Moorpark High School
4500 Tierra Rejada Road
Moorpark, CA 93021
February 11, 2014

The Mythbusters
Beyond Productions
1268 Missouri Street
San Francisco, CA 94107

Dear Mythbusters Team:
We are a group of students from a Pre-AP English 1 class at Moorpark High. In our class, we are currently studying ancient Greek myths and the valued characteristics that the heroes of those stories possess. We are writing to you in regards to a stunt that was pulled off by the main character of Die Hard whose personal characteristics resemble those found in the myths we are studying. We would like to hear your thoughts on whether the stunt in question could be pulled off in real-life.

In a scene from Die Hard, the main character, played by Bruce Willis, survives an explosion on the rooftop of a skyscraper by tying a fire hose to his waist, which breaks his fall, and allows him to smash a window of a lower story and take cover within the that story of the building. Willis falls 2-3 floors before the hose brings him to a complete stop. Now, as much as we love to witness the unlikely on a movie screen, we find it highly improbable that this could happen for a multitude of reasons. An average fire hose is about two and a half inches in diameter, anywhere from fifty to a hundred feet long, and the maximum amount of pressure that can be withstood is about 1,204 psi. A normal sized man is about 154 pounds, and Bruce Willis, who is five feet and eleven inches, is closer to 195 pounds. If Willis was to jump off the side of a skyscraper, a massive amount of pressure would be forced upon the fire hose, causing it to break. Due to these technicalities, Bruce Willis would not be able to survive the jump. But, this still does not take into account the damage of the explosion. If Bruce Willis was miraculously able to survive the jump, the explosion would have caused severe burns and injuries, therefore killing him.

As you can see we do not think that the odds were in his favor if you take into account the strength of an average fire hose, the weight of a man, and the power and danger of the explosion. We thank you for the amount of time you have spent reading and considering our points. We hope to see you bust this myth on your show sometime in the future.