• Question: What holds your eyeballs from falling out?

    Asked by 533enqm32 to Dan, Jennifer, Luke, Martin, sakshisharda on 5 Mar 2018.
    • Photo: Martin Lindley

      Martin Lindley answered on 5 Mar 2018:

      well ….an interesting question 🙂

      the eye is connected to the body via the optic nerve so if the eye should ‘pop out’ then it will not go far !

      it is not uncommon for the eye to bulge or pop …maybe a finger will poke the eye and it will pop out …but it goes back into the socket very easily and usually does not do too much damage.

      but I don’t recommend it 🙂

    • Photo: Luke Williams

      Luke Williams answered on 5 Mar 2018:

      There’s also the pressure inside the eye, which means it stays in the eye socket (the bone around your eye). Although technically a liquid sloshing about, its thick enough and has enough pressure to stay put, at least most of the time.

      You can actually have the eye work just fine outside the eye socket, but really not something you should try at home!!!

    • Photo: Jennifer Paxton

      Jennifer Paxton answered on 5 Mar 2018:

      Yeah, an anatomy question!! 😀 Martin and Luke have already given great answers about this 🙂

      Your eyes are connected to your brain by a cord-like tissue called the optic nerve so normally, your eyes should be fine just where they are! The optic nerve is what transmits information to your eye from your brain and back again so it is really very important in vision, as well as just being a physical connection.

      Your eyes sit in their sockets, or ‘orbits’ which are specially designed parts of the skull, made up of the parts of SEVEN different bones of the skull! The eyes have fat around them to try and hold them in place in the orbit. Your eyeballs also have very important muscles around them that helps you see all around and these help to keep the eyeballs in place. They also have a blood supply (this is helping to see the eyeballs with lots of fresh oxygen) and these will also help to keep them in place.

      Martin and Luke have mentioned that your eyeballs CAN come out of their sockets….. usually after an accident or something nasty. A famous basketball player’s eye came out during a game last year when another player poked him in this eye….ouch!!

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