How drunk is it possible to get before you just die?

How much alcohol is lethal?
The lethal dose of alcohol is clinically defined as the amount that would kill half the population. Most authorities place this dose at about .40%, or about five times the legal limit in New Mexico. However, there are many cases in which death occurred from alcohol poisoning at much lower, and in some cases, higher levels. For a 120 lb. man or woman drinking very quickly, it would only take about 9-10 drinks in an hour to reach the lethal level.

It's important to note that the body oxidizes about one ounce (approximately one drink) an hour. Depending upon how much you drink, how quickly you drink, and what else is in your stomach, it may take from about 30-90 minutes after you stop drinking before you reach your highest level of intoxication. This occurs whether the individual is conscious or passed out, thus it is critical that someone who is semi-conscious or unconscious be constantly evaluated.

"I've had 18 straight whiskeys. I think that's a record."

http://www.forgotten-ny.com/STREET%20SCENES/bars/barswhitehorse1.jpg

People need to learn to drink. If you're going to drink, you can't do it like that.

sounds like nonsense, sorry

If you're still posting to ILX, you're going to recover.

Just how big is a mickey?

If you're still posting to ILX, you're going to recover.

Seriously debatable.

I dont know how true it is but urgh.

I've got through 20 pints in a day before, in my late teens/early 20s. Not in 4 hours though! There's no way I could do it now.

I've not touched Southern Comfort since then. Even the smell of it makes me feel sick.

We ended up with a pint of thick, black sticky liquid that smelled of aniseed and cost about £35. The poor birthday boy downed the whole thing, and was fine for roughly 20 minutes. Then he started to go downhill rapidly, reaching a peak when he passed out in a pool of his own vomit in the toilet of a Connex train. He was quite a big lad, so it was a struggle to force the door open and drag him out onto the platform when we reached Hither Green, still less than an hour after he drank the drink. That was at about 2:30 in the afternoon, by the way. He didn't get of bed for the rest of the day. Or the next day.

A TEENAGER died after a 30-minute binge-drinking session the night before his 18th birthday, an inquest was told.

A post mortem showed that Mark Shields, from Prudhoe,Northumberland, was more than six times over the drink-drive limit when he died after drinking three pints of lager, five double whiskies and three double shots of sweet liqueur Aftershock.

The inquest was adjourned.

Lightweight.

also
For a 120 lb. man or woman drinking very quickly, it would only take about 9-10 drinks in an hour to reach the lethal level.

25 pints in 4 hours = 6.25 pints an hour so even a 120lb man can drink it and might not die.

ok this story is batshit insane:

The little-told story of how the U.S. government poisoned alcohol during Prohibition with deadly consequences.

Frustrated that people continued to consume so much alcohol even after it was banned, federal officials had decided to try a different kind of enforcement. They ordered the poisoning of industrial alcohols manufactured in the United States, products regularly stolen by bootleggers and resold as drinkable spirits. The idea was to scare people into giving up illicit drinking. Instead, by the time Prohibition ended in 1933, the federal poisoning program, by some estimates, had killed at least 10,000 people.

There was a news story here not so long ago about someone who was dared to down a pint of vodka on their birthday and died instantly after finishing it

i've done this, but it didn't kill me. i didn't do it again though.

√

i'm sooooooo glad i didn't die when i was a teenager. i could have so easily died so many times. thanks, God!

I was reminded last week that Sam Smith's do a 2.8% Alpine Lager - I wonder if that or similar was what Martin's acquaintance was drinking? Either way I get a little uncomfortable at the idea of drinking 25 pints of water in 4 hours.

My parents' generation (in the NW of England, anyway) drank mild - I'm guessing that would have been around 3-3.5% ABV. The keg beers of the 1970s were not generally strong either - I think Double Diamond was about 2.8%. Brown ales like Mann's were around 3% too.

So the image of the session drinker downing 10+ pints - rather like 6 pints of Stella today. Which would certainly do me great harm, but others are made of stronger stuff.

I was thinking along the same lines. As a teenager in the Midlands I knew of people drinking 20+ pints (over a day, not 4 hours) but it was usually mild or best bitter, so around 3-3.5%. So 20 pints of that ~= 14 pints of Stella.

I've drunk the equivalent of 40 units in a day before a few times but the most actual beer I ever drank was 19 pints on my 19th birthday (which coincided with the legalisation of all day drinking on Sundays, conveniently). I puked a bit halfway through the 19th so that probably doesn't count anyway.

Sam Smith's do a 2.8% Alpine Lager

Hah, I saw this for the first time only this weekend.

You gotta be careful drinking at high altitude.