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[iceball3]

It keeps it from being externally lethal.
This has been used in game multiple times to survive falling from upper atmosphere with no way of slowing down. It has an ((electro magnetic?)) outer shielding, armor plating, some sort of futuristic skin suit, and some fluid to protect the wearer.

Though this is also used on people who are heavily modified so maybe I'm leaving a lot of info out on the person wearing the suit.
This is the augmentations put on the person we are talking about.

The shield might help deflect the force of the collision, though I'm not sure it's actually strong enough for that. The shield gets depleted in 6 pistol rounds or so? Given the weight of the suit, I'm sure the impact force is stronger than that.

Do take into account that the weapons in Halo are not civilian grade, nor "Small Arms" as we know it for that matter. Don't the pistols in Halo use Armor Piercing High Explosive rounds? Heck, even the skimpy baby pistols in Halo 2 were chambered in .50 Calliber!

[i2amroy]

Doesn't matter how much they can stop, if we're looking at them through the lens of real science that force has to go somewhere. Hypothetically a real shield would express the majority of that force onto the shield generator, which would just mean that parachute-less base-jumping in one would just result in your suit exploding and then you slamming into the ground (or rather you pancaking inside of your suit, then it exploding into pieces, and then you slamming into the ground). Without something to apply a force on you over a longer period of time (be that gravity manipulation, rockets, or what have you) it's not going to make a difference.

What you might be able to do with a shield generator is to totally interlace the entirety of your body at the molecular level with shields (which would probably kill you outright). If you did so your flesh body would essentially be a "totally rigid body" during the course of the impact, which would mean that instead of splatting on the surface you would sink into the surface until your energy had been spent but you would be ok. End result is that rather then cracking the pavement in a dramatic landing you'd essentially sink into the ground up to your chest and be trapped, but you would survive the impact.

[Arx]

Doesn't matter how much they can stop, if we're looking at them through the lens of real science that force has to go somewhere. Hypothetically a real shield would express the majority of that force onto the shield generator, which would just mean that parachute-less base-jumping in one would just result in your suit exploding and then you slamming into the ground (or rather you pancaking inside of your suit, then it exploding into pieces, and then you slamming into the ground). Without something to apply a force on you over a longer period of time (be that gravity manipulation, rockets, or what have you) it's not going to make a difference.

What you might be able to do with a shield generator is to totally interlace the entirety of your body at the molecular level with shields (which would probably kill you outright). If you did so your flesh body would essentially be a "totally rigid body" during the course of the impact, which would mean that instead of splatting on the surface you would sink into the surface until your energy had been spent but you would be ok. End result is that rather then cracking the pavement in a dramatic landing you'd essentially sink into the ground up to your chest and be trapped, but you would survive the impact.

The molecular interlacing would be one way of achieving total internal rigidity. If you could cause the shield to form a sharp point at the base, you could possibly lithobrake (terrabrake?) by punching a few hundred metres into the ground, which might not prove fatal.

[iceball3]

The suit did seem to have "locking up" as a defensive measure against the landing, so molecular interlacing would be a good way to explain it. It'd also explain why it took him so long to recover from the crash and yet not wake up with a massive concussion, or why he can go into cryogenic stasis so frequently.

[i2amroy]

The molecular interlacing would be one way of achieving total internal rigidity. If you could cause the shield to form a sharp point at the base, you could possibly lithobrake (terrabrake?) by punching a few hundred metres into the ground, which might not prove fatal.

You wouldn't go down near that far. If we look at Newton's Impact Depth approximation formula we find that it doesn't really matter how fast you are going short of relativistic speeds, the depths you sink has a lot more to do with your relative densities than your speed. As such you would probably sink to a depth of somewhere between 1.3 meters (4'4") and 9.1 meters (30') depending on the exact densities of you+the suit and the ground that you hit. The more dense the suit is and the greater it's mass compared to yours the deeper you will go, the denser the rock that you are hitting the shallower. Assuming your suit's main component is steel about the deepest you should ever end up is ~30 feet below the surface though.

Running some calculations I find the pressure that deep in our average soil is approximately 245 kilopascals, which is about 10x more than the amount of pressure the average person can exert with their hands (i.e. to dig themselves out). So if the suit made you about 10x stronger than the average human you could hypothetically dig yourself out even if you plunged the whole 30 feet into the ground (though it would take some time to do so). At that point the question would be down to how long can your suit give you life support without access to outside air, since the process of digging your way 30 feet to the surface when you start literally entombed in the dirt without any empty space at all is not going to be a fast one.

[Osmosis Jones]

I was intending it to be a hyperbole, but I'd have thought instant acceleration of 8gs the opposite way would cause some pretty nasty problems? The thing about fighter pilots, Apollo and that was that whilst it is fast, the change in acceleration isn't instantaneous.

Edit: I worded this badly, rewriting. One mo!

You know what, I'm wrong on this actually. Classically, higher derivatives of motion than acceleration are not associated with any forces, which is where my answer was coming from. However, a discontinuity in force would induce a shockwave moving from the point of impact that a gradual easing wouldn't. This shockwave would be associated with large transient forces over a much shorter timescale. My bad.

[miauw62]

I don't think the acceleration is necessarily instantaneous, though. You could start a bit higher up and just gently ramp it up. Would take longer to get to the ground, obviously.

[Il Palazzo]

Would the ((2-3 inches?)) of fluid in the suit be able to absorb the impact?

I imagine the fluid would quite efficiently transfer the impact force to your skin. Unless it has some kind of magical physics-defying properties?

The idea here is to fill all body cavities with an inert fluid (which is the science fiction part), and immerse the whole body in an impact-resistant tank, so that upon collision the forces are evenly distributed through pressure throughout the tissues.

[wierd]

perfluorocarbons are science fact, not science fiction.

Can you breathe them long term? No-- not really.  Can you breathe them for a limited amount of time, and have the effect of such hydraulic compression protection? Yes.

[i2amroy]

Your lungs aren't the only cavity in your body though, and things like your abdominal cavity (which is larger than your lungs anyways) would collapse unless filled as well with an impact at 200 MPH.

[Cryxis, Prince of Doom]

Through observing some of the game's cut scenes I think the armor has an air braking system. Also the halo (legacy?) movie shows similar stuff in the armor IIRC, could a controled fall reduce the forces on impact to survivable conditions?

[ChairmanPoo]

I fail to understand why wouldn't you die by filling your cavities with some liquid....

[scrdest]

I fail to understand why wouldn't you die by filling your cavities with some liquid....

It's less compressible than air. Basically, try pushing a large bottle with your finger - an empty one may cave in or deform, a filled one may still move as a whole.

[Tylui]

We need some non newtonian fluids up in this discussion

[ChairmanPoo]

The impact would nonetheless probably burst everything in the body. It's not like asteroids remain intact after crashlanding, right? I don't think having empty or full cavities would significatively affect the outcome, given the ammount of force involved.