There are some things
you just can't live without.
Like gravity,
oxygen,
the Sun's warmth.
And we're about to take
those vital things away from you.
But just for five seconds,
don't worry.
OK, we will start big
and remove the enormous,
scorching ball of gas
that makes our planet habitable.
The Sun.
You might think it would suddenly
become very cold.
But it wouldn't.
You wouldn't even notice the difference.
Our planet has stored enough
heat in its atmosphere and oceans
to keep us warm for those five seconds
without the Sun.
But if our star suddenly
vanished from the sky,
things would get much worse
than a little temperature drop.
The Sun is the most massive object
in the Solar System.
It not only keeps us warm here on Earth,
but it has a massive
gravitational influence in space.
Without the Sun,
every planet, moon and asteroid
in our galactic neighborhood
would start flying off into outer space.
OK, this part gets a little confusing,
but stay with me here.
The moment the Sun disappears,
the entire Solar System
would plunge into chaos.
Now, even though the Sun has vanished,
you are still able to see it in the sky,
as if nothing happened.
This is because it takes the Sun's light
eight minutes to reach us on Earth.
So you'd get this delayed effect of
seeing the sunlight when the Sun
is already gone.
Five seconds later,
the Sun would return
to its original position.
And its gravity would grab ahold
of all the planets again.
They’d stop heading off into outer space
and return to orbiting the Sun as usual.
Then, 8 minutes and 15 seconds later,
you'd see the Sun blink for five seconds.
But you'd most likely be busy
trying to survive all the gravitational havoc
losing the Sun might have caused
in those five short seconds.
The Earth wouldn't travel far enough
to leave the Habitable Zone.
But we don't know how this
massive change in gravity
would affect our Solar System.
Alright, let's try this again,
maybe with something less dramatic.
How about removing all the oxygen
for five seconds?
I mean, you could just
hold your breath, right?
Well, this might surprise you,
but five seconds without oxygen
would be fatal for you and the Earth.
At first, you'd feel your ears burst.
That's because the air pressure
would suddenly drop by 21%.
Oh, that would be painful.
As soon as you recover from your pain,
you'd see that all the concrete buildings
had turned to dust.
That's because concrete sticks together
thanks to carbon dioxide.
This molecule consists of
one carbon and two oxygen atoms.
Without oxygen,
nothing would hold the concrete
in those structures together.
Airplanes would fall from the sky
because there would be
no combustion in their engines.
And all the water on the planet
would vanish too,
and hydrogen would
flood our atmosphere.
But worst of all,
without oxygen,
your body would be filled
with hydrogen gas and rupture.
Even if the planet could
eventually recover from
these five seconds of horror,
you wouldn't have a chance of surviving it.
OK, not having oxygen would be bad.
But what about carbon?
You already know that
all the concrete buildings would collapse.
But could you survive without it?
The short answer is no.
The long answer is that you'd
immediately lose 10-14 kg (22-31 lb)
of your body mass.
That's because 18% of you is carbon.
But it's not the kind of weight
you'd want to lose.
Carbon forms proteins, carbs and fats,
and it's a building material for your DNA.
Without carbon,
your primary body functions
would just stop for five seconds.
But you wouldn't have to worry
about long-term effects.
That's because the Earth,
which has a very carbon-based core
and mantle,
would collapse on itself.
And no,
you wouldn't survive this scenario either.
How about we try something more fun?
Like gravity.
Who needs it anyway?
Imagine people, cars
and everything not attached to the ground
flying around.
Well, the only downside is
that you'd be flying in strong winds.
I'm talking winds so strong
that they would be six times
more destructive than Hurricane Katrina.
And after five seconds of that,
you'd plunge to the ground.
At the same time,
the Sun would lose its gravitational
grip on us in space.
The Earth would once again
go flying in a straight line
at 30 km/s (19 mi/s)
until the Sun catches it again.
That wasn't so bad, was it?
Those winds could really get much worse.
Like if we made the Earth
stop rotating for five seconds.
If Earth came to a standstill,
our atmosphere would keep moving,
thanks to inertia.
And this would make winds strong enough
to rip Earth's crust apart.
The winds would be most powerful
at the equator
because of the Earth's bulging shape,
making water flow
away from the equator toward the poles.
And that would cause massive tsunamis.
But things would start
going back to normal
after those horrifying five seconds.
The winds would die down.
The water would return to where it was,
flooding everything in its way once again.
After so much destruction,
there might not be much left on Earth.
You'd be lucky to survive this.
And if you did,
you'd have to spend the rest of your life
rebuilding the planet.
It could be that after all
these disastrous scenarios,
the Earth wouldn't be suitable
for life anymore.
Then we'd need to start planning
humanity's global evacuation.
But you know what?
That's a story for another WHAT IF.