In 1964 – a year that would prove to be a big one for sleep-deprivation records – 17-year-old high school student Randy Gardner attempted to break Tom Rounds’ record.Īware of Tripp’s case, Gardner believed he was able to “not go insane” whilst doing so. However, we do know that he wasn’t the only person to suffer negative consequences as a result of attempting this record. We’ll never know exactly how severely, if at all, Tripp’s stunt affected his later life. Besides, Tripp got divorced four times in his life could they really all have been caused by his sleeplessness stunt? Whilst it’s true that both his radio career and marriage ended in the following years, the former can be attributed to Tripp’s involvement in a financial scandal, and the latter can happen to even the most well-rested of people.
It is often repeated that Tripp’s sleep-deprivation stunt had long-lasting effects on his personality, however, this cannot be confirmed. Years later, Dr William Dement, one of the sleep researchers who monitored Peter Tripp during his record attempt, stated that the Ritalin administered to Tripp was far more likely to have caused his paranoia and hallucinations than the lack of sleep was. Neither was Tom Rounds, another 23-year-old radio DJ, who broke the record later in the same year by staying awake for 260 hours (10 days 20 hours) while sitting in a department store window display. He was not reported to have suffered any ill effects. The majority of his well-earned rest was spent in REM sleep, including one of the longest REM episodes ever recorded.Įlsewhere, in Florida, Dave Hunter managed to stay awake for 24 hours longer than Tripp, clocking 225 hours (9 days 9 hours) to secure the world record. They concluded that Tripp’s brain was performing a waking version of REM sleep as a way to cope with the sleep deprivation.Īfter 201 hours (8 days 9 hours) awake, Tripp slept for over 13 hours, during which he continued to be monitored. Interestingly, doctors noted that Tripp’s hallucinations ran on roughly 90-minute cycles, just like REM sleep. His mental state was described as ‘nocturnal psychosis’. He also became paranoid at first he accused doctors of trying to poison him, and then he thought they were conspiring to imprison him.Īlthough doctors attempted to test Tripp on a daily basis, many of the tests towards the end were not completed as Tripp was no longer cooperative. He began questioning his own identity, and he claimed to see scurrying mice and kittens. His emotions became highly erratic his perceptions slowed and then he began to suffer hallucinations and delusions. Tripp spoke too soon though, as he was about to take a drastic turn for the worse. In 60 minutes it seems that these five days of deprivation have been wiped away,” Tripp said at the time. Hunter took no stimulants at all, whereas Tripp was reportedly “buoyed by an energy giving drug advised by physicians when he neared total collapse.” Advertisements The first person we awarded the 'sleeplessness' record to was a radio DJ named Dave Hunter who, in 1959, attempted the record at the same time as Peter Tripp, another popular radio DJ.Īs you’ll soon learn, the ‘50s were a popular time for radio presenters performing publicity stunts like this.Ģ3-year-old Hunter, broadcasting for Florida-based station WZRO, began his attempt two hours before 32-year old Tripp, who was broadcasting for WMGM from a glass booth in New York’s Times Square.īoth Tripp and Hunter claimed to be feeling fine after passing the 140-hour mark, as reported by Miami News-Record several days before the end of the attempt. A timeline of record-breakers and the effects they suffered 1950s
In order to estimate the upper limit of how long a human can go without sleep, let’s first look at how far the boundaries of human wakefulness have been stretched over the years. That poses the question: is it truly impossible for a human to stay awake for 19 consecutive days?Īnd just how dangerous is it to forego sleep for such a long period of time? Advertisements The record holder at the time was Robert McDonald, who went 453 hours 40 minutes (18 days 21 hours 40 minutes) without sleeping in 1986.Īlthough we no longer monitor the record due to the inherent dangers associated with sleep deprivation, we can say that no one is known to have broken it since McDonald.
In 1997, we stopped monitoring the record for the longest time to stay awake.
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