To bore a hole through Earth

Did you know that if you could cut a hole through the center of the Earth and jumped right through, it would only take 42 minutes to reach the other side? If the entrance was of identical altitude to the exit, you could walk right out.

Extended fun fact: if one bore a hole from New York to Los Angeles, the travel time would STILL be 42 minutes! Sidney to Baghdad? 42 minutes.

Another fun fact: if you dug a hole through the center of the Earth from virtually anywhere in the United States, it would become the world’s deepest swimming pool! The Indian Ocean is underneath the United States, and would flood your hole in 42 minutes.

Extended fun fact #3: a hole of that magnitude would need to be 12,756.2 kilometers deep, and about 4 meters wide. This makes the volume of soil removed about 0.16 cubic kilometers: enough to decrease world-wide ocean levels by 502 nanometers!

Extended fun fact #4: we can use air as a carrier fluid to aid our travel! If you cut a hole at a 45-degree angle to the equator, the opposite side will be in the opposite season due to the earth’s tilt. This means that if you wait until summertime to jump in, there will be a massive difference in surface temperatures. The hot air from your side will be flowing through the hole, acting as a trans-terranian jet stream! We can even exacerbate this by jumping in on high-noon on June 21 (in the northern hemisphere) because the other side will be midnight, thus having an even-greater difference in surface temperatures!

Isn’t physics fun!?