Surprising statistics (part 2)

I've featured surprising statistics before on the Charles Fudgemuffin blog, so it should come as no surprise that this week I round-up another batch of surprising statistics!*

* For clarification, the statistics themselves may be surprising, but my inclusion of those statistics in this week's blog post shouldn't come as a surprise.

"Have you farted?"
"No, it's just the obnoxious spray from my scent glands."

To start things off, here's a surprising statistic about farts!

1) Parp!

Every second, over a million people in the world fart!

The average person farts 14 times per day, and there are approximately 7.7 billion people in the world.*

* At the time of writing.

There are 86,400 seconds in a day, so if we assume that a typical fart lasts for 1 second or less, than an average person will fart during 14 of these 86,400 seconds.

So the number of people who fart each second is:

14 farts / 86,400 seconds x 7,700,000,000 people = 1,247,685 farts every second!

Micromorts: The risk of dying (part 2)

The risk of death can be measured statistically.

I've mentioned before on the Charles Fudgemuffin blog that there's actually a unit to measure the risk of dying known as the 'micromort'.

Just to recap, a micromort is a million to one chance of dying, so an activity with a 5 micromort rating would carry a five in a million chance of death.

This week I look at the micromort rating for a few more activities, starting with a comparison of how the safety of various forms of travel compare...

1) Transport

I love travelling around the world, so it's just as well that I'm not afraid of flying.  However, anyone who is afraid of flying should check out the figures below* which compare the risk of travelling 1,000 kilometres by various forms of transport...

Micromorts: The risk of dying

Caution: If you suffer from thanatophobia (fear of death), discretion is advised before reading this article!

Fighting with a light sabre has a rating of 187,500 micromorts.

2016 was a memorable year in many ways; Leicester's incredible Premier League win, a new Star Wars movie, and of course the release of 'How To Poison Your Husband And Get Away With It', my collection of crime themed short stories (available for kindle from Amazon).

However, it was also a scary and sobering year in the way that so many celebrities seemed to die. It's a morbid thing to think about, but it's also a reminder of how temporary life is, and to take a positive approach, it's a reminder of how we should make the most of every day because you never know how long you've got left.

Believe it or not, there's actually a statistical unit which is a measurement of the risk of dying called the micromort. A micromort is a one in a million chance of death, so for example if an activity has a rating of 1 micromort that means there's a relatively small one in a million chance of dying, whereas a rating of 1,000,000 micromorts would mean certain death.

Here are some micromort ratings for a variety of activities, from just living your life, to more dangerous pursuits...