What if you died in outer space?

Question

What if you were out in space, but you suddenly died. Would your body continue to roam in space for eternity since nothing in space would cause the body to decay? What else would happen? Remember you're way out in space, millions of miles from a planet.

Answer 1

Your body would disintegrate due to low pressure and temperature. I believe this is true because space is mostly vacuum.

Answer 2

You would freeze solid and, depending on your velocity, you would either orbit the sun forever or go drifting off into interstellar space. You would not decay, since you'd basically be a human-shaped block of ice. Eventually micrometeorite impacts and radiation and temperature damage would cause you to break apart, but that would take a LONG time. If you were drifting in deep space your body could easily last millions of years.

I used to think being sent up in a rocket after I died would be cool, not anymore. I don't like the thought of my corpse just lying there frozen for millions of years.

Answer 3

Exposure to a vacuum! Not sure if this answers your question.

"..gas and water vapor will continue to flow outward through the airways. This continual evaporation of water will cool the mouth and nose to near-freezing temperatures; the remainder of the body will also become cooled, but more slowly.." (1)

The gas in your body will go to fill the vacuum. Not sure your body would be pleased about that!

Your body would disintegrate as all cells saw their contents leaving to fill the vacuum. I guess cause of brain death would be initially asphyxia?

On the plus side you will not suffer from 'decay' since there are no lifeforms to 'eat' you. At least non I am aware of.

Answer 4

In a spacesuit, the body would decompose since there are plenty of bacteria to do the job locked up in there with you. If ejected from a spacecraft without a suit the body would be freeze-dried in short order, frozen by the extreme cold then the moisture drawn out by the vacuum of space.

Answer 5

My body would continue to roam in space since nothing would cause the body to decay. I don't know what else would happen.

Answer 6

You'd probably eventually get pulled into orbit by some planet/star and get burnt up in an atmosphere or the middle of a sun or something.

I guess it would depend on how fast you were traveling as to how long that would take. But I don't think you'd be out there forever.

Eventually, you'd run into something, and then you'd run into decay or, uh, crisping.

Answer 7

You'd eventually be pulled towards the nearest body, no matter how far away initially they are. There is a gravitational force between you and everything in the universe no matter how far away the two objects are. It gets vanishingly small at large distances, but it is there. Assuming no initial velocity, your body would drift towards the closest object to it - the one with the largest gravitational force acting on it. A larger force than this though would most likely be interstellar dust impacting your body and "blowing" you along with it.

Answer 8

In/out of the space suit. Your body would eventually explode due to the pressure differential. Your body would freeze because of the cold and be subject to radiation and bombardment with space dust. That's all I can think of.

Answer 9

You'd become freeze-dried. Evaporative cooling would eventually cause your body to freeze, and the ice would continue to sublimate to a gas and drift away.

Since there would be no bacterial decay, your bones and dried flesh would persist for thousands of years, floating through space.

Answer 10

Depends... how good is the space suit you're wearing? Eventually, all the air would leak from it, along with all the water & fluids from your body. If you were ever found, you'd prolly be a perfectly preserved mummy.