These Statistics on Cats Falling Will Surprise You

We now know, thanks largely to the Internet, that when the domestic cat falls she always lands on her feet. We also know that cats have a self righting mechanism which operates very quickly. And thirdly, we also know that when a cat falls a considerable distance he extends his limbs outward, assuming the position of a flying squirrel allowing him to glide and put a brake on the speed of descent. This position also prevents cats from tumbling head over heels through the air while falling thereby preventing them from hitting the ground head first.

The shocking (for me) short video below (it’s actually an animated gif) shows a tabby cat falling from a huge height (looks like it’s around 20 stories) and running away when he hits the concrete. I think he runs away because there is a rival cat nearby – just a guess.

A record fall involved a cat from New York named Sabrina. She fell from the 32nd floor of an apartment building. She landed on a concrete sidewalk – the hardest possible landing you could envisage. Sabrina walked away after she hit the ground. She suffered a chipped tooth and a minor chest injury. There are very few animals who could have done that.

A study by the Animal Medicine Centre in New York carried out many years ago looked at 132 cats. All the cats had fallen from tall buildings from the height of the second floor to the 32nd floor (the Sabina fall).

Astonishingly, the study found that 90% of the cats that fell from these considerable heights survived. Almost 2/3 of them required no medical treatment whatsoever.

We know that people falling more than six stories are almost invariably killed. The figure of 90% survival rate for cats surprised me considering the heights involved.

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7 thoughts on “These Statistics on Cats Falling Will Surprise You”

  1. Amazing story, 32 floors, wow. I had a cat that fell twice within a year from a 4th fl. balcony where I lived (about 1983). A scuffed chin and disoriented, she went and hid in a neighbor’s garage who was someone I worked with and knew she was mine. The second time she was just mad at my roommate for knocking her off shaking out a rug! But unfortunately FLV took her down at just 3 in 1985, she was such a sweetheart!

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    • Wow. Sad story really but one more statistic that cats fall beautifully… 🙂 That said we don’t want them to fall. Sometimes they do suffer injuries to the chest and chin. In some ways the longer falls are safer because they land in a more stable fashion.

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  2. Michael, you mentioned her running because of another cat. Indeed, I played the video several times and saw a white cat with black tail and markings running along a cement wall bordering green bushes adjacent to the sidewalk where the tabby cat fell. The white cat immediately chased her across the street. I’m so thankful the cat survived that fall with only minor injuries.

    Actually, cats have that marvelous built-in ability of righting themselves during a fall from great heights, whereas they are at a disadvantage during a shorter fall.

    According to the ASPCA, “It is a misconception that cats won’t be injured if they fall from one or two story buildings. They may actually be at greater risk for injury when falling shorter distances than by falling from mid-range or higher altitudes. Shorter distances do not give them enough time to adjust their body posture to fall correctly.”

    I had a cat fall from our second floor balcony toward the flagstone floor below, in a previous home. Fortunately, my husband was quick-thinking enough to throw a sofa pillow on the floor where Shannon landed. However he landed SPLAT on his belly with all four legs spread akimbo, he splashed a bit of blood upon landing. Fortunately, the vet said it was a minor injury.

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      • I read the same thing. You can see it in this video – it takes a bit of time for the cat to assume the “parachuting” position. I read that the number of injuries increase up to seven stories or so after which the rate goes down. This is based on cats brought to the vets, so it’s not clear how accurate it is since neither dead cats nor uninjured cats would be brought to the vet.

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