What A Way To Go

Shouldn't Smile Really...

 

Jean-Louis Toubon, 44, choked to death when pieces of his girlfriend's edible knickers got stuck in his throat in Marseilles , France . Sun, 22 May 2003.

 

A 64-year-old electrician from Berlin died in his new home in Malaga, Spain, while wired up to a home-made gadget. He told friends that his "orgasmatron" - named after a sex-machine in Woody Allen's film Sleeper - was better than a woman and a lot cheaper. It had a vibrating mat, massage pads and electrodes to attach to his manhood. "Unfortunately there seems to have been a power surge while he was watching a film called Hot Vixen Nuns," said a police spokesman. "And the flat was damp." The cause of death was electrocution. Glasgow Herald - 28 March 2003.

 

A 27-year-old Thai man with a prosthetic leg was electrocuted when he urinated near a power pole on the side of a highway in Bangkok . The victim's father told police they had stopped their car near a tollbooth during a rainstorm on 3 July, after nature called. It was thought that the victim had urinated on a flooded ground line, with his prosthetic leg acting as a strong conductor. Queens land Times, 5 July 2003.

 

A Doctor mistakenly declared a 72-year-old woman dead in Mettmann, Germany, and sent her body to a mortuary, where she froze to death in a refrigerator. An undertaker raised the alarm when he found the 'corpse' was still warm, but it was too late and she died from hypothermia. Metro - 13 March; Toronto National Post, 14 March 2002.

 

Susie Stephens, 36, of Winthrop, Washington State, America's top pedestrian safety expert, was run over and killed by a bus in St Louis, Missouri, last March. She was in the city advising a cycling and walking conference on safety. The driver of the tour bus said he didn't see Ms Stephens as he made a left turn. Ananova - 22 March 2002.

 

Roger Wallace, 60, was flying his radio-controlled plane near Tucson, Arizona, on 18 May when he turned toward the sun and lost sight of it. The place, which weighed nearly 7lb (3kg) and had a wingspan of nearly 5ft (1.5m), then flew into his chest, killing him. Tucson (AZ) Citizen - 20 May 2002.

 

An Indonesian man, using a home-made stunning device to catch fish, electrocuted himself and drowned. Syahrul, 42, had attached electric cables to a diesel engine and was trailing them in the Mentaya River in Kalimantan. He supposedly dipped his foot into the water, received an electric shock and fell in. Associated Press - 20 November 2002.

 

Mark Billington, 35, of Halifax , west Yorkshire , died when he suffered an epileptic fit, fell out of bed and got his head stuck in a wastepaper basket. He was found with a duvet wrapped around him and his head securely wedged in the 10in (25cm) deep basket. D.Express, 21 December 2002

 

Bernard O'Reilly, 44, a blood transfusion driver, died on 2 January while trying to adjust a camp bed. His hand got caught in the frame slicing off his fingertip and sending him into shock through loss of blood and the trauma of his injury. His workmates became worried about him when he failed to return after the New Year holiday. On 5 January, his body was found in the Lanark flat where he lived alone. Glasgow Herald, Scotsman - 11 January 2001.

 

Anton Brieszov was trapped in the lion's enclosure of Moscow Zoo when the ladder he climbed down to retrieve a toy dropped by his child toppled over. He managed to outrun the lions and climb to safety. He then jumped into a moat surrounding the enclosure and, being a non-swimmer, drowned. Guardian - 15 February 2001.

 

A Zookeeper in the eastern Chinese city of Jinan was mauled to death by a tiger after apparently defecating on it. Evidence at the scene, including lavatory paper, excrement and a loosened trouser belt, suggested that Xu Xiaodong, 18, had climbed on the tiger cage and relieved himself over four Bengal tigers. He either slipped or was dragged in by an angry tiger. Daily Telegraph - 22 February 2001.

 

George Kafats, a customer in a crowded Athens restaurant, was killed by a flying lamb-chop when an oven exploded. Five other diners were injured. Sunday Mercury - 10 June 2001.

 

Dwayne Carroll, 48, from Kentucky, had a fatal heart attack while clearing a place for the double gravestone intended to commemorate himself and his wife in the Floyd County cemetery. When he was late arriving home, his wife Carolyn, 49, sent her sister, Shelby Shrewsbury, to look for him. Mrs Carroll had a fatal heart attack herself when her sister told her the news. The headstone had the names and birth dates of both husband and wife on it, but only one date of death will be required. A joint funeral service was planned. Ananova - 11 July 2001.

 

A preacher who claimed he could walk on water like Jesus died at the first attempt. Hundreds watched in horror as he was swept away. His body was recovered by followers from the River Kwipu in the Congo. Sunday Independant - 25 November 2001.

