EVA re-entry is possible?

[guitarxe]

I was fooling around with something in sandbox at 100km orbit and my ship exploded while my Kerbal was on EVA. So I thought to myself, "hey, why not re-enter?". And I did. Landed in a pond... and survived!

Is that... normal? I thought for sure I'd either get burned up, or at the very least the kerbal wouldn't survive the impact, even in the water, and yet he did.

Edited June 11, 2015 by guitarxe
change to answered

[Mitchz95]

Kerbal helmets are indestructible. It's saved Jeb many times, when I chose a bad landing site and had to bail out of the ship.

And re-entry heating is pretty weak when it's just from LKO. I haven't lost a single part to overheating since upgrading to 1.0.2.

[tsotha]

I'm kind of surprised he survived a water impact, but Mitch is right - his melon is indestructible.

I've always wanted to try a "rescue" using a suborbital probe that just gets close enough to switch to rescuee. Then I can use his jet pack to land. So far I haven't been able to get the timing right, though.

[G'th]

Depends on how fast you came down. If it was a gentle deorbit, I could see a kerbal surviving down the surface.

[xtoro]

I did it once, burning all the rcs right before hitting the water and survived, but I won't try it again...

[guitarxe]

Wait, so you're saying the correct way to re-enter was to dash his head against the rocks?

[OddFunction]

Wait, so you're saying the correct way to re-enter was to dash his head against the rocks?

Yup.

I can make most every kerbal survive a landing. I saved 3 at once one time from a FUBAR reentry. It seemed... immersion breaking, so I installed EVA parachutes. At least that mod makes it make sense lol

[guitarxe]

O.o never knew about this.

[Snark]

Depends on how fast you came down. If it was a gentle deorbit' date=' I could see a kerbal surviving down the surface.[/quote']

Doesn't matter how fast you came down; regardless of your original trajectory, you'll be falling straight down at terminal velocity by the time you get down to the surface. And then you survive.