You vs 1 ton of feathers

[Stigmazilla]

You are teleported to the centre of the arena, then seconds later a ton of feathers is teleported ten feet right over your head. You can't leave a 4 x 4 square in the middle of the arena. Do you survive?

[The MunchKING]

Feathers shouldn't be that densely packed, so I'm guessing by holding your hands up you could deflect most of the individual feathers that were over your head

[Postmania]

I would assume 1 ton is 1 ton regardless of the material.

However spread across 16 square feet it wouldnt all fall on you so Idk.

[big_adventure]

If you are standing in the middle of this, you are going to get hit, softly, by maybe 200 lbs max of feathers gently falling like feathers do over a period of time. And you are going to be supported from the sides, so it can't knock you down. Yeah, you'll be fine, unless you suffocate. That much feathers will go over your head.

[Hiromi]

Yeah, you'll be fine, unless you suffocate. That much feathers will go over your head.

this is the kicker, average chicken feather weighs 0.0082 grams or 0.0003 ounces, which means you have 80 thousand feathers per pound, so one ton of feathers means 160 million feathers

[Totoro Man]

a ton of anything falling on top of you from a height of 10 feet above is going to kill you. it doesn't matter how soft or light the material is.

even if we factor in dispersal because the feathers will flutter to the ground... things still have a tendency to fall straight down when you get large volumes like this. the optimistic suggestion of a mere 200 pounds landing on you says a lot. even 200 pounds of anything falling on you from 10 feet overhead will kill you.

without being given explicit notice in advance, and being informed of an audible trigger warning of the impending fall, nobody will be able to move out of the way.

even with an audible warning, and a willingness to run out of the kill radius, the 4x4 foot area restriction guarantees that you are required to stay inside of the kill zone. even if that restriction was removed, most people are simply incapable of moving fast enough to get out of the kill radius in time.

[Tami]

I'm allergic to feathers.

[The Arbiter]

this is the kicker, average chicken feather weighs 0.0082 grams or 0.0003 ounces, which means you have 80 thousand feathers per pound, so one ton of feathers means 160 million feathers

So you will definitely absolutely suffocate. But like... slowly and horribly as they just KEEP falling down. You linger on for a while as you try to "swim" to the top, but then ANOTHER 800,000 feathers fall.

What a horrible way to go haha

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

So you will definitely absolutely suffocate. But like... slowly and horribly as they just KEEP falling down. You linger on for a while as you try to "swim" to the top, but then ANOTHER 800,000 feathers fall.

What a horrible way to go haha

It's a clucking nightmare scenario, yes.

Bwut?

[bruceleegreyhulk]

Factor in air resistance a ton of loose feathers would still fall more slowly than a ton of bricks. This means the fallen force on your body would be less than if a ton of bricks were to fall on your head. mass x acceleration = force. This is due to density because even if a ton of feathers and a ton of bricks would weigh the same, a ton of feathers would still be less dense than a ton of bricks.

[The MunchKING]

So you will definitely absolutely suffocate. But like... slowly and horribly as they just KEEP falling down. You linger on for a while as you try to "swim" to the top, but then ANOTHER 800,000 feathers fall.

What a horrible way to go haha

Not necessarily. It says we're in the middle of the arena and WE can't leave a 4x4 square. but nothing about being in a box or anything, so the FEATHERS can go all around the arena. And this is an arena big enough to hold spaceship battles when it wants to.

[Stigmazilla]

How would this change if the 4x4 box was instead a 4x4 collum raised 100 metres off the floor of the arena?

[Sharpandpointies]

How would this change if the 4x4 box was instead a 4x4 collum raised 100 metres off the floor of the arena?

Drop to hands and knees to avoid unfortunate, blind staggering, and you should be fine.

[big_adventure]

Drop to hands and knees to avoid unfortunate, blind staggering, and you should be fine.

Exactly this. Feather will fall slowly. If they can't build up or suffocate you, you'll be OK.

[The Drunkard Kid]

I dunno, depending on how tightly they are clumped together, the central mass of the few tens of millions feathers could be mostly shielded from the large part of the slowdown from air resistance for the ten feet of fall. Like, one grain of sand would probably get blown every which way by air resistance, but if you drop a ton of sand at once, its probably going to crush whatever is underneath it pretty badly.