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IPhone 4 Survives 1,000 Foot Fall From Plane
tekgoblin writes "From the article: 'US Air Force Combat controller Ron Walker had lost his iPhone 4 from his aircraft during flight. He works as a Jump Master, which is where he would ensure the airplane was in the correct position when he sends parachute jumpers out. The plane was moving at 150 mph and while looking out the door of the plane to find necessary ground landmarks his pocket opened and his iPhone flew out. When he noticed his phone fell, he thought all was lost. Upon landing and sharing the story with friends he installed the Find My iPhone app on one of their phones and went looking for his phone. He expected it to be battered from the fall but found the phone to be 100% un-damaged from the fall. The phone was protected by a Griffin Motif TPU iPhone case but it isn't clear whether the case protected the phone from the fall or the fact that it was cushioned by the brush that it hit.'"
The pilot was holding it wrong.
That either makes the iPhone really cool or really lucky
My old iPhone 4 shattered in a 3-foot fall from my pocket to the concrete... The new one hasn't had a scratch on it since, though.
That WAS the article, minus the last sentence.
So we know now that the iPhone 4 can survive a 1000ft fall as long as it doesnâ(TM)t hit concrete, I wonder if Apple will talk about this at one of their next iPhone announcements.
There, now you've read the entire article.
I always knew that the Chinese manufacture the best equipment in the world.
I would love to see the accelerometer and gyroscope readouts on that thing during the fall. Too bad it probably doesn't log that info while in sleep.
Big deal, I've lost my Nokia E51 from 4000 feet during parachute operations, same situation, fell into a bush. Only found it because of the anti-theft GPS Tracking software on it.
Anyone know the tumbling terminal velocity of an iPhone? After a certain height it's all the same (until you start getting high enough that the iPhone will burn up in the atmosphere).
But can your iPhone survive the building it's in being blown up by an RPG? The original Gameboy has. It still plays Tetris to this day.
Because mine didn't survive the 4 ft fall from my hand to the kitchen floor.
Once the phone falls far enough to reach terminal velocity (not more than a few feet) It doesn't actually matter if its 1000 ft or 5 beyond that point, the Phone is falling as fast as it's ever going to. Headline should read "iPhone can survive fall if broken by vegetation" But that won't sell as many "Griffin Motif TPU iPhone cases" will it ) Nice name drop though!
I'll probably get modded down for this but I can't help it. I am in a giddy mood today.
INTO brush. Isn't this going to be true of most gadgets with no moving parts?
An old laptop of mine resisted a car collision, but the screen cracked one time it fell ONE FOOT HIGH from the ground (and flat).
There is some sort of law in electronics that makes a gentle caress the most common cause of electronics death. You can shot devices with a shotgun and not do as much damage as treating it with care.
.. dropped calls.
(Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week. If you're unlucky).
Small objects have proportionately more drag for their weight so their terminal velocity may not be that fast, reached earlier (so overheight doesn't matter) and damage less.
Another case of why there are no flying pigs -- weight increases as the cube of length, while drag increases as the square. So lots of flying bugs.
Only means that he got lucky that his phone survived the fall. Could had been any phone. Just like any phone that is dropped 4-5ft has a chance of surviving or not. This is just irrelevant news.
Terminal velocity of a cellphone must be pretty low, + it landing in vegetation / soft ground...
A cold morning causes my MacBook Pro not to start up due to logic board problems.
my iPhone scratches if I even think about putting it in the same pocket as my car keys.
WOW , now it's got super-powers! Is there anything it can't do?!!!
Apple! IPhone! Apple! IPhone! Apple! Apple! Apple! IPhone! IPhone! IPhone! Apple IPhone!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
I'd be more interested if Flight Safety contacted him about improperly securing dangerous FOD.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
I wonder how many G's it pulled when it hit.
all of which belies the fact that the phone is made by Foxconn, one of China's better known purveyors of junk.
Would that it weren't so.
Like the inimitable Groucho Marx, I would never join a club that would have me as a member.
Most of the drop zones there have the consistency of beach sand, or they did "back in my days" as they say
I once watch a Jump Master open the door of a C130, grasp the side rails, pull himself forward to get a visual on the drop zone, then fall out, the stick I was in was laughing and stomping their feet so hard it drowned out the engine noise, he was ok, Jump Masters have Parachutes.
The phone was protected by a Griffin Motif TPU iPhone case but it isn’t clear whether the case protected the phone from the fall or the fact that it was cushioned by the brush that it hit.'"
With any luck the brush it hit was a Taliban guy's pubic hair.
I guess these guys are not CSI, or even scientist for that matter.... ....
