If he made any attempt at it, I’d scream, “Take your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!”
It may be exaggerated but they are incredibly strong. There is actually little scientific research on this but there are anecdotal reports of male silverback gorillas bending steel bars two inches in diameter. I have seen video of a gorilla crushing a coconut with one hand, then pulling another coconut apart with two hands like a human would an apple.
In 1924 a chimpanzee in the Bronx Zoo pulled on a dynamometer with 1,260 pounds of force. Frans de Waal, one of the world’s best-known primatologists, says “I doubt that 20 adult human males, or an entire football team, would be able to hold down a male gorilla against his will…They will be pulverized.”
This is true, but I was also a primatologist and have experience with both great apes and monkeys. ANY creature is difficult to restrain when it struggles, so that’s really not a very good criterion. (I can guarantee that it would take more than 5 people to restrain a 65-pound baboon.) Think of it this way: If a typical human could curl a 100-pound weight, can a typical gorilla curl a 2700-pound weight? In my experience, no. A 1000-pound weight? Maybe. I’ve seen apes and macaques do some pretty amazing things.
Well, these replies have been both amusing and informative. Thanks!
A steel bar 2" in diameter? Going to have to call you on that one. I used an online calculator and plugged in a 2" diameter by 24" long, round steel, and the amount of deflection with 1000 pounds of force was .19". I plugged in a 48" wide one, assuming the gorilla could get a wider grasp, and there was more deflection, 1.56", but then the amount of force would not be the same, of anything it would be less.
So, yeah, no way a gorilla is bending 2" steel bar unless it’s some inferior material.
Also, for those who are crazy big into fitness, a dynamometer and related results are always into debate. Spring versus hydraulic, single or double handed, etc. But, pulling 1,260 pounds of force means that gorilla had some incredible grip strength, assuming it was gripping it with its hands and not pulling via a harness around the body. As yet again, the result will vary.
This dude pulled a +400k pound airplane via a harness. I doubt he’d have been able to do that if he was pulling via his hands.
So, that 1924 result is inconclusive without knowing the type of dynamometer and method of application.
Not sure of the exact episode, but I believe I saw it done on Gilligan’s Island.
No fair citing to such an unimpeachable zoological source.
But could a gorilla tear a human’s head off if he was on a treadmill?
24 inches long? How do you know the cage wasn’t designed like this, which has bars maybe 70 inches long:
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1124/9324/products/gorilla-sm-600x600_grande.jpg?v=1473265964
If you plug those numbers in, you get 4.8 inches deflection per bar, or a total gap increase of about 10 inches for two bent adjacent bars.
The alleged 2" bar might also be an approximate description. Nobody said it was measured with digital calipers. If it was 1.7" diameter the deflection would be 9.3 inches per bar or 18.6 inches for two bent adjacent bars.
In the book “Gorilla Hunter” by Fred Merfield, he says gorillas can bend iron bars 2 inches thick:
The book “Animals from Africa” says an adult gorilla can bend a steel bar 5cm (1.97 inches) in diameter: http://a.co/aJNrlqT
As I previously said, these reports are anecdotal, not scientific measurements.
For real dude? Your first link is to the kiddie section of a newspaper, like weekly reader or something. The second is written as a kids book. Feel free to continue to wiggle-waggle about the measurements of the bar… But you got on the internet so maybe google a scholarly article with references versus some kids book.
As I already said twice, these are only non-scientific anecdotal reports. There are no known scholarly references. This is an informal discussion where we are just sharing ideas, not trying to prove something to a hostile prosecutor.
Re the OP question, in another forum a physician said the longitudinal separation force for a human neck was about 100 Newtons per square cm, which would equate to about 13,100 Newtons or 2944 pounds force. If that is correct it’s difficult to see how a gorilla could apply that force but I doubt this area has been thoroughly investigated. OTOH the physician didn’t cite any white papers or prove this by a finite element analysis run on a supercomputer, so maybe it’s not right.
The Perfect Master on the surprising strength of chimps (with a passing reference to gorillas, who are even stronger): Can a 90-lb. chimp clobber a full-grown man? - The Straight Dope
Srsly; why not just tell us you spoke to God the other day? There’s no way to argue against such a source!
Just yanking it off in a single effort seems like it’d take more strength than a gorilla could normally manage. But I think a gorilla could get a human head off if they were alone with the body, had some time, and, for some reason, were so inclined. It might take a while, though, and if you pissed off a gorilla I’m sure you’d be long dead before that.
Yes, yes; but if the steel bars had been exposed to burning jet fuel …
When does the person’s screaming stop? Before or after the gorilla has torn the head off?
What might it do with the head afterwards? This gives me a chance to once again trot out my favorite Cecil Adams quote, about animals and masturbation – a female gorilla (or was it a chimp?) who attempted to achieve “carnal union with a mango.” 