--- title: "What would happen if you fell into a hole through the Earth?" description: "You would oscillate from one side to the other and back, with a one-way trip of about 38 minutes. The mechanism, what follows in what order, and how confident the an" url: https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/hole-through-the-earth/ site: "At One Place" --- # What would happen if you fell into a hole through the Earth? **What would happen if you fell into a hole through the Earth?: You would oscillate from one side to the other and back, with a one-way trip of about 38 minutes.** Reasoned extrapolation Ignoring the practical obstacles, the physics is elegant. Inside a uniform sphere the gravitational force on a falling body is proportional to its distance from the centre, which is exactly the condition for simple harmonic motion, so the fall through the planet is a pendulum swing. For a uniform-density Earth the one-way trip works out at 42 minutes and 12 seconds, independent of where the hole is drilled; using Earth's real density profile, which concentrates mass in a dense core, gives about 38 minutes. You would reach roughly 7.9 kilometres per second at the centre, arrive at the far side with exactly zero velocity, and fall back — oscillating forever in the absence of friction. Air resistance ruins it, bringing you to rest at the centre; and the real obstacles are that the interior reaches around 5,200 °C and pressures of several million atmospheres, and that the Coriolis effect would grind you against the wall of any hole not drilled pole to pole. ## How confident this is This is a reasoned extrapolation rather than an observation. The mechanism is understood, but the scale of the consequences depends on assumptions that could reasonably be argued differently. ## Physics - [What would happen if an asteroid hit the Earth?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/asteroid-hit/) — It depends enormously on size — most burn up, a 20-metre one broke windows across a city, and a 10-kilometre one ended the dinosaurs. - [What would happen if gravity disappeared?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/gravity-disappeared/) — The Earth itself would come apart — gravity is the only thing holding a planet together. - [What would happen if the Sun became a black hole?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/sun-became-a-black-hole/) — Earth's orbit would not change at all — the mass would be the same. It would simply go dark and cold. - [What would happen if you fell into a black hole?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/fall-into-a-black-hole/) — Into a small one, tidal forces would stretch you apart before you arrived; into a supermassive one, you would cross the horizon without noticing. - [What would happen if you travelled at the speed of light?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/travelled-at-light-speed/) — You cannot — accelerating any mass to light speed requires infinite energy. Approaching it, time dilates dramatically. - [What would happen if gravity doubled?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/gravity-doubled/) — You would weigh twice as much, most tall structures would need rebuilding, and no bird larger than a sparrow could fly. - [What would happen if you were shrunk to the size of an ant?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/shrunk-to-ant-size/) — The square-cube law would break you: you would freeze, suffocate, and be unable to drink from a surface of water. - [What would happen if the speed of light were slower?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/speed-of-light-slower/) — Chemistry, nuclear fusion and the mass-energy relationship would all change — stars would not work as they do. - [What would happen if a gamma-ray burst hit the Earth?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/gamma-ray-burst/) — A nearby one aimed at us would strip a large fraction of the ozone layer within seconds, with the damage arriving as ultraviolet over the following years. ## Common questions ### What would happen if you fell into a hole through the Earth? You would oscillate from one side to the other and back, with a one-way trip of about 38 minutes. ### How certain is that? Reasoned extrapolation. This is a reasoned extrapolation rather than an observation. The mechanism is understood, but the scale of the consequences depends on assumptions that could reasonably be argued differently. ## Related pages - [What would happen if an asteroid hit the Earth?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/asteroid-hit/) - [What would happen if gravity disappeared?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/gravity-disappeared/) - [What would happen if the Sun became a black hole?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/sun-became-a-black-hole/) - [What would happen if you fell into a black hole?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/fall-into-a-black-hole/) - [What would happen if you travelled at the speed of light?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/travelled-at-light-speed/) - [What would happen if gravity doubled?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/gravity-doubled/) - [What would happen if you were shrunk to the size of an ant?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/shrunk-to-ant-size/) - [What would happen if the speed of light were slower?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/speed-of-light-slower/) - [What happens if you stop eating sugar?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/stop-eating-sugar/) - [What would happen if the Earth stopped spinning?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/earth-stopped-spinning/) - [What happens if you stop drinking alcohol?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/stop-drinking-alcohol/) - [What happens if you stop smoking?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/stop-smoking/) - [What would happen if the Sun went out?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/sun-went-out/) - [What happens if you stop eating meat?](https://atoneplace.net/what-happens-if/stop-eating-meat/) ## Sources - United States Geological Survey — USGS (https://www.usgs.gov/) [Public domain (US Government)]