RedHanded - ShortHand: So You’ve Fallen Out of a Plane…

Episode Date: June 19, 2026

You’re free falling towards the ground at 120mph, and below you all you can see is an expanse of open wilderness. What are you going to do? Had you not listened to this ShortHand, you’d most likely panic and die. Luckily for you though, we’ve decided to give you a comprehensive (without assuming any legal responsibility) guide to what to do if you find yourself in a spot of bother.From the best way to hit the ground to finding your way back to civilization, this is the ShortHand.--Patreon - Ad-free & Bonus EpisodesYouTube - Full-length Video EpisodesTikTok / Instagram

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Hello. Hello. Welcome to an episode. Disaster. It's going to be great. Get ready. Strap in. Because we're going. Where are we going? You're going to tell us. I know. A falling.

So, you've fallen out of the plane. The ground is hurtling towards you at 120 miles per hour. We've all flown on a Boeing. Don't be too hard on yourself. At this point, there's good news and there is bad. news. The good news is whatever calamitous event led you to being ejected from the aircraft hasn't killed you. The bad news is what awaits you now. A six-mile free fall followed by weeks of recovery alone and potentially months of self-sufficiency in the wilderness. But not to worry, because just before you took off, you listened to this very shorthand. Over the next 20 or so

minutes we will equip you with a load of vital information you might not know about surviving in harsh remote conditions. And, for the first time ever, this might just save your life. This is the shorthand. So where are we? Oh yes. You're six miles up and falling.

And weirdly, things could actually be worse. Had you fallen from a tenth-story balcony or off of a cliff, you'd only have a few seconds to prepare yourself for your impending reintroduction with the earth. Luckily for you, at about six miles up, you've got a good couple of minutes to get yourself ready for what is probably going to be quite a rough landing.

Unfortunately, as six miles up, the oxygen is quite thin, however. And freezing. So the bad news is that you are going to pass out. It's probably best to see this as a nice bit of light relief before you come back round and the realisation of your impending thump hits you once again. Once you wake up, it's probably best to look for some more positives. Don't get too caught up with the technicalities, like your odds of survival.

Because sure, that is very, very low, but it's not zero. And that's something you can hold on to. Firstly, you need to take a look around and assess your situation. The million-dollar question is, are you still strapped to your seat? If you are, that is excellently great fantastic news. the odds of living to tell the tale are significantly higher if you have a bit of wreckage to protect yourself. Julian Capico was blown out of a blockheed electorate on Christmas Eve 1971

and woke up strapped her seat in the Amazon jungle. Fucking out. Merry Christmas. Sure, she had a broken colophon and had to wander the jungle clinging to life, but she did make it out alive and that is an enormous win. If you're not attached to a piece of wreckage, it's probably time to start thinking about trying to slow yourself down. The main thing is to make yourself as wide as possible in order to maximise your drag.

That is your best shot of fighting the forces of gravity pulling you speedily downwards. The ideal position would be a sort of mid-air starfish, chest down, arching your back with your head upwards. Classic skydiver pose. Now once you've adopted the falling position, it might be a wise idea to have a look down and think about what you want to aim for. The optimal landing materials are things that will either compress or break, as they'll absorb some of the energy of your landing. Mud, swamps, and freshly plowed fields are great.

Snow is even better. Trees are also good, but try to aim for the outside branches rather than going down the centre, you know, to avoid being impaled. If you're falling towards a more built-up area, well, at least you won't have to find your way back to civilization. Remember, keep thinking about the positive. The bad news, though, is that towns and cities are notorious for being quite concretey, and concrete isn't great for cushioning your landing.

Try and have a look for a tiled roof or even some sort of nice breakable glass to go crashing through to slow down your descent. Let's have a look at Alan McGee, who was blown out of a B-17 flying fortress during World War II. He fell about four miles completely unconscious, before crashing through the glass roof of a railway station in the sleepy town, of Saint-Nusier in France. Alan survived the fall with a few cuts and a couple of broken bones, and he lived to the ripe old age of 82.

So stay positive, remember Alan, as you're hurtling towards your certain demise. What you absolutely must not do is aim for any water. That is what I thought you should have done. Myth busting. Myth boosten. Life-saving. Red-handed, short-hand.

because unlike snow or mud or a bog, water doesn't compress. It only moves apart out of your way. And that's fine when you jump off the diving board at your local swimming pool, but the harder you hit it, the less likely the water is to displace itself, which is why bellyflops hurt so much.

If you hit the water at 120 miles per hour, it doesn't give the water a lot of time to get out of your way, so effectively it becomes concrete that swallows you afterwards. Plus, if you do miraculously survive this impact, you're probably not going to be feeling particularly up for a swim. This is bonkers. So aim for glass roofs. Don't aim for water. Yes. I hope you are writing this all down, listener. I really hope there are people listening who are like on a plane.

