this question comes from Thomas and many other people who all asked what would happen if everyone on Earth Stood as close to each other as they could jumped and landed on the ground at the same instant this is one of the most popular questions submitted to what if it's been examined before including by a science blogs post and a straight dop article they cover the physics pretty well however they don't tell the whole story at the start of the scenario the entirety of Earth's population has been magically transported together into one place this crowd takes
up an area the size of Rh Island in fact let's assume they I mean we are actually in Rhode Island at the stroke of noon everyone jumps as discussed elsewhere this jump doesn't really affect the planet Earth outweighs Us by a factor of over 10 trillion on average we humans can vertically jump maybe half a meter and that's when we're not shoulder Tosh shoulder in the middle of a crowd even if everyone did jump that high and the ground were rigid and responded instantly the Earth would still only be pushed down by less than an
atom's width next Everyone Falls back to the ground technically this delivers a lot of energy into the Earth but it spread out out over a large enough area that it doesn't do much more than leave Footprints in a lot of gardens a slight pulse of pressure spreads through the North American continental crust and dissipates with little effect Beyond moving the needle of a few local seismometers the sound of 12 billion F feet hitting the ground does create a loud drawn out Roar which lasts many seconds eventually the air grows quiet seconds pass everyone looks around
there are a lot of uncomfortable glances someone coughs a cell phone comes out of a pocket within seconds the rest of the world's 7 billion phones follow all of them even those compatible with the Region's towers are displaying some version of no signal the cell networks have all collapsed under the unprecedented load outside Rhode Island abandoned Machinery begins grinding to a halt airplanes drift through the skies on autopilot trajectories food starts burning on abandoned kitchen stoves soccer balls complete their trajectories into now vacant goals and empty playground swings gradually drift to a halt back in
Rhode Island people many people begin to wonder how do we get everyone home the TF Green Airport in Warwick RH Island handles a few thousand passengers a day I just flew out of there they have the nicest bathrooms of any airport I've ever seen very impressive this is not part of the recording assuming they got things organized including sending out scouting missions to retrieve fuel they could run at 500% capacity for a 100 years without making a dent in the crowd the addition of all the nearby airports doesn't change the equation much nor does the
Region's light rail system crowds climb on board container ships and the deep water Port of Providence but stocking sufficient food and water for a long sea Voyage proves a challenge Rhode Island's million cars are common deared moments later I95 i1 195 and i295 become the sites of the largest traffic jams in the history of the planet most of the cars are blocked by the crowds but a lucky few get out and begin wandering the abandoned Road Network some make it past New York or Boston before running out of fuel since the electricity is probably not
on at this point rather than finding a working gas pump it's easier to just abandon the car and get in a new one after all who can stop you all the cops are in Rhode Island the edge of the crowd spreads outward into Southern Massachusetts and Connecticut any two people who meet are unlikely to have a language in common and almost Nobody Knows the area even if people cooperate everyone is hungry and thirsty grocery stores are immediately emptied and woefully insufficient fresh water is hard to come by and there's no efficient system for Distributing it
sanitation is a disaster and Healthcare infrastructure non-existent within weeks Rhode Island is a graveyard of billions including most of the people who submitted this question probably you and me too the survivors spread out over the face of the world and struggle to build a new civilization at top the ruins of the old our species staggers on but our population has been greatly reduced and most importantly the Earth's rotation and orbit are completely unaffected it spins along exactly as it did before our species wide jump note to Future civilizations let's not try that again [Music]