 

The traditional Pre-Christmas swine slaughter in the Hungarian village of Darvaspuszta turned to tragedy on 24 November when an unnamed Croat was electrocuted attempting to knock out a pig with a homemade pig-stunner. Then a local man was hospitalised with an irregular heart rhythm after attempting a rescue by trying to unplug the device. The pig's owner was so shocked by all this that he suffered a fatal heart attack. There was no word on the fate of the pig. Observer - 25 November 2001.

 

A 28-year-old Iranian bridegroom died instantly when he licked honey from his brides finger during their marriage ceremony in the northwestern city of Qazvin and choked to death on one of her false nails. The bride was rushed to hospital after fainting from shock. Iranian couples lick honey from each other's fingers when they get married so that their life together starts sweetly. Reuters - 12 December 2001.

 

Stephen Hyett, 38, of Haverhill, Suffolk, who six years ago survived a pioneering transplant in which his stomach, liver, kidney, pancreas, duodenum and small bowel were replaced, died from head injuries after falling off a chair while changing a light bulb. Express -15 April 2000

 

Arvin Jah, 48, was killed by a plant pot dropped by a monkey from the sixth floor of a block of flats in New Delhi. The Sun - 17 April 2000.

 

SHAWNEE, Okla. An 82-year-old man was killed when his wife accidentally backed over him with their car while trying to drag him to the house after he had fallen in the driveway, police said.

Pottawatomie County Sheriff's Detective Tracy Warkentien described Franklin Gray's death Thursday as a ``freak accident.''

Gray, who is legally blind and uses a cane, was going for a walk along the driveway when he fell. His 87-year-old wife, Leta, tried to help him up but couldn't.

Gray asked her to drag him back to the house with a rope attached to the couple's car, Warkentien said. She came back with an extension cord and tied it to his belt.

The belt broke as the car started moving up the 44-foot driveway. The wife then tied the cord to Gray's ankle, Warkentien said.

When the extension cord broke, police said Gray asked his wife to back the car closer to him so he could reattach it. But, police said, her foot apparently was on the gas instead of the brake and when she put the car in reverse it backed over him. Associated Press - 26 August 2000

 

Jenny Rider, 41, poured petrol over her clothes and set it alight. As it flared, she changed her mind and plunged into a river in New Norfolk, Tasmania, to douse the flames. She then knocked herself unconscious on a rock and drowned. News of the World - 24 September 2000.

 

German tourist Hermann Roag somehow survived a fall from the window of his 8th floor hotel room in Lausanne, Switzerland with no more than a broken ankle; but on the way to hospital he fell out of the ambulance and died under the wheels of a passing bus. Guardian - 23 November 2000.

 

Antonio Mazelli, 24, whose friend Ricardo Lestrada handed him a mobile phone with a superglued handgrip - as a joke - to answer while driving along Milan's main highway, lost control of his vehicle and struck a crash barrier while trying to dislodge the unit from his right palm where it had stuck. He suffered minor injuries in the crash, while Lestrada died from internal injuries at the scene. Media Milano - 5 December 2000.

 

Paolo Fasano, 71, from Alessandria in northern Italy, killed his 74-year-old wife Piera for having the television turned up too loud as she watched a music festival. He hit her with the iron from the ironing board and then strangled her with a tie from the wardrobe. "Then he didn't know what to do," he siad, "so I sat down next to her in front of the television. But I lowered the volume." Daily Telegraph - 2 March 1999

 

Francis Buhagiar, 68, didn't like the breakfast his 76-year-old sister Maria gave him one morning last February - so he shot her dead, a court in Malta heard. The row is believed to have been over burnt toast. Rueters - 3 March 1999

 

A married man and his secretary were killed by lightning while making love in a rubber dinghy in the middle of a lake near Osnabruck in Germany. Tomas Gormann, 32, and Maria Tlek, 22, were found by a forestry worker next day still locked in a naked embrace. Store chief Gormann's wife, Jan, 36, said: "This was God's intervention". The Sun - 21 June 1999.

 

A dwarf nicknamed Od has died in a circus accident in northern Thailand. According to the Pattaya Mail, he "bounced sideways from a trampoline and was swallowed by a yawning hippopotamus which was waiting to appear in the next act. Vets on the scene said Hilda the Hippo had a gag reflex that automatically caused her to swallow." The vet said it was the first time the hefty vegetarian had ever eaten a circus performer. "Unfortunately, the 1,000-plus spectators continued to applaud widely until common-sense dictated that there had been a tragic mistake." Melbourne Herald Sun - 16 July 1999

 

Najib Khoury, a thrifty Syrian, stashed his life savings of £15,000 in a box, which he placed in a hole in the wall. Then he dreamed that he had given all his money to charity. He rushed to check his hiding place and found a family of mice nesting in the box, which was comfortably lined with chewed-up banknotes. Mr Khoury had a heart attack and dropped dead. Express - 25 September