# What would happen if you fell into a volcano? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 11, 2019, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299 "2019-11-11T19:15:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2019, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/21 "2019-11-12T17:31:27Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > [Disposal of organic waste in Erta Ale Volcano lava lake causes violent eruption](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kq7DDk8eLs8&feature=emb_logo) (Youtube) That accurately represents how my moods work. Totally calm until presented with a minor annoyance… ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2019, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/22 "2019-11-12T17:43:21Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > In Fantasy and sci fi, the impossible is easier to believe than the implausible. Gollum temporarily surviving the fall and the heat due to the ring, sure. Sinking down into rock, not so much. That said I didn’t notice it up until this thread. Nah, the trick is that Mount doom wasn’t a normal volcano and that wasn’t actually lava. It was some hot magic liquid. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2019, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/23 "2019-11-12T20:08:10Z")
Even at 20 feet from red-hot lava I was afraid my eyebrows would singe off. And standing on hard, cooled lava, I could still feel the the soles of my shoes getting tacky in places, as they started to melt. And hanging in a helicopter, several feet over a lava pool, it was like being in a blast furnace. That shit is HOT! ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2019, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/24 "2019-11-12T23:11:30Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > I’m not sure a not-human-to-begin with creature that has survived far more lifetimes than he should due to the influence of an evil magic ring being killed in a possibly-evil volcano used by a fallen angel to craft said magic ring is a good standard of comparison for what would happen in reality. > [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > This, I mean he was in possession of said ring at the point of his magma-interface incident. That has to count for something. > [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > Nah, the trick is that Mount doom wasn’t a normal volcano and that wasn’t actually lava. It was some hot magic liquid. The reason Gollum reacted that way instead of realistically wasn’t because of magic, it was because of CGI. “A computer did it!” is just as good a way to explain something as “A wizard did it!”😉 Sure, you can fanwank magical reasons why Gollum might have reacted differently to lava. (Just as you can suppose that Obi-Wan and Anakin were somehow using The Force to shield themselves from the heat - although that doesn’t explain why Anakin went up like a Tiki Torch at the end even when he wasn’t much closer to the lava than before.) But the real reason is the opposite of magical: He behaved that way because that’s what an ordinary person, with no actual experience with lava, would _expect_ to happen. Because it flows so fast, we expect lava to behave like water or maybe hot oatmeal, since we have no idea of its actual density. And since we’ve never encountered it, we have no idea how frikken hot it actually is. We don’t think about him being protected by magic because we see the scene as realistic instead of impossible. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/25 "2019-11-14T04:27:58Z")
Now I want to know why **panache45** was hanging over hot lava in a helicopter. **Panache double-O 45** perhaps? I’ve always thought that ”artist” story was just cover. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/26 "2019-11-14T06:19:42Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > We don’t think about him being protected by magic because we see the scene as realistic instead of impossible. You’ve just described the premise behind magical realism! ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/27 "2019-11-14T14:32:47Z")
Otherwise known as, A Bad Day. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/28 "2019-11-14T15:07:35Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Sure, you can fanwank magical reasons why Gollum might have reacted differently to lava. (Just as you can suppose that Obi-Wan and Anakin were somehow using The Force to shield themselves from the heat - although that doesn’t explain why Anakin went up like a Tiki Torch at the end even when he wasn’t much closer to the lava than before.) The explanation for that (canon, I believe) is that since Anakin had lost both legs and one arm, he now had fewer midichlorians available to him, so no longer had enough Force strength to shield himself. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/29 "2019-11-14T15:23:50Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > You wouldn’t sink, it’s molten _rock_, after all. No, that’s wrong. Google says magma has a density 2.80 g/cm3. At room temperature, mercury is 13.6 g/cm3. Things dropped into mercury will submerge briefly and then emerge to the top. Naturally I’m talking about dropping things from low height. If you drop things into any liquid from a great height, then you get a sudden traumatic stop depending on density and viscosity. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/30 "2019-11-14T15:39:34Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > No, that’s wrong. Google says magma has a density 2.80 g/cm3. At room temperature, mercury is 13.6 g/cm3. Things dropped into mercury will submerge briefly and then emerge to the top. If they emerge again to the top, then they don’t sink.:dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/31 "2019-11-14T15:51:42Z")
