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What if the world lost Oxygen for 5 seconds?

Breathless Moments: A World Without Oxygen

By Mubarak Published 4 months ago 3 min read
What if the world lost Oxygen for 5 seconds?
Photo by Javier Miranda on Unsplash

Picture this: What if, for just a fleeting five seconds, the Earth's oxygen vanished into thin air? Would we all collectively hold our breath? What about the atmosphere? How would our environment fare in such a scenario?
Take a moment to inhale deeply. Feel that rush of satisfaction as your lungs fill with oxygen, the life-giving gas that makes up approximately 21% of our atmosphere. Surprisingly, nitrogen dominates the rest at 78%. Despite its seemingly modest presence, oxygen plays a vital role in our world. But what if it suddenly vanished, leaving us breathless for a mere five seconds? Let's find out.
Without oxygen plants animals water and us humans wouldn't be where we are today five seconds may not sound like a whole lot of time to be without oxygen most of us can go at least thirty seconds without taking a breath so it would happen too fast for your body to even notice your breathing would actually remain normal but as for everything else not so much in just five seconds the earth would look completely different without oxygen you can say goodbye to the Hoover Dam the Pantheon dome and anything else made of concrete these structures would instantly collapse oxygen acts as a special binding agent to concrete without it concrete is just dust speaking of buildings any untreated metal would instantly be fused together this is because there's a layer of oxidation on metals that prevents them from welding together without that layer metals would instantly bind to each other if you happen to be relaxing at the beach at the time expect a severe sunburn the ozone layer our protection against the sun's UV rays is made of oxygen take away the oxygen and the earth would become extremely dangerous there would be nothing protecting us from the sun's UV rays in addition to a sunburn our inner ear would explode losing oxygen means losing 21% of our air pressure a change in air pressure that drastic is equivalent to being at sea level and dropping down 2,000 meters instantly our ears wouldn't have enough time to adapt having a good time yet well don't expect it to last long without oxygen there's no fire the combustion process and vehicles wouldn't be able to occur any mode of transport that isn't electric will automatically fail planes will fall from the sky and millions of cars will be stopped in their tracks the sky would be completely dark before it hits the earth light from the Sun bounces off multiple particles in the air without oxygen in the atmosphere there are less things to bounce off and the sky will appear dark oh yeah and while all this is happening the Earth's crust would completely crumble that's because Earth's crust is made up of 45% oxygen the crust would crumble and continue to crumble until there's nothing left sending you and everyone on the planet into a free fall, sounds like fun probably not but luckily you can take a deep breath of 21% oxygen knowing this will never happen for more things that are fun to speculate on.

Here's a fascinating fact if the Earth lost Oxygen, our bodies are pretty amazing at storing oxygen! You see, when we take a deep breath, our lungs absorb a good amount of oxygen, which then gets transported through our bloodstream to every part of our body. During those precious five seconds without oxygen, our bodies would rely on this stored oxygen to keep us going. So, while it would definitely be a strange and unsettling experience, rest assured that we'd likely pull through just fine!

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About the Creator

Mubarak

"Passionate about life's essence, enamored by history's mysteries, and intrigued by fascinating fun facts about reality. Join me on a journey of enlightenment and exploration

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