Glossary:Deceleration Trauma

{{Marvel Database:Glossary Template
 * Title            = Deceleration Trauma
 * Image            = Gwen stacy dies.JPG
 * ImageSize        = 300px
 * Definition       =  In Newtonian physics you decelerate from terminal velocity to a dead stop in less than a second, and it is the sudden deceleration of that stop that kills. It makes no difference what specifically causes that sudden deceleration.

However in the Marvel Universe the law is sometimes ignored with individuals with powers breaking this by catching people.

Referenced

 * The original comic featured a "snap" sound effect next to her head in the panel in which Spider-Man's webbing catches her. Some fans believe this indicates that her neck was broken by being caught by Spider-Man's web. Other fans do not think this sound effect implies this. Further confusing the issue, some reprints of the story take out the "snap" sound effect.
 * In (October 1973), Roy Thomas wrote in the letters column that "it saddens us to have to say that the Whiplash effect she underwent when Spidey's webbing stopped her so suddenly was, in fact, what killed her. In short, it was impossible for Peter to save her. He couldn't have swung down in time; the action he did take resulted in her death; if he had done nothing, she still would certainly have perished. There was no way out." They also explained that Gerry Conway, Roy Thomas and Stan Lee had decided that she had to die because Peter Parker wasn't ready for marriage, and the relationship was too often off and on again.
 * In an issue of What If?, Spider-Man saved Gwen not by letting her fall, but by leaping down in time to catch her - also, when the same is done to Mary Jane in the first Spider-Man movie, he swings down from his web to save her instead of trying to stop her in mid-air.
 * It is also interesting to note that Mayday Parker in MC2 does the same thing to save Gwen during a vision Gwen's death.
 * Several subsequent adventures have contained echoes of Gwen's death when other women have fallen great heights during Spider-Man's battles. On most occasions he has saved them by jumping after them and working with their momentum, rather than trying to stop them with his webbing.
 * In the final issue of Superior Spider-Man, Anna Maria fell from the roof of Alchemax. Spider-Man used his web to catch her arm, stating that he had been training thousands of times in case this situation happened again, so that he wouldn't live this nightmare ever again.
 * Other examples of this include Amazing Spider-Man #275, Web of Spider-Man #125, Marvel Knights: Spider-Man #12, and Superior Spider-Man #2; with Peter saving Sha Shan, Joyce Delaney, Mary Jane, and Mary Jane again, respectively, from a Goblin and a fall.
 * In the Ultimate Universe, Peter saved MJ after the Green Goblin threw her off a bridge in #25, but that universe's version of Gwen died differently in #62.

}}
 * SeeAlso          =