How fast does air rush into a vacuum, or how can I figure that out?

Sea level 14.7 psi
10,000 feet 10.2 psi
20,000 feet 6.4 psi
30,000 feet 4.3 psi
40,000 feet 2.7 psi
50,000 feet 1.6 psi

Speaking of... how quickly do people pop in space? Is it slow and painful like the movies? Or a quick and painless death? Do they implode or explode.

Speaking of... how quickly do people pop in space? Is it slow and painful like the movies? Or a quick and painless death? Do they implode or explode.


Most movies extremely exaggerate the effects of total vacuum on a human body. Believe it or not we are much more resilient than people think. First off you don't pop or explode. Oh there will be some damage to the eyes if you keep your open during decompression and if you don't exhale as your exposed to vacuum your lungs will be damaged from the air expanding in them....but you don't explode. A good scene to watch is in 2001 space odyssey where Bowman has to go from the pod to the emergency airlock without a helmet on. He balls up and closes he eyes nice and tight and is blown into the airlock but can move around quickly enough to grab the handle to close the hatch and repressurize the airlock. It's true that liquids exposed to vacuum boil away and if in a cold environment too also freeze. But your body is warm enough and your skin is tough enough to prevent this right away. I think, and I could be wrong on this, that a human can survive a total vacuum environment for about 20 to 30 seconds without much ill effect. After that you tend to worry more about the bends and lack of oxygen so you don't pass out.

"an accident during a NASA test of a space suit in a vacuum chamber on earth caused a man to be exposed to vacuum long enough to pass out for lack of oxygen. He later said the last thing he remembered was the saliva boiling on his tongue"

And yet he is still alive and obviously his head didn't explode or anything. Still that would be a rather frightening ordeal to go through.

And Saith, for finding out pressure differentials like that I think you need to know the volume you want to fill and the size of the openings. I don't know the math but I'm sure you can google it.

Three Cosmonauts died in the Soyuz 11 craft when it depressurized due to a faulty valve. They were found in their seats, with no visible injuris except bruising on one man's hand (possibly due to an attempt to close the valve manually).

It took some time to determine the cause of death - initially it was suspected that they might have had heart failure due to returning to Earth after extended exposure to microgravity (they had just spent a record 24 days on the Salyut space station).