>or the fact that it was cushioned by the brush that it hit
Of course if you found it in the bush, then it was cushioned, as anyone knows that some material to cushion the fall takes some of the impact away from the object, and that means as well that it landed on grass or dirt underneath, and not pure cement (i never seen a brush grow in the middle of a street)....so again another reason why it was ok, I am glad that his iphone is ok, as I have one, and could not live without it, but get a clue, it was not apple or the cell phone, it was the environment it landed in,
If you really want a test.., try letting it fall from the plane into water, then go find it, then tell me that it is not wet, and its a miracle, then i will praise apple for creating the perfect phone, until then....
Would that give the highest n900fly score OF ALL TIME?
http://maemo.org/packages/view/n900fly/
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
I know what you mean. Whilst following the news following the death of Princess Diana. There were reports of a white Fiat Uno which exited the tunnel just after the crash. But isn't it true that a car of any colour or make might have come out of that tunnel instead?
A similar thought occurred to me whilst watching a review of "127 Hours", the film about the American man who got trapped by a boulder, and ended up having to cut his arm off. Isn't it true that a man from any country, being trapped in a remote place by a boulder, might have to cut his own arm off?
...but AT&T still sucks moose cock.
How exciting!
I believe it was saved by the rush of apple users that threw themselves on the ground to cushion its fall.
They pwnd an iphone (pwn2own) in during the time it took the phone to hit the surface. Let me know when it survives the hackers.
Do combat fighter pilots often perform maneuvers with the canopy open? Was it really exceptionally warm, on that particular day, and he was just out for a spin, chatting with his girlfriend on his iPhone, with his helmet and mask pulled off and the wind rushing through his hair?
I'm sorry, I guess I'm just having a difficult time reconciling any part of this story with my "Top Gun"-perspective of fighter aircraft.
Seriously /. ?
A big viral ad for the Griffin Motif TPU iPhone case ?
Come on...
So active phones are safe on military planes, that explains the higher price tag of that equipment.
it wasn't raining at the time though.
You missed your chance to make one hell of a "The Gods Must Be Crazy" reference.
Would make for an awesome episode, though.
There's an app for that!
"Slow down, Cowboy! It has been 3 years, 7 months and 26 days since you last successfully posted a comment."
This is why I visit Slashdot. Where else could I get such precise and important information about IT events that change the world.
Just goes to show you, you cannot break a piece of crap.
Any word on if the sound quality improved?
If you're going to drop an iPhone 1000 feet, aim for a bush.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
I had a look at this case, it's not really a "case" more like a cover. At best it protects against scratches, a few drops of water, that's it. It would have no effect in ameliorating an impact. None.
I thought it was still law that all mobile phones had to be turned off whilst on board an aircraft, in which case how could he have found his phone by tracking it?
Explains why the Knights wanted a shrubbery. How Monty Python knew about iPhones back then is anybody's guess though...
-Space for rent
There are plenty of cases where people survived falls of 20,000 feet or more so I really don't see this as impressive.
It makes it very easy to find American Soldiers, so they can blow them up, etc.. -Andrew
This is fine and good, but to see what normally happens when you drop an iPhone out of a plane, we should be statistically rigorous. Is it possible to get a grant to drop 40 (or more) iPhones from a plane? And as long as we are doing that, how about getting a few different models of Android and Windows phones (again in a sufficiently large numbers) and sending them all plummeting to the ground in one big, glorious shower of technology?
This isn't news. About 6 months ago, a boy & his father sent an iphone up up and away... it reached the upper atmosphere and the cold finally popped the balloon. The iphone fell... from much further up than just 100 wimpy ft. Here's the vid - http://vimeo.com/15091562 I thought everybody knew about this.
I had left it on top of the car and forgot. It flew off into the road at some point and was picked up by a thankfully very honest person. Again, not a scratch. I believe this was one positive result of the monolithic design of the iPhone, in that it remained in on piece as it impacted. Another phone with a removable battery would have probably been in pieces scattered all over creation.
Cheers
Who is this delectable creature with an insatiable love of the dead?
I realize that military attire regulations have changed to allow personnel to carry their pagers/phones, but seriously why did this idiot have a cell phone during training exercises?
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
Is the brush ok?!
The rule of thumb when skydiving in a belly-to-earth position is that it takes ten seconds to fall the first 1000 ft., each following 1000 ft takes six seconds. To me this means that it takes 1000 ft. (or less) for a skydiver to reach terminal velocity. The exact terminal velocity of an object is determined by its ratio between (effective) area and weight. I know that stuff like helmets, shoes, cameras tends to have a (much) lower terminal velocity than a person, it tends to fly up relative to a skydiver at terminal velocity. I can't really back this up with cold hard facts, but I wouldn't think there's a big difference in time taken to reach terminal velocity. Oh, and by the way: 1000 ft. AGL is scary low for a (civilian) skydive, I would only consider this in case of a big fire, serious structural damage to the airplane or an incapacitated pilot...
