How Long Can You Survive?

 Buckle up, because today, we’re going to find out just how long you can survive. Survive what, you ask? How about EVERYTHING? How long could you survive if absolutely everything went right? Ask Jeanne Calment, who lived from 1875 to1997 - yes, a shocking 122 years, the longest recorded lifespan for a human being. She claimed to never be ill except for some eye ailments, ate a regular diet including her favorite braised beef, and even enjoyed the occasional wine and cigarette. 

She was deeply religious and credited God for her long life - but whatever the secrets were to her incredibly long life, she eventually took them with her. But how about the average person? Life expectancy varies around the world - and took a short-lived dive in 2020. But the average life expectancy for a man in the United States is around 78 years - but women live several years longer. 

This is a high for human history, mostly due to the advances in medical care that’s helped people survive many common ailments. But what accounts for that multi-year gap between men and women? Many believe it’s not due to the end of life - but the more risky activities men engage in when young, driving down the average. 

How Long Can You Survive?

But what if you’re all about the tasty stuff? How long could someone survive exclusively on junk food? Well, there’s only one way to find out - and few people are willing to put it to the test. Documentarian Morgan Spurlock ate nothing but over-the-top McDonald’s meals for a month and saw his health go down the tube- but model Faye Campbell lives on a diet of pizza, cheeseburgers, and takeout and seems largely healthy. 

Any ill effects may not appear until decades later - unless nutritional deficiencies become a problem. But the odds are that someone could live on a junk food diet for decades. But what about those with one of the deadliest diseases? Cancer. It sounds like a death sentence to many - and some cancers are caught too late or are inoperable. But for those with treatable and common cancers like skin, breast, and prostate, it’s possible to use treatment and surgery to put the cancer into remission. 

While monitoring is necessary to catch it if it starts to come back, it’s possible for people to live with their cancer in remission for ten years or more. When you’ve gotta go, you’ve gotta go. But what if...you don’t? How long can someone survive without having a bowel movement? Most people do it daily - or more, if they’ve just eaten Taco Bell. 

Going several days without pooping can be a sign of painful constipation. But the record-holder is a man in England who reportedly refused to use the bathroom for forty-seven days - because he didn’t want police to find the drugs he was concealing...up there. By refusing food, he was able to slow his bowels - but long-term this could cause an obstructed bowel that would need surgery. 

You might think this next item would kill you fast - but you’d be surprised. Radiation poisoning. Invariably fatal above a certain dose, and a horrible way to die - as many in Chernobyl and Fukushima found out. Radiation is measured in a unit called Sieverts, and the threshold that kills fifty percent of people is roughly 3.5 Sieverts. 

Within forty days, half the people exposed will die - but many of them might not make it that long, and those that survive will have long-term health issues. It’s one of the most basic elements of life. How long could you survive without food? There’s a reason people on a desert island quickly start scrambling for food - starving is horrible. 

How Long Can You Survive?

The body starts by absorbing the fat, and then moves onto the available protein in the muscles, as people start wasting away. The average seems to be about twenty-one days before there’s not enough resources in the body to sustain life - although if people have consistent access to water, it can be stretched past a month in rare cases. 

But this food will cut down your lifespan- a lot. How long could you live after eating one of the world’s most poisonous mushrooms? Amanita Phalloides doesn’t kill like most poisonous things. Also known as the Death Cap, this lethal but benign-looking mushroom kills primarily through slow kidney and liver damage, which leads many people to think they’re getting better. 

And by the time it becomes clear how bad the damage is, it’s too late - and the mushroom claims most of its victims within sixteen days. But how long could you go....before you fall asleep permanently? Sleep. It’s one of the things that make us human, and even a day without sleep can lead to some serious ill effects. But one teenager pushed the limits of human endurance in 1963.

How long can a person go without sleep? The answer, according to one Randy Gardneris eleven days and twenty-five minutes in a sleep experiment. And the young man survived with no ill effects aside from taking an immediate fourteen-hour nap. And while some have claimed to have beaten his record since, the record is no longer officially kept out of concern for the safety of those who try. 

But one more building block of life is an even more urgent need. For those on a desert island, the most urgent need might not be food - but water. They’re surrounded by water, sure - but it’s all salt water, which is the opposite of what’s needed. How long can someone live without water? That depends on the climate. 

