A bullet dropped (not fired) from the Empire State Building would reach a terminal velocity of only about 50 mph—not fast enough to kill someone. However, heavier objects like pennies could still cause painful injuries.
Could a Dropped Bullet Kill You? The Physics Says No
Here's a scenario straight out of an action movie: someone drops a bullet from the top of the Empire State Building. A pedestrian below looks up just in time to see their doom falling from 1,454 feet above. Terrifying, right?
Except physics has other plans.
Terminal Velocity: Nature's Speed Limit
When any object falls through air, it accelerates until air resistance equals gravitational pull. At that point, it stops speeding up. This maximum speed is called terminal velocity, and it's surprisingly modest for small, light objects.
A typical bullet weighs about 10 grams and has a relatively streamlined shape. Dropped (not fired) from the Empire State Building, it would reach a terminal velocity of roughly 50-70 mph. That's about the speed of a fastball pitch.
Painful if it hit you? Absolutely. Lethal? Almost certainly not.
Why Fired Bullets Are Different
The confusion comes from conflating dropped bullets with fired bullets. When a gun fires, it propels a bullet at speeds between 1,700 and 2,800 mph—roughly 30 to 50 times faster than terminal velocity allows for a falling bullet.
That muzzle velocity is what makes bullets deadly. A bullet falling from the sky simply can't achieve those speeds through gravity alone.
What About the Penny Myth?
You've probably heard that a penny dropped from the Empire State Building could kill someone. This is also false—but closer to concerning than the bullet scenario.
- Pennies reach about 25-50 mph terminal velocity
- They're flat, so air resistance slows them significantly
- Impact would sting but wouldn't penetrate skin
MythBusters famously tested this, firing pennies at terminal velocity into ballistic gel and finding they barely made a dent.
When Falling Objects ARE Dangerous
That said, the Empire State Building does pose real dangers from falling objects—just not bullets or pennies. Construction debris, tools, glass, and other heavy objects have caused injuries and deaths when dropped from skyscrapers.
In 1979, a piece of the building's facade fell and killed a pedestrian. This led to New York City's Local Law 11, requiring regular inspections of building exteriors.
The physics lesson? Mass matters more than shape when it comes to falling object lethality. A dropped hammer from 100 stories is genuinely terrifying. A dropped bullet is just an expensive piece of litter.
The Real Danger: Celebratory Gunfire
Interestingly, bullets can be lethal when they come back down—but only when fired upward at an angle. Bullets shot straight up lose their spin stabilization and tumble down at terminal velocity. But bullets fired at an angle maintain ballistic trajectory and can return to earth at 300+ mph.
This is why celebratory gunfire kills dozens of people worldwide each year, particularly on holidays like New Year's Eve.
So the next time someone claims a dropped bullet could kill you, you can confidently correct them. Physics doesn't care about dramatic movie moments—and neither should you.