> [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > Nah, the trick is that Mount doom wasn’t a normal volcano and that wasn’t actually lava. It was some hot magic liquid. So…McDonald’s coffee? ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/32 "2019-11-14T16:13:44Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > If they emerge again to the top, then they don’t sink.:dubious: I am trying to be clear that submergence definitely will happen, possibly complete submergence, although temporarily. If you want to press a semantic quibble that this is different from sinking, you win, the victory is yours. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/33 "2019-11-14T17:26:09Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > That’s exactly [one of the scenes I had in mind.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4UiQX-Rf3U) They’re fighting just a few feet above 1,800 degree rock, _and have hardly broken a sweat_.Basically they are fighting inside a blast furnace while hardly noticing it. Jedi or not, they should have been flash-fried. That’s literally what happened to Anakin. He never touched the lava. He was several meters away. The fight scene can attributed to the Force or some kind of shielding technology. But when that was lost, he ended up extra crispy. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2019, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/34 "2019-11-14T17:32:01Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > Even at 20 feet from red-hot lava I was afraid my eyebrows would singe off. And standing on hard, cooled lava, I could still feel the the soles of my shoes getting tacky in places, as they started to melt. And hanging in a helicopter, several feet over a lava pool, it was like being in a blast furnace. That shit is HOT! Dude, did you piss off a mob boss?😕 ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2019, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/35 "2019-11-18T15:40:15Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > Would you be poisoned by toxic gasses? Volcanoes being what they are, there’s a good chance you’d be inhaling toxic fumes even before you jumped/were pushed off the cliff edge. If not, you’d be inhaling greater and greater concentrations on the way down, but these things take time to have their effect on your physiology. ISTM that for any reasonable cliff height (and therefore descent time), you’d probably still be conscious at impact. > [@mbh](#): > > Would you die of asphyxiation when hot gasses seared your lungs? Assuming the height of your fall was inadequate to cause death or unconsciousness due to impact, I’m pretty sure this is the thing that would end your consciousness. a few deep breaths would end oxygen transfer to your bloodstream, and your heart would soon be pumping oxygen-free blood to your brain; I expect you’d be unconscious within 20 seconds or so. > [@mbh](#): > > When you hit the magma, would you splatter across the surface, or would you plunge into the depths? Magma is liquid, but it’s high-density liquid. Water is 1 gram per cc, and as noted upthread, magma is about 2.8 times that. People who jump from the Golden Gate Bridge suffer massive blunt-trauma injuries when they hit the water 200 feet below. Since magma is about 2.8 times the density, you’d expect similar injuries with an impact velocity only 1/2.8 as high as what GGB jumpers experience; that translates to a cliff-fall height of just 120 feet. If you’re falling into magma from that kind of height, yes, you’ll submerge, and yes, you’ll float back up to the top, but you’ll have a lot of broken bones and various other severe damage. > [@mbh](#): > > How long would it take for you to burn? To what level of completion? Cremations take a long time to reduce a body to ash, on the order of a couple of hours. I would expect something similar for direct exposure to magma, since the temperatures are in the same ballpark. ---
**Author:** ![swampspruce](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/swampspruce/32/261_2.png) [@swampspruce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/swampspruce)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2019, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/36 "2019-11-18T16:17:18Z")
Since every magma composition is unique there might be some mitigating factors as noted above. One thing that hasn’t specifically been mentioned is H2S. If you’re breathing before you hit the magma, and there is more than 500 ppm H2S it’ will pretty much instantly render you unconscious (which is probably your best outcome if you’re rocketing in a swan dive at 9.8 m/sec sq) toward immanent death. So, there’s that. More fun reading here: [Hydrogen Sulphide (H2S) | IVHHN](https://www.ivhhn.org/information/information-different-volcanic-gases/hydrogen-sulphide) ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2019, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/37 "2019-11-18T21:20:29Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > If I fell into a volcano, Pele would be rather annoyed: > > • She likes 'em younger > > • She likes her boys virginal > > • Insufficient ceremony Pele would only be annoyed with you if you couldnt put a ball on target from inside the box. And today I found out that Pele was a she. Those Brazilians!! ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2019, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299/38 "2019-11-18T23:40:02Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > If you were lucky, the impact of hitting the magma would knock you out. It would, after all, be a rather sudden stop. So a long fall might not be too painful. Molten rock is much more dense than water. A very sudden stop. > [@Jack Handey](#): > > If you ever drop your keys into a river of molten lava, let 'em go, because man, they’re gone. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-you-fell-into-a-volcano/843299.md?page=1)