Yes. Yes, explosions can, in fact, do that. Most deaths from explosions happen due to the shockwaves of pressure leaving an area. Most explosions are way less flame, and way more air. Air is the difference between living and dead and it is the only thing keeping you on that gray line. If it, (yes, air), comes flying at you at several hundred miles an hour, it will shatter your bones. Not break, not fracture. Shatter. You will simply not have any bones in one piece, larger than a few inches at the most. That is, if you're not simply caught by it and yeeted into death.
Let's look at EOD combat vets that are killed in action. Look at their suits. All that armor isn't to prevent the explosion from killing them. It's to keep their bodies in one piece. At the distance they have to be to disarm bombs, they're fucked if it blows anyways. 'Either I do it right, or it's not my problem anymore.' - a common quote amongst EOD specialists.
A pyroclastic wave would be no different. All you would feel are three things, if you're lucky: the envelopment of smoke and ash surrounding you; the heat increasing in temperature until you're being cooked alive; and your eardrums shattering from the sheer volume of it all.
It'd at first sound like a low humming, almost like a tornado. Then you'd be hit by the volume. It comes crashing in like an ocean wave, only a thousand times louder. The air pressure in the area drops, faster than you can believe. Then, (if your ears still work), you'd hear the thudding and crashing of rubble and earth, landing on people, smashed into splat marks around you. There would be no screams at this point, because there'd be very little air to breathe anyways. Then the smoke and ash arrive, and soon after comes the glowing orange of the lava chasing after it.
First, your ankles are consumed, soon followed by the rest of your legs. If you're somehow still standing at this point, then your clothes would light on fire and only now would you feel the heat and the pain. Everything under the surface of the lava you simply would not feel anymore. The pain receptors have long been incinerated by now, and you're dead. You'd have fallen into the lava and your head would be consumed in flames, if it doesn't just melt. That's it. Nothing you can do about it.
"Ohohoh," you might say. "But what if I, you know, manage to get in the water and tried swimming away?"
Your head, still above the water, would be consumed in smoke and ash again, and if you're not (somehow) knocked unconscious by flying debris, or outright killed by it, then you'd be boiled alive because the lava flowing behind you, as you might notice, is fast and really fucking hot. No it's, and's, or but's about it.
"But what if I try to escape, assuming that I was able to see the smoke?"
Well, you're still fucked.
Pompeii was one of, if not the, worst eruptions since the supervolcanoes. The eruption alone had upwards of 100,000 times the thermal energy (temperature and explosive capability) of both nuclear bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. If you're not caught in the initial blast radius, then you're definitely going to be feeling the effects of the eruption: Blacked out skies, randomly falling debris, ashfall, acid rain, polluted waters for near everywhere in the surrounding countries/kingdoms/empire(s) at the time. Polluted waters means less vegetation. Less vegetation means less herbivores. Less herbivores means less predators. You might have survived the eruption but will you survive the next three days without any water? What about the next month, if you can even find food?
You might not be able to escape to other countries/kingdoms, either, because of political relations, diplomacy, overpopulation from other fleeing refugees, and the bureaucracy attempting to figure out what to do now. Not only that, but refugees will be scared and would be prone to kill anyone they think might take their place in line to get into the cities nearby. Robbers, raiders, and highwaymen will also be prominent during all this, so traveling's not going to be much fun.
The only way to survive the Vesuvius eruption was to not be there at all. You can go ahead and try to survive living in Asia, but empires in Asia rose quickly, and fell just as fast. Try and not be conscripted, or enslaved, or murdered, or killed by bad luck, or your own idiocy. Everyone is stupid, even more so during an emergency or natural disaster, and if you're not barely managing to survive, you're dead.
"But what about the Americas? Surely I could survive there?"
No. No, you can't. Are you willing to kill? Because that's what you're going to have to do to rise in respect and power in Native American tribes, among other things. The tribes may pursue peace, but they're still human. Headhunting, scalping people's heads, murder. The history books might want you to imagine that it was all sunshine and rainbows until the White Men came, but the tribes at the time were not the peace-loving figures they appear to be today.
And that's just in the middle portion of North America. Central America and southwards still have huge warring populations of Incas, Mayans, and Olmecs, still sacrificing people, where one mistake you make could send you into the mouth of another volcano, or drown you in a pool filled with snakes, or decapitated, with your head to be used as a ball for games.
The point is, this is easily one of the shittiest things you can try to make light of. No, a lot of them couldn't survive it. Neither could you. In fact, you would die even faster. At least the refugees of Rome had the purest intent to survive, where you, toskarin, can't even look up an event just to figure out how fucked you are. Being a troll just makes you look stupid and arrogant. Much better to actually contribute to education, or be silent, and learn. If you have questions, ask them. When you have the capacity for learning, use it. Don't waste it on bad opinions and even worse, misinformation.
Good day, good evening, and good night.
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prguitarman
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