MythBusters — S9 E12 "Paper Armor" — Aired June 29, 2011

Adam and Jamie went back to the underwater explosion survival question with a sharper focus this time, setting a specific pressure threshold known to correspond to a 50 percent mortality rate from a shockwave and then measuring exactly what that pressure looks like at different depths and distances from a detonation, finding that a person floating 30 feet from the blast would likely survive while the same explosion at greater depths produced pressures well into the lethal range, and crediting the surprising survivability closer to the surface to the way much of the underwater pressure wave dissipates into transverse waves once it reaches open air, turning what sounds like a grim question into one of the more genuinely useful safety numbers the show ever produced.

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Using science as their weapon and curiosity as their fuel, Hollywood special effects experts Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman spent 14 seasons and 296 episodes testing the world's most popular myths, urban legends, and movie moments. From the Diet Coke & Mentos explosion to surviving an underwater car escape — if it can be tested, they'll test it.

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