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Can the Flash run or walk on water?

The reason I ask is because no matter how fast he can move, he needs something to push against.

I am assuming that he can, as hitting water at great speeds gives it the property of concrete, so to speak. But I want to know whether he has done it or not?

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    I admit to not having watched much of the new show, but wasn't there some silliness where he was running up the inside of a cyclone cloud or somesuch?
    – Radhil
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 12:43
  • Have you never seen those youtube videos of people driving dirt bikes across pools?! For flash I think moving on water would be child's play regardless of what we have seen... Quicksilver in the x-men movies also moved fast enough to "climb" falling debris; I would say that is even less to "push against"
    – Odin1806
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 13:44
  • @Odin1806, youtube.com/watch?v=BjSYKFasMHA
    – KyloRen
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 13:45
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    @Thunderforge Every Flash can run on water - otherwise they're just a glorified Usain Bolt (no offence meant to anyone)
    – Gallifreyan
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 16:25
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    I voted to close, not because it's too broad, but because if you google "flash run on water" or several variations of that, it's literally the top results. We used to have a "no research done" reason for closing, but I guess that's gone now.
    – Omegacron
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 19:48

4 Answers 4

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I'm not sure if he's ever been depicted as doing so in the current series. [EDIT: Yes he has, thanks to Gallifreyan] However, he was shown doing so in Ep1 of the 1990 series.

Regardless of whether he has been shown as doing so or not, it is extremely likely that he can based on real world physics and examples. The Basicliscus Lizard can run on water

...at a velocity of 1.5 meters (4.9 feet) per second for approximately 4.5 meters (15 feet)...

It is calculated here that to run on water you would have to run at approximately 30m/s, or around three times faster than Usain Bolt. Is the Flash more than three times faster than the Lightning Bolt? The Flash has been depicted as running at at least Mach 1 which is 343 m/s.

So yes, the Flash could run on water.

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    Aren’t their some iterations of the Flash that can outrun light?
    – KRyan
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 17:40
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    Several iterations of the flash have run much faster than light. See scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/5928/…
    – Bob G
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 18:26
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    running too fast (not even getting remotely close to light) should put him in orbit pretty quickly (basically escape velocity + whatever is necessary to beat air resistance)
    – njzk2
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 20:09
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    @njzk2 The Speed Force is basically a "Get out of physics free" card for all of the logical flaws with super speed, though; it canonically makes speedsters immune to, for example, bursting into flames from the friction, among other things. So, it likely includes a super-anchoring effect to keep them from catapulting off into the void.
    – Justin Time - Reinstate Monica
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 21:20
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    @JustinTime How dare you link to something other than the relevant XKCD What If when talking about friction vs. a relativistic speed item.
    – jpmc26
    Commented Apr 28, 2017 at 9:33
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Yes, the Flash can run on water, much like the common basilisk.

I can't speak for the comics, but in the TV series it first happened in S1E5:

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    Wait, is he setting the water on fire as he runs?
    – mattdm
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 14:13
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    @mattdm, don't think so -- it appears to be the standard snap/crackle/pop as he runs
    – bedwyr
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 15:06
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    This QA is proof that this site is the best site in the SO network :)
    – Fattie
    Commented Apr 27, 2017 at 18:03
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Yes, on Superman Vol. 1 199 The Flash races around the globe against Superman, as you can see he is able to run over water

Flash runs across the ocean as Superman swims on top of it; the caption reads "As the two rapidly leave America far behind the horizon..." Superman thinks "Flash can run on the surface... But I can top him by swimming with super-strength through the waves he has to go over!", The next panel shows superman pulling away with the caption reading "And so, within seconds, the Vizier of Velocity and The Super-Sultan of Speed approach the coast of Africa at 140,000 miles an hour..."

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Without reading the other answers I am going to say yes strictly going off the TV show. In the TV show Barry is seen running on water in the first season. All he needed to do was run over 600 MPH.

There are also certain times where we see Barry go into "Flashpoint" where he runs so fast everything around him freezes. Putting that in mind that would also mean the H20 molecules would also stop moving so you could not run a shower or jump in a pool. Why? Because the water cant separate. The covalent bonds could not break. Just as some people have taken photos of the water on swimmers faces before the surface tension is broken, that is when time is still moving at its normal speed. If the Flash is going so fast the everything freezes, while he could just walk on water the same way he would walk on the ground.

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