You're aiming for something nice and squidgy. As for your landing position, there's not a massive consensus on what works best. but the golden rule is anything but head first. You essentially want your head to be the last thing that hits the ground, so that it's going nice and slowly when it does eventually hit. The last thing to remember is to try and stay in your skydivers position until the last possible second. The moment you curl up into a ball or go into a pencil position,

your drag is going to be significantly reduced, and you're going to accelerate. The aim of the game here is to be going as slowly as you can manage when you hit the ground and for your deceleration to be as gradual as possible. With all of that in mind, the last possible second is also probably a good time to repent for your sins and pray to all of the gods you can think of, because the odds of sticking the landing are still essentially zero. But against all the odds, you have nailed the touchdown and you weren't immediately turned into human pulp.

Now what? Well, as we've already said, if you land in civilization, the odds are somebody probably noticed you're 120 mile an hour arrival and you'll be in hospital within the hour. If you land in the wilderness, that is a whole other kettle of fish. And yes, this is the 21st century and it feels like there's not a whole lot of uncharted territory,

but there are more wild places on the planet Earth than you might think. And without good phone signal, you've got a pretty good chance of being stranded miles from civilization. The most important part of survival in the great outdoors is knowing your priorities. Your absolute first priority is to stay calm and positive. Be more Alan. Despite what you might have seen on TV, when it comes to survival, less is more. There is no circumstance in which you need to find yourself scaling a cliff, swimming across a lake, or whatever we've seen on bear grills. And as we're saying positive, congratulations, you just survived falling out of the plane.

So few people can say that. The odds of pulling that off were extremely fucking low. And now you're out and about, surviving out in the wilds much higher. So your next priority is first aid. If you or any fellow survivors have a problem with your airways, circulation, breathing, or any kind of severe bleeding, you need to deal with that immediately. There is absolutely no point focusing all of your efforts on setting up a bad, campside, only to bleed to death as soon as you sit down.

It's important to remember, especially if you've been in some kind of accident, that you and those around you are going to be flying high on adrenaline. So you might not notice at first that something is wrong. And also, you'd be able to sell your lug out without feeling it. So calmly check yourself over and check anyone else who's with you to make sure that they don't have any immediate injuries that need to be dealt with. Once that's sorted, you need to start thinking about the rule of threes. You can survive three minutes without oxygen

You can survive three hours without shelter In a harsh environment Three days without water And three weeks without food You're good for oxygen We've got oxygen covered because you didn't fall in the water So you need to start thinking about shelter And then you need to start thinking about water

If you're exposed to extreme weather Hot or cold It's going to sap your energy and kill you off in a matter of hours If you've landed somewhere really hot You need to start looking for shade and you need to do it quickly. Cover your head and your neck do not start running because that will just make you hotter.

Then if you have any drinkable fluids to hand, drink them immediately. A common misconception is that survivors need to ration water. Actually, it takes significantly more water to rehydrate than to stay hydrated. So if you're thirsty, have drinkable water. Drink it until you are no longer thirsty. It's much better to stay hydrated while you can.

Yeah, I saw that on, um, I shouldn't be alive. And they were basically saying, don't take little sips because it's pointless. You need to take big gulps of water and just focus on finding more. And it's so counterintuitive to what you think you should be doing. Yeah, exactly, as Surrey just said. Drink the water and then hope you can find some more and figure it out. Because if you ration your water, you'll become unwell and then you won't be able to search for more anyway.

In the extreme cold, staying warm is everything. So once again, your top priority should be finding shelter from the elements. If you're surrounded by deep snow, digging a deep snow hole can be a great option. Snow is actually a great insulator, and if you dig yourself a small entrance leading into a nice big bunker in the snow, you can get yourself pretty toasty in snow time. Just remember to build any snow holes wide and tall enough that you're not physically touching the snow when you lie inside it. Otherwise, that's not a snowhole. You've just bit yourself a snowy tomb. Now if there isn't any snow,

then looking for another form of natural shelter is a great start. Small caves, overhanging rocks or fallen trees can be good options. And if they're not perfect to begin with, some sticks and foliage can go a long way to making yourself a nice protective new home. Hydration in the cold is less of an issue. Colder climates tend to have much larger abundances of water and you can always melt snow and ice.

Very important, though. that being said, do not eat snow. Do not do it. Eating snow is going to lower your body temperature massively and won't do much in the way of actually hydrating you. So eating snow will probably kill you. So be sure to melt it first. Naturally, if you've landed somewhere cold,

you should be more concerned about fire than you should be about water. In fact, starting a fire is important even in areas of extreme heat, mostly because you'll want to purify any water that you can't guarantee is clean. and also to get spotted. Mm-hmm. If it's coming from the ground or some kind of watering hole,

the water could be teeming with bacteria, which is going to make you very ill. And on top of that, deserts get really cold at night, and you don't want to spend all day finding shade only to catch hypothermia that evening. Starting a fire in the wilderness is no easy feat. It took humanity quite a few thousand years to master it, so don't be too hard on yourself.

