Is it possible to calculate the maximum height that you can dive or jump into a body of water without sustaining serious injury (or worse!!) ?

I would have thought it would depend upon the individual person, how they hit the water and how deep it was etc.. Otherwise - I don't actually know. However - after a certain height, you stop accelarating and reach terminal velocity. How safe it would be to ht the water at this I don't know either - but I wouldn't fancy anyones chances.

 

There was a story about a Rusian lady who fell out of a plane without a paracute from about 30,000 feet or so. She landed on a the side of a hill that was covered in a few feet of snow. She didn't even break a bone (How true this is I do not know - story passed on by word of mouth to me years ago - probably been well exagerated by now!)

The reason I asked was I read that you can kill yourself falling from a high bridge into a river (or similar scenario) because when you hit the water you're moving too fast for the water to "get out of your way" hence it's like hitting a solid sufrace.

Yea - hitting water at high speed can be like hitting concrete. I think some divers break up the suface of the water with their hands ahead of them to soften the inpact from a high dive.

See this thread, with several links to actual studies on the subject

just try 'slapping' hard a pool of water. it isn't as 'liquid' as you would imagine.

 

* please do not try too hard, unless you have a black belt or something, you may injure yourself. *