious permanite damage.

A man fell 16 stories from a hotel window in St. Paul, MN, just this past January, and survived. It happens!

i tripped over my dog earlier. stubbed my toe really bad.
anything is possible :)

duh. like anytime something extraordinary happens, it was because of the island's magic powers.

no, wait, hold on...

I'm sure people have survived worse than that.

I saw an episode of cops (I think it was cops) a few years ago, A guy was on drugs and jumped 8 stories running from the cops, then got up and ran! Even the cops where freaked out. Yep, you can slip in the bathtub hit your head and die yet some people can survive a fall from parachute not opening? Make lost not seem so crazy! lol

Maybe it has something to do with luck. We know that Walt was considered very lucky. Locke and Walt an a pretty tight bond back in season 1. Perhaps they were drawn to each other becuase of their good luck. Maybe on top of the daddy issues there is a a theme of luck. Didn't somebody say soemthing to Hurley like "you make your own luck"?

I am sure that there are a decent number of people who survive an 8 story fall. I think that the majority if people wouldn't survive though.

Could be just a way to explain Locke's paralysis, but maybe the point isn't that he became paralysed, but that he survived at all.

I would hardly describe Locke as lucky. He seemed to have really been given a bad lot in life. Thus he is the nut job that we all know and love today.

And I agree that survivng that fall seems much more probable then having so many people survive that plane crash. Nobody really complained too much in the begining. I think that we just have to continue to roll with it.

Actually it has been proven with 97.5% accuracy that falling from great heights has never killed anyone.

<spoiler>They are usually killed by the sudden stop at the bottom ;) </spoiler>

It was an incredible fall but not unheard of to survive. Also, we didn't see how much time passed between the fall and Locke getting into his wheelchair. He would've looked a lot worse on his first day in hospital. We don't know how long he'd been there when his nurse put him into the wheelchair.

Yes, it's more about survival than paralysis.

I just saw on the news this morning that a 5 year old fell from 9 stories and landed on their back (just as Locke had) They lived, the whole thing was on CNN.

It's been known to happen....

People surviving free fall (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_fall)

JAT stewardess Vesna Vulović (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulovi%C4%87) survived a fall of over 10,000 meters on January 26, 1972 when she was thrown from JAT Flight 364 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAT_Flight_364) by a terrorist bomb. She broke several bones and was in a coma for 27 days.

Thread may be dead now, but thnxs for these links that's a pretty amazing story

"The man who found me he told me that I was in the middle part of the plane. I was found with my head down and my colleague on top of me. One part of my body with my leg was in the plane and my head was out of the plane. A catering trolley was pinned against my spine and kept me in the plane."
http://www.asi-mag.com/editorials/vesna_vulovic.htm

So anyway, agreed easily a survivable fall.