When it’s hot, the body loses liquid through sweat much more quickly, and fatal dehydration can set in after only two days. But in a climate-controlled environment, death by dehydration can take as much as a week. But nothing’s more essential than air - and those who can’t take it in normally don’t last long. How long can someone last without functioning lungs? 

This is usually the result of a serious illness or injury, and it would have been invariably fatal in the past. Now, transplants are possible, but someone who has both lungs removed would have a very short time to live. The record-holder? A double-lung transplant patient who was kept alive on life support for six days before his transplant. But what about another essential body function? 

People can hold in their poop for a long time- but things get trickier when it comes to peeing. Your bladder has a limited capacity, and it’s usually less than half a day before holding it in becomes painful. This can lead to serious health issues like urinary tract infections and incontinence, but eventually the body will just...go. 

How Long Can You Survive?

The only way to prevent this? Not drinking to avoid peeing, at which point the body is likely to expire in four days. We’ve all done this as a kid - but how much is too much? How long can the body survive upside down? Whether you’re working out or just playing around, you know the blood rushes to the head pretty quickly when you’re hanging upside down. 

But for those who have gotten trapped upside down, like those in cave-exploring mishaps, it soon becomes much more dangerous. Blood and liquid build up in the upper half of the body, causing asphyxiation, and the unfortunate hanger-on would die in a little over twenty-four hours. But what about another - more painful - form of hanging around? Crucifixion. 

One of the most notorious execution methods of all time under the Romans. But how did it actually kill - and how long could someone survive? Victims would be spread out on the cross, in agonizing pain from the nails driven through their wrists. This would force the victim to bear their weight on their chest, compressing their lungs and putting pressure on their heart. 

Heart and lung failure - not the nails - would be the cause of death in around twenty-four hours. How long could a human survive in one of the most inhospitable places on Earth? Mount Everest. The tallest point on Earth, and above a certain point, it’s called the death zone. This is the point where it’s impossible for the human body to acclimate to the conditions, and no human life is capable of surviving for long. 

How long? Estimates are around sixteen hours before the low oxygen levels take their toll and cause a severe risk of a heart attack. There’s a reason most climbers reach the summit - and then leave as soon as possible. But what about going below? Buried alive. It’s one of the scariest fates imaginable- and has been the subject of many horror movies. 

But how long could someone actually survive underground? Well, the good news is that you won’t die of starvation or thirst waiting to be rescued. The bad news is, you’ll be dead long before that - in less than six hours. The constant breathing in a confined space will raise the carbon dioxide level in the coffin massively, and the unfortunate resident will drift off to sleep - forever. 

Buckle up - because from here the survival times are going to go way down. Cocaine is one of the most dangerous drugs, and one of the easiest for rookie drug users to overdose on. It can cause an elevated heart rate, chest pains, tremors, and vomiting - and in high enough concentrations, it can dangerously raise the body temperature and cause respiratory and cardiovascular failure. 

How Long Can You Survive?

In these cases, treatment to cool the body and lower the blood pressure is essential - or death could come in only an hour. But for some people, something much more mundane can be even more dangerous. Allergies are common, and most are annoying but harmless - like that sneezing you do every spring. 

But for those who have severe anaphylaxis, an allergy to a common food or trigger can cause chest tightness, difficulty breathing, and even the closing of the throat. The inability to breathe can cause fatal damage in less than fifteen minutes - which is why many people with severe allergies carry a portable injector of epinephrine to alleviate the symptoms until they get to the hospital.   

How much can the human body endure at the most extreme conditions? You might think that the biggest problem for the human body at the bottom of the sea would be the lack of oxygen - but it’s actually the pressure. Even with an oxygen tank, scuba divers have to be careful about resurfacing too quickly or they’ll suffer severe medical issues from depressurizing. 

But at the bottom of the sea, the human body would only be able to endure a maximum of ten minutes before the extreme pressure crushes them. What about in the deep freeze? Temperatures of negative 30 Celsius are very rare, but in cold climates during winter, the weather can get deadly. A human being exposed to temperatures of negative30 Celsius will quickly find themselves affected by hypothermia. They’ll become weak and confused and their body will start to shut down. 

Making it worse, hypothermia can fool the body into thinking it’s hot - which may lead confused people to take off their clothes. In these harsh climates, the point of no return can come in less than ten minutes. But what happens when things get bloody? We lose blood all the time - from a little in a paper cut, to a pint or so when we donate blood. 

