If you are wondering why I would want to know my eye resistance, it is because I wanted to know how much electricity would pass throw my head if I fell into a body of water with live wires in it.

I did an article on Electrocution in Water where I put my finger in a bowl of water along with live wires in it. Many people mistakenly thought the result of my experiment was that you would not get electrocuted in such condition.The reason that experiment was not that risky was because the electricity was only passing through my finger, and not anywhere else inside my body. Also the finger was covered with thick skin.

Although it might not be that straight forward to be electrocuted in water, the likelihood is not that low. People die of such incidents every year. It is much more dangerous if your body is between live and neutral or earth, which is usually the case. Imagine live wire in water only and some more conductive connection to earth somewhere else in the pool, and you will be between them. Especially in most pools they add chemicals to clean water which makes it even more conductive and more dangerous.

But skin resistance is pretty high and doesn’t allow much current through body. That’s some level of protection that might not be enough. Also there are sometimes cuts and bruises on the skin which provide a much less resistive path through body. The resistance of tissues inside the body is pretty small, in orders of less than 10kOhm. Considering the body resistance over skin is 100kOhm to 500kOhm, a cut on the skin could pass ten times the current through the body. You say in my article Electrocution in Water that when I had a cut in my finger, I felt the electricity much more.

And cuts are not the only spots, as you saw in the video, the resistance between eyes or on the tong is around 20kOhm. That’s very small and too close to the brain. So with your eyes under the water and mouth open, you brain would receive a hefty electrocution, which is not good. So… keep your head above water? I doubt that would be quite possible with all the shaking in the water!