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First, some train of thought to show I am not completely insane.

Last night there was a college football bowl game, the Duke's Mayo Bowl. I naturally assumed the winner would receive a lifetime supply of mayonnaise.

Then I thought, what would one do with limitless mayo. Why not fill a pool and try to swim in it?

If one were to jump off a relatively low spring board into such a pool:

  • What would entering it be like (would it be unyielding? Would you not even submerge your entire body?)

  • if you were to submerge, would it be a fatal decision? That is, would you not be able to swim to the surface?

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    $\begingroup$ Try it and find out. $\endgroup$
    – hft
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 0:38
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    $\begingroup$ Mayo is colloidal oil droplets dispersed through water. Oil has a fairly low specific gravity. Mayo specific gravity is too low for you to float to the top of the Mayo layer. You would either drown or suffocate in it. $\endgroup$
    – David White
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 0:52
  • $\begingroup$ @DavidWhite, "drown," "suffocate;" Usually the same thing. Most drowning victims do not aspire significant amounts of water. (see health.clevelandclinic.org/… and search for "laryngeal spasm"). They "suffocate" due to being immersed in water (or whatever other fluid). $\endgroup$
    – Solomon Slow
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 2:44
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    $\begingroup$ @DavidWhite, "specific gravity is too low...to float" One presumably could "tread mayo" at least for a while. But of course, that assumes that one knew which way to swim to reach the surface and, that one would even know that they had reached the surface when ones arms and face were covered with a thick layer of goo. I personally have had the experience of being held under turbulent water on a whitewater river, and I only knew in which direction to swim because I could see where the light was coming from. $\endgroup$
    – Solomon Slow
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 2:49
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    $\begingroup$ twitter.com/franciscellis/status/… $\endgroup$
    – Richard
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 11:15

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Mayonnaise is made of a mixture of vegetable oil, water and some egg yolk. It might be possible to swim in mayonnaise (see below) for a short amount of time, but given it's high viscosity (mayonnaise has an absolute viscosity $\approx 2\times 10^5$ Poiselle which is far greater than water), you would have problems. But assuming one fell into this pool of mayonnaise, would you at least have enough buoyancy to survive for a little while by getting to the top or the edge of the pool?

The average human has mass $70\ kg$, volume $0.07\ m^3$ and knowing that mayonnaise has a density of about $910\ kg/m^3$, this person in a pool of mayonnaise would experience a buoyant force of $$F_b=\rho V g=910\times 0.07\times 9.8\approx 624\ \text{N} $$ The weight force of the same person is $$W=70\times 9.8\approx 700 \text{N}$$ and for comparison, in water the person has a buoyant force $$F_b=\rho V g=1000\times 0.07\times 9.8\approx 686\ \text{N} $$ since the density of water is close to $1,000 \ kg/m^3$. Note that this is slightly greater than for being submerged in mayonnaise. So it might be possible to at least get to the surface or to a close by edge with very vigorous strokes due to the high viscosity.

I am guessing though that due to the viscosity of mayo, if you fell deep enough, even your greatest efforts will end up in you sinking to the bottom. But if you were not that deep (perhaps less than a foot from the surface), you might be able to make use of your buoyancy (and strong enough strokes) to at least get to the surface/close edge and save yourself. But you'd be mad to try it unless it's done under controlled conditions and supervised by others.

  • All of these calculations were done at standard temperature and pressure ($25^\circ$ Celsius and 1 atmosphere). Note also that reduced fat mayonnaise has a density of $1,000 \ kg/m^3$ which is very close to water.
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    $\begingroup$ Wait, some sources say that mayonnaise has significantly reduced viscosity at a high shear rate, so your cited absolute viscosity may not be relevant to swimming in it. $\endgroup$
    – user21820
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 12:43
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    $\begingroup$ related: How would you swim in inviscid water?. IIRC, there have been experiments with syrup, honey, corn starch etc and people could swim just fine. $\endgroup$
    – Bergi
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 16:36

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