We can afford to lose some of our blood, but when an artery gets cut, it can cause a fatal hemorrhage. The blood starts flowing and doesn’t stop, and if it’s not stanched quickly, it can render the body incapable of pumping blood to the heart effectively. Blood loss of more than forty percent can be fatal - and that can happen in only five minutes if a core artery is cut. But what about without the most essential element of life? Air. 

We take it in constantly - and without it death can come very quickly. The most common causes of an inability to breathe include choking and drowning, and when the brain is deprived of oxygen, things begin to go wrong very fast. After only a minute, brain damage can occur. After five minutes, severe brain damage is guaranteed and survival is unlikely. 

That’s why the Heimlich maneuver and CPR are taught to all first-aid responders - so they can move fast. But ingesting the wrong thing can be even deadlier. Spies around the world have long sought to kill their enemies with poison. But few poisons are more effective than cyanide. While trace amounts of this deadly compound can be found in fruits we eat regularly, a concentrated cyanide pill added to a target’s food can be fatal in only three minutes - too quick for an antidote to be applied in most cases. 

While cyanide gas can kill even faster, it’s also more indiscriminate - not great for a spy if you don’t want to start a war. Hold on, because things are about to get both hot - and cold. How long could someone survive on the planet Mercury? The little rocky planet is the closest to the sun, and it’s a planet of extremes. 

When facing the sun, the temperature can rise to a burning 425 degrees Celsius. On the dark side, it’s a bone-chilling negative125 degrees Celsius. Maybe somewhere in the middle there’s as mall survivable zone - but there’s also no atmosphere. All that adds up to any unprotected human on this planet being dead in less than two minutes. 

How Long Can You Survive?

This next situation might be a little shocking. How long can someone survive a 120 volt electrical shock? That depends on what happens. Getting shocked by an electrical current is survivable, but only if the person is separated from it quickly. A prolonged shock can quickly stop the heart and lead to a fatal heart attack in only one minute. 

Getting the person clear is critical, as well as performing CPR if their heart has stopped - but be careful. If the person is being actively shocked, the rescuer might wind up being hit by the same electric current. Get ready - because now we’re down to seconds. How long could you survive falling into an active volcano? The lava would burn you alive - a horrible way to go. 

But don’t worry about it, because you won’t be alive long enough to feel it. The heat surrounding the lava is so extreme that it would make you burst into flames and die in only thirty seconds - probably dying before you ever hit the lava. It turns out that casually jumping over lava rivers is only something that happens in video games. 

But what about in the final frontier? Astronauts can survive in space for a longtime - because they have their space suits. But if anything goes wrong, death will come quickly. Outer space has no air to breathe and is one giant, deadly vacuum. It will suck the air out of your lungs, cause your organs to rupture, and cause your body to inflate. If that doesn’t kill you, the lack of oxygen. 

Within fifteen seconds, you’ll pass out and die from the lack of air - and become just another object floating through space. But it’s not the only thing in space that can kill quickly. Why does it take so long to get to places in space? Because the human body can only handle traveling at certain speeds. 

Acceleration can be a killer, with the human body only able to handle 5gs for a few minutes. 9gs, which exerts a massive gravitational force on the body, would only be survivable for three seconds - and that’s still not enough speed to get us to light speed any time soon. But what about surviving the deadliest weapon on planet earth? 

How long could you survive a nuclear explosion? Well...not long. That’s probably not a surprise. These massive weapons can spread radiation for miles and kill people from cancer years or decades after their detonation. But for those caught near the epicenter of the blast, their lifespan would be how long it took for the blast to reach them - often a second or less. 

As soon as the massive wave of nuclear fire hits, they would be vaporized instantly. Let’s finish up with one of the deadliest places in the universe. The sun. It sustains life - but that’s only because we’re a good distance from it. The center of the sun is a staggering 15 million degrees Celsius - more than enough to kill any living being on the surface via incineration instantly. 

With a proper spacesuit - well, no one’s invented a spacesuit that can endure anything close to that- but if someone wound up on the sun somehow, their lifespan would be measured in a tiny fraction of a second, making it one of the most un survivable places in the universe. 

So naturally you’d only want to visit the sun at night. Check out “You Wouldn’t Survive World War 3” for more extreme situations, or watch “What You Should Do to Survive in the Wilderness "for some unique survival tips.