And there he was, peacefully sunbathing naked on his belly, and then this!
A 100 Ft fall is probably the same as a 1000 ft fall or a 10,000 ft fall, because it will be going at 45 mph when it hits anyway. And if that energy can be dissipated over ten ft(because of the brush), then the impact isn't that great. Not very impressed. I would be impressed if 99/100 iPhones survived a fall from 10 ft. That would be a measure of engineering quality.
Erm, what the flying hell are you saying?
... for the next time I need to decide which phone to throw out of a flying airplane.
Non-story about an Apple product!
You would need to perform controlled tests under identical conditions to decide which is the more durable in reality. Please post the results on YouTube.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Man I really needed to know how "rugged" the iPhone is! I'm so excited I could cry!
"but it isn’t clear whether the case protected the phone from the fall or the fact that it was cushioned by the brush that it hit"
What, the brush was moving too? It (actively) hit the iPhone 4? That's one Fandroid bush!
Try dropping it from one foot into a toilet (WC) and see if it works? Yah, that is right... Never mind... That water was clean...
at a certain point it could have have been 10'000 feet i sure an iPhone hits terminal velocity with in a few hundred feet if not a lot less less. the case and the bush it it soft enough to slow the phone and make it not shatter was just perfect. people have fallen from that height onto soft ground and walked off fine (if not a bit sore and in need of new shorts) its not the fall that kills you its how hard the stop at the bottom is :)
I've dropped my (naked / unprotected) iPhone 4 from a height of roughly 5 feet onto a concrete sidewalk, and it's not even scuffed.
YMMV...
the tedious, tenuous appleslashvertisements continue...
I am surprised no one thought of this. says something about american science education I guess.
the plan was moving at 150mph. for a small object, and only 1000ft to fall, this means much like hitting th e ground at a flat angle. It can very well survive, and I am sure the case helped in protecting from any concentrated stress points.
"He was just trying to get a good signal"
It was the darnedest thing. The iPhone4 landed on a barstool in a bar.
Their they're doing there hair.
Too bad the workers who plummet to their deaths at the iPhone factory aren't similarly protected...
Goddamned slashvertisements... of COURSE if something has a soft landing it's not going to explode into a million pieces. Terminal velocity and stopping distance are the deciding factors. There are numerous documented cases of aircraft pilots and gunners surviving 15000+ foot drops onto snow or foliage with little more than a sprain or minor fractures, which can happen just the same from a 10 foot fall onto a hard surface.
Like the saying goes, it's not the fall that kills you, it's how you stop.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
If you have a point to make I'm dying to hear it.
I wonder if one day, someone will invent a bike that has an engine and can reach this sort of speed...
What else can happen when an unstoppable force collides with an immovable object?
will it blend? That's what I thought
Thanks to Stumble Upon, once upon a time I ran across a cartoon talking about cell phone falls. Sure it can fall 1000 ft. It be thrown off of a skyscraper, it can survive reentry from space without a scratch. But if it falls off a 3 foot counter top, it shatters into millions of pieces. Moral of the story, drop it from a plane, don't drop it trying to put it back in your pocket.
Or that all phones should have inch thick plastic and rubberized surrounds so that the people who drop their phones onto concrete or bus floors can do so with confidence.
The 'Ikky Ikky Ikky ptang' is a two part harmony at the end.
No single person can say it.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
You do realize that iphones are heavy little bastards? It'd be like dropping a brick.
Nobody's calculated the terminal velocity of an iPhone 4 yet?
Slashdot, you're getting sad in your old age...
The saying is spelled the following way according to the "script" subtitles available on the collector's edition DVD: "Ekke Ekke Ekke Ekke Ptang Zoo Boing Zow Zing!"
Wikipedia
Or that all phones should have inch thick plastic and rubberized surrounds so that the people who drop their phones onto concrete or bus floors can do so with confidence.
Better solution is for all of your people who love dropping your phones to practice up on your football/soccer skills.
Though I've noticed that my iphone does not stay on those rubbery non-slip sheets, that seem to hold anything else just fine.
All the hoopla about jumpmaster and the tracking of missing iPhone is good story. Hard evidence would have really made it news. So next time they drop an iPhone they should turn on the video and show us the trip. BTW for years we have been nudging Apple and all other PDA manufacturers to bring out a high resolution video model that was MILSPEC especially waterproof.
In this instance if the device had dropped in water it would have been milk toast in a few seconds.
Bob Kiger - Videography Lab
Seems he had it turned on in the plane!
Where is the FCC or FAA when you need them? lol
Lucky it hit a brush, what's the odds? A bush is much more likely.
Was the bush okay?