# sky-diving

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sky-diving/6209>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [January 15, 2000, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sky-diving/6209 "2000-01-15T13:32:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![harpo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/d9b06d/32.png) [@harpo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/harpo)\
**Post date:** [January 15, 2000, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sky-diving/6209/1 "2000-01-15T13:32:00Z")

</div>

I heard a sound bite on the tube last week that said that sky-divers can breath while in free-fall without using their lungs. The spot claimed that the oxygen in the air rushing over their bodies was absorbed directly through their skin making it possible for then to “hold their breath” all the way down. sound goofy enough to be true, is it?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![pluto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f08c70/32.png) [@pluto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pluto)\
**Post date:** [January 15, 2000, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sky-diving/6209/2 "2000-01-15T15:53:00Z")

</div>

Nope.

* * *

“To do her justice, I can’t see that she could have found anything nastier to say if she’d thought it out with both hands for a fortnight.”  
Dorothy L. Sayers  
_Busman’s Honeymoon_

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\
**Post date:** [January 15, 2000, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sky-diving/6209/3 "2000-01-15T22:02:00Z")

</div>

I hope these skydivers don’t get jobs working for Auric Goldfinger and get killed by having their bodies covered in gold paint. 😉

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![lvick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d07c76/32.png) [@lvick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lvick)\
**Post date:** [January 16, 2000, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sky-diving/6209/4 "2000-01-16T04:35:00Z")

</div>

Well, in my 250 odd jumps I can honestly say that I never can remember breathing. However, IIRC, my maximum freefall was ~90 seconds. Besides, except for the rare naked jump, people are often wearing jumpsuits, gloves, goggles and possibly helmets,  
Larry

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\
**Post date:** [January 16, 2000, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sky-diving/6209/5 "2000-01-16T04:49:00Z")

</div>

Last time I checked, people don’t breathe through their skin.

What a silly story.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\
**Post date:** [January 16, 2000, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sky-diving/6209/6 "2000-01-16T05:03:00Z")

</div>

From a Cecil column on painting skin:

> [@](#):
>
> There was a notion abroad in those days that you breathed through your skin. Well, science–or at least the popular understanding of it–has made mighty strides since those early years, and it is now known that you do not breathe through your skin. You breathe through your mouth and nose.

[http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1\_221b.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_221b.html)

- Rick