The most important thing is to have nice dry fuel to burn. Smaller and the crispier, the better. It doesn't matter how quickly you can rub two sticks together or bash some rocks if the spark doesn't land on something that's easy to burn. Wood shavings are a great option, or even better cotton wool, which is included in first aid kits. And if you're struggling with the more old-school methods, using glass to concentrate the sun's rays onto something flammable,

is always a great way to get a fire going. Once you've got fire and water sorted, it's time to start thinking about our last two priorities, food and rescue. As we've said already, you can last three weeks without food under good conditions. So while it might feel scary not knowing when you're going to eat next, it isn't as vital as you might think to get a daily meal. In fact, eating actually uses up water and could cause dehydration

if you haven't got easy access to more fluids. So unless you have plenty of water, don't worry that much about food. And if you think people are probably out there looking for you, and you don't think you're going to be out in the wilderness for more than a few days, food really isn't the biggest priority. Unless you can access it easily, there can be a lot of risk for not a lot of reward. Getting into fast-flowing water with a handmade spear, for example, or climbing a tree in order to try and get something to eat

can be a sure-fire way to get yourself injured. So is a random berry that you don't recognise. I've seen into the wild, I know that. Now, obviously if you recognise something like a banana or a coconut, go ahead and tuck in. But if you're not sure, then you need to be really, really careful. And if you fancy your chances that hunting animals like fish, frogs and birds, are a great way to sustain yourself. But again, you could very easily get yourself injured.

Yeah, or eat a poison frog. Yeah. If you are genuinely starving and you need to start eating plants, you don't recognize, there are a few. rules of thumb. If it has white berries, milky sap, an almondy scent, seeds, beans or bulbs inside pods, thorns, spines or hairs, a bitter taste, grainheads with pink or black spurs, or groups of three leaves, do not eat it. Top tips. All of those things I just listed are signs that that plant is not going to make friends with your insides. Your insides will soon be on the outside.

But if you do find a plant that looks edible, you've got time to test it. First and fourth, make sure that there is enough of this plant around to make the test worth it because it is pretty laborious. If there are loads of that plant around, split the plant into its constituent parts, stems, leaves, roots, berries, etc. And then make sure you don't eat anything else for at least eight hours and only drink purified water. That way, if something makes you sick, you'll know exactly what it was. Food diary. Yes, a very long, drawn out, food diary. So now you're prepped. It's time to start testing.

Take one part of the plant, crush the part you've chosen into a paste, and hold it against your skin for 15 minutes. Now wait eight hours and see if your skin shows any sign of a reaction. If it doesn't, that's a great start. Next, cook the plant if you can and hold it against your lip for three minutes. If it burns or tingles, not just because it's hot, that's bad vibes. If that's gone okay, put a small piece of the plant on your tongue without chewing it and wait for 15 minutes. If you're still okay, take another bite, chew it without swallowing and hold it in your mouth for another 15 minutes.

If there's no reaction again, it's time to swallow a very small amount, a single leaf or a pinch of grain at most. Now wait for another eight hours. If you don't vomit or go on some sort of mental trip, it's okay to swallow a slightly larger amount. roughly a quarter of a cup's worth and wait another eight hours. If that doesn't make you sick, you're probably okay to eat that specific part of the plant in the very specific way that you have prepared it.

But remember, just because that part of the plant is edible, doesn't mean the rest is. So you should test each part just as thoroughly. Mm-hmm, like the grapes, the skins of Korean grapes to make you shit your pants. Oh dear. True story.

The final piece of surviving is getting yourself back to civilization. In our scenario, you've just fallen out of a plane, so chances are people are going to be looking for you, or at least for the plane. The best chance you've got of being found before it's too late is staying where people are going to be searching. So stay near the wreckage. Someone is probably going to come looking for you at the most obvious place first. A more common example of this would be breaking down in your car.

If you break down in the middle of nowhere, unless you know for sure that there is some kind of civilization with an easy walking distance, do not, Maura Murray, leave your car. Your car is a shelter. It's where people are most likely to look for you. And it's on a road, so you might be spotted by another driver. If you really don't think anyone is coming to find you, then it might be time to start thinking about a self-rescue. Finding your way to civilisation is no easy task. But there are some things that are helpful to remember. Rivers are a great place to start. That's a good tip.

And following water downstream is a great way to pull yourself out of a sticky situation. People like to build villages and towns near a source of fresh water. And the chances are you're going to find someone before you get to the sea. Roads are, of course, also great. So if you stumble across one, stick to it. You're much more likely to bump into someone than in the middle of a field. Lastly, remember that towns and cities often emit a faint glow at night. If you can see the sky at night,

it's worth looking around for any signs of life. And our last tip for finding help is to stay visible and loud. As much as you're hoping to spot someone, you're also hoping that someone spots you. Things like singing to yourself and shouting hello at random various intervals are great ways of keeping up your morale and increasing your chances of being spotted. And that is our red-handed shorthand guide to falling out of a plane. Just remember, if you do find yourself in a spot of bother, stay calm and stay positive.

If you've stuck the landing, the rest is easy. I don't know if I would say easy. Easier? Easier. Yeah. Your chances drastically improve if you survive the fall. Exactly. One thing at a time.

One thing at a time. Prioritise, stay positive and hope for the best. Yeah. May Alan be with you. And we will see you next time for a different thing.