or Survival Tips
for Extremely Dangerous Situations that you will Encounter if you
ever find yourself in a James Bond Movie, Robert Ludlum Novel or
other Techno-Thriller all of which may seem Unlikely but the Genre
continues to gain Popularity
What to Do When You're Falling from an Airplane
with no Parachute
You're thinking you haven't
got much time, but if you're falling with a car you've got enough
time to take the keys out of the ignition, climb to the trunk and
rescue the beautiful woman inside. Of course the only time I saw
this done, there was a parachute involved, but my point is, you've
got lots of time.
Let's figure out how much
time. Say you're in a commercial air flight and a terrorist bomb
blows a hole in the fuselage and you're sucked out (this is why
you should keep your safety belt fastened even when the light is
off). You're at 20,000 feet, which would be 6,096 metres. The
acceleration due to gravity is 9.8 metres/second/second. Since the
distance is equal to one half the sum of the final speed and the
initial speed times the time; and since the acceleration is equal
to the difference between the final speed and the initial speed
divided by the time, the time you'd be falling (assuming no
slowing down due to friction) would be twenty seconds.
Not much time, so don’t
waste any of it freaking out, instead:
See if someone else is
falling with a parachute. If so, do that free fall body surfing
thing to get to them. If they're a friend, or at least a
well-meaning stranger, hold on tight, being sure not to interfere
with their ability to open the parachute, maybe you could lock
your arms through their straps. If they're a deadly enemy you
will need to knock them out and take the parachute for yourself
sending them to the unpleasant death that would have been yours.
Hold on to one of their straps when you punch or you'll just get
sent spinning away and not do much damage.
If there is nobody falling
with a parachute and you are over water, point your feet
downward, tuck in your chin and cross your arms over your chest.
The idea is to enter the water with as small a cross section as
possible so you enter like an Olympic diver with a tiny little
splash. In the water, take off your shoes and let them sink. Use
your pants, jacket or shirt to make flotation devices by tying
off the ends of the pants and the sleeves. Before long a Chinese
junk will arrive and people chattering in a language you don't
speak will rescue you.
If the water angle just
isn't going to happen, aim for a tree. Yes, you could get impaled
on a tree, but you're much more likely to survive an impaling
than a hard landing. Gross, but true. Other things to aim for
include: barns, green houses, cars, awnings, circus tents, blimps
and hay bales.
As long as you're not
landing on water, you still want it to be feet first. The only
difference is that you want your knees slightly bent. This will
allow your legs to absorb more shock. If your legs are locked at
the knees, the shock gets passed straight up to the spinal column
and your skull. With the knees bent, you're still going to be
seriously injured, probably for life, but you could always become
a cartoonist and draw offensive cartoons that no one can complain
about because you're a quadriplegic. (This stuff with the knees
also applies to falling out of buildings or carnival rides.)
What to Do When A Big Guy
with a Knife is Coming at You
What to Do When An Evil
Master Mind is about to Shoot You with a Gun
(Note: this section is only
here for completeness as even small children know how to deal with
evil master minds.)
Get the evil master mind to
explain the entire plot. Evil master minds love explaining things
even though the time it takes only makes your escape more likely
and the knowledge they give you allows you to foil them.
Suggest that shooting you
lacks the imagination and flare you'd come to associate with the
evil master mind. The master mind will agree and put you in some
complicated killing device and then leave.
Escape from the complicated
killing device using some knick-knack that you've been carrying
for no apparent reason.
Make sure you always carry
some apparently useless knick-knack. I've got a miniature bottle
of Tabasco sauce.
What to Do When an
Enormous Bad Guy is Trying to Kill You in a Boiler Room
For some reason enormous bad
guys love to chase their victims into boiler rooms. Be prepared
for this: if you live or work in a building with a boiler room,
hide a gun, crossbow or some other weapon somewhere inside it.
If you wind up in a boiler
room that you have not hidden a weapon in, have a quick look in
likely spots. There’s a chance that someone else will have
read this article and tucked away a semi-automatic or something.
If the enormous bad guy is
upon you, yank down on the nearest lever or chain. Pulled levers
invariably cause blasts of live steam to shoot out and blind your
adversary, while pulling on a chain will cause a heavy object to
drop on his head.
What
to Do When You're Trapped in a Burning or Exploding Building
Find a motorcycle and drive
it through a big window.
If there is no motorcycle,
get to the roof where a helicopter will be taking off. You may
have to dangle from a landing strut, especially if your enemy is
flying the helicopter. Don't worry, the pilot will not notice
your extra weight. Jump off when it's hovering near the ground
and run away so they don't crush you while landing.
What to Do When You're
Tied Up with a Bomb Nearby
The key is to keep as
expanded as possible while you're being tied, this way the ropes
might be loose enough to slip out of. To keep expanded, hold your
breath and don't struggle. Otherwise you're going to be stuck
trying to break some glass and cutting the ropes without
puncturing an artery. This is not as easy as it looks.
Once you're untied defuse
the bomb or throw it in a nearby body of water. To defuse the
bomb cut a wire. Depending on the number of wires you will have
between a 25% and 50% chance of cutting the right one. Better
odds than just letting the thing blow up. But most important of
all: make like you're going to cut one wire and then at the last
second, cut a different one.
What to Do When Your Wife
finds Someone Else's Panties in the Glove Compartment
[Strictly speaking this is
not a techno-thriller situation as married action heroes do not
cheat on their wives unless their wives are enemy moles, but if it
does happen to you, it could indeed be life threatening.]
Claim to be experimenting
with cross-dressing. You'll have to live with uncomfortable,
binding underwear for at least six months, but if you can't do
the time, don't do the crime.
What to Do When Everyone
you Meet Could be an Enemy Agent or a Member of a Conspiracy that
is Out to Rule the World and Kill You in the Process
After you talk to someone
and say you're going somewhere, double back and surreptitiously
check to see if they've picked up the phone to call someone.
From time to time, pick up
your friends’ phones and press “redial”, see
who answers. If they have call display, cycle through the last
few numbers that called them. If they don’t have call
display, try star-69 whenever you can.
Also, check who is on their
speed dials.
And from a pay phone, call
the possible enemy agent, disguise your voice and say, “it’s
me, what’s going on?” If they start describing their
latest interaction with you, referring to you as “the
package” or as some other code phrase, they’re an
enemy. Keep them going by asking, “do you know what to do?
Repeat it back to me.”
Whatever happens
Copyright 2000 by David Scrimshaw
www.davidscrimshaw.com
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