The orca was trained not to eat him. So, an orca accidentally swallowing a human, especially one sporting a scuba tank, is akin to saying you accidentally swallowed a watermelon - WHOLE! Imagine trying to crawl in a tight-fitting sleeping bag made of wet, slimy, foam-rubber. Maybe pushing laterally in both directions could stabilize the person's position to not be easily swallowed further. And different animals are resistant to different things, some animals like turtles are resistant to both suffocation and crushing, or like some worms are resistant to acids.
Getting a human being inside a whale’s mouth doesn’t appear to be impossible, so have there been such dreadful instances of giant fish swallowing humans?
Escaping into the peritoneal cavity won't really help as there is no breathable gas there either, but if sufficiently motivated and good at holding it's breath it might be able to dig through the abdominal wall to reach the outside, especially if a bright light is transilluminating the way. Discuss the workings and policies of this site
Heat? Toothed whales, or as scientists call them: odontocetes, are the subset of whales that possess teeth instead of the baleen plates of filter-feeding whales like humpback and blue whales. They digest the creatures they ingest wholesale, bones included.I put it that way because it's going to be a mixture of lack of oxygen and excess of CO$_2$. It's physically impossible. Acid? Gas in the stomach is usually released via burping and this is often a by product of carbonated fluid or air whipped into foods, very little oxygenated outside air is ingested under normal circumstances. They keep grit and small stones there to help. If you’re a voracious reader—especially of mythology—you might be aware that stories of human beings swallowed by whales have been around for some time. If it's a human getting swallowed by a large creature with a similar digestive system you'll also be burned by acid, but it won't kill you faster than suffocation. All species involved are fictional. @Dan I've found scuba gear to be very helpful in that situation. Therefore, even if a human could fit into its narrow lumen, the feet would be still sticking out of the mouth when the head entered the stomach. Much better to be fatally mauled and eaten in pieces. Even if he did have outrageous relative strength to cut tissue quickly, his tiny little pocket knife isn't going to get him anywhere fast.
A further restriction is the opening of the throat that is much smaller than the gape of the mouth.
The best answers are voted up and rise to the top Of course the scuba gear presents a bigger problem.I've read about an orca who playful swallowed a boy from his legs up to his breast some years ago. Even if it could push out it's legs to make space, there won't be much, if any, oxygenated air for it to breathe, so it would asphyxiate quickly.Of course if it was conscious on the way down it could have torn the crap out of the esophageal lining, and could possibly bite its way through the stomach lining if swallowed fast enough. It only takes a minute to sign up.Being eaten is obviously not a process most organisms can survive. That would make it awfully hard to crawl out too. At the Naked Scientists we get sent a lot of interesting questions. @Innovine Drowning applies specifically to suffocation in water. If you have long fingernails, you might be able to use them like claws to get a better grip. @ApproachingDarknessFish@SRM how is it about real world biology? ELI5: When an animal is swallowed whole and is still alive as it slides into the larger animals stomach, how exactly does it die? Would it necessarily be painful, or could you peacefully fade away into soup?Edit: If it makes the question less off-topic, I'm particularly interested in fictional carnivorous humanoid mammals somewhat resembling anthropomorphic wolverines swallowing rat or weasel sized mammals. @Samuel In fact we do melt from the inside--there's a mucus lining to the stomach specifically to counteract this, and ulcers result when it's not continually renewed.
If there is a big difference in size it is usually crushing forces that kills. Of course, I still want to caution you about taking this scenario seriously. (Don't forget to bring your dive knife also! In that case, the humans would have to be torn into smaller pieces in order to fit down the throat.Dismembered pieces of a human are unlikely to crawl up the oesophagus, or swallowing tube! Of course, one can say the same thing about pet dogs. If they swallowed a fish tail first, the spines on the fish's back would get caught poking into the oesophagus.
Stack Exchange network consists of 176 Q&A communities including To date, there are no records that I could find of an orca, sperm whale, or other toothed whale consuming a human. site design / logo © 2020 Stack Exchange Inc; user contributions licensed under Head-first ensures the spines are flattened out and pointed away from the direction of swallowing. So the rat will find itself in a gently squeezing sac mostly filled with liquid. So, if an orca could swallow a human, it would likely be head-first. Toothed whales include the very large sperm whale, beaked whales, pygmy and dwarf sperm whales, but also dolphins and porpoises. Asking about real world is just as "in world" as any fantasy realm unless you're changing it somehow.
The problem is the mechanics of the size constraints of fitting a whole human into an orca's digestive tract. So, an orca accidentally swallowing a human, especially one sporting a scuba tank, is akin to saying you accidentally swallowed a watermelon - WHOLE! Usually it is either suffocation or crushing It's physically impossible.Now, let's talk about the likelihood of an orca, or any other toothed whale, actually consuming a human. Sperm whales sometimes swallow squid whole, so it could definitely manage a human.