If I am shot into space without a space suit, what happens to me?

Question

Am I killed instantly? Also, what is most likely the cause of death if you are shot into space with a suit on but am not retrienved by my space ship. I had a lot of time on my hands today.

Answer 1

This question is asked quite often and almost always answered incorrectly.  NASA has actually studied this and has a webpage devoted to it.  Do note that two Russian cosmonauts died from exposure to vacuum in space, and thus we have actual bodies that have been studied as well.

The primary cause of death on being exposed to the vacuum of space is asphixiation (lack of oxygen) and it takes just as long to die in space as it would if you were drowning.  You'll have about 30 to 60 seconds of "useful consciousness" after which point you will pass out.  Brain death will occur in about five minutes.

The myths:

You will explode.  No.  Your skin is tough enough to hold you together.  You could, however, rupture your lungs if you attempted to hold your breath.  Also, the capillaries near the surface of your skin would rupture, leaving you with what would essentally be a full-body hickey.

Your blood will instantly boil.  No.  "The bends" experienced by deep sea divers who surface too quickly take about 30 minutes to set in.  In space, you will be dead from asphixiation long before your blood would boil.

You will instantly freeze.  No.  There is no conductive path for your body heat to easily escape to space.  In fact, space would not feel cold...it would not feel like anything.

You will instantly burn.  No, but you could get a severe sunburn in as little as 30 seconds.

The bottom line is that you could survive exposure to space for up to two minutes provided you are immediately returned to a pressurized environment.  The only popular movie that has ever depicted this with some accuracy is 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Answer 2

The pressure difference isn't that big. 1 atmosphere is like 10 meters (bout 30ft) underwater. So your blood wouldn't boil but you'd feel it in your ears.

You'd suffocate of course and if you had air.. freeze to death. Since you're in an almost vacuum you can't lose your heat that fast. You'll lose most of your heat by heat rays (infrared radiation), which would take a while.

You'd also suffer from the aggressive rays and winds that come from the sun. (No ozone layer and no magnetic field from the earth that could protect you)

So I'd guess you'd die of suffocation.

Good question though

Answer 3

you would definitly die

Answer 4

at Armstrong's line ( 63 thousand feet above the surface of the earth )  bodily fluids exposed to ambient barometric pressure and at 98.6 degrees f will boil away.  it would not take long for your remains to dissipate your core temperature.  cold and freezing are relative terms in space.  the absence and presence of heat measured above absolute zero is all that matters.  you most certainly will be dead before the last usefull blood cell decays, but after being exposed to such alian elements aren't we just splitting hairs?

Answer 5

You would die.

Answer 6

If you don't try to hold your breath, exposure to space for half a minute or so is unlikely to produce permanent injury. Holding your breath is likely to damage your lungs, something scuba divers have to watch out for when ascending, and you'll have eardrum trouble if your Eustachian tubes are badly plugged up, but theory predicts -- and animal experiments confirm -- that otherwise, exposure to vacuum causes no immediate injury. You do not explode. Your blood does not boil. You do not freeze. You do not instantly lose consciousness.

Various minor problems (sunburn, possibly "the bends", certainly some [mild, reversible, painless] swelling of skin and underlying tissue) start after ten seconds or so. At some point you lose consciousness from lack of oxygen. Injuries accumulate. After perhaps one or two minutes, you're dying. The limits are not really known.

You do not explode and your blood does not boil because of the containing effect of your skin and circulatory system. You do not instantly freeze because, although the space environment is typically very cold, heat does not transfer away from a body quickly. Loss of consciousness occurs only after the body has depleted the supply of oxygen in the blood. If your skin is exposed to direct sunlight without any protection from its intense ultraviolet radiation, you can get a very bad sunburn.

Answer 7

your blood would boil

Answer 8

you wouldn't breath any more

Answer 9

I suppose your body would burn and break apart as you passed through the atmosphere into space.