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Benjamin Franklin once said, “In this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” Everyone will meet their demise, and it’s only a matter of when, where, and how.
Unfortunately, some people leave this mortal plane in the saddest and oddest of ways. Here are a handful of examples from a recent Reddit thread, as shared by those who saw it happen to someone they knew.
Fair warning: many of these stories are grim, morbid, and quite distressing.
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#1
A friend of mine was backpacking Australia after finishing university.
One evening he and some friends had a barbecue on the beach in Darwin and he fell asleep on the beach afterwards.
His friends thought it would be funny to leave him sleeping and all went home.
He was never seen again but the police believe he was eaten by salt water crocs who were known to be in that area.
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#2
A friend of mine’s parents. In their late 50s.
His mom was on her last hours after a long battle with cancer. She chose to die at home and was expected she wouldn’t last more than a few more hours so the family gathered to each say goodbye.
When she passed, her dad kissed her and then went outside for some time alone, he made it as far as the patio, slumped in to one of the chairs and died. Heart attack.
My friend lost both parents within 15 minutes. One expected, one not. But he had said he was worried about his dad once she was gone because he’d be useless without her, he was a good husband and father, worked hard to provide for them and give them a good life but they were a traditional couple. She cooked, did his laundry, cleaned and generally took care of him. He had his mental health struggles and past alcoholism and she grounded him and kept him stable. In a way, it was for the best, but also a heartbreaking end for them both.
They were born within days of each other, and died within minutes of each other.
Howl's sleeping castle 2 hours ago (edited)
My grandmother died and within three days, my granddad also passed away due to heartbreak. They were barely in their early thirties
#3
An acquaintance of mine was on breathing assistance in a home care situation. Someone doing a gender reveal celebration down the road let those metallic helium balloons go and they got caught in the power lines. Caused a local blackout which caused his equipment to stop working overnight and by the time he was found the battery backup had died. As had he.
#4
The manager of a place I used to work at was on vacation in Hawaii and while out hiking too close to restricted areas, he fell into a volcano and died. They never found any part of him. It’s true. And happens more than you would think. 😳 🌋.
#5
A friend in high school was riding a 4-wheeler down a trail in the woods. Somebody hung up a No Trespassing sign. At neck height. With a wire. The sign came off somehow.
My friend was beheaded.
#6
Someone from my year in high school went in for a tonsillectomy and died on the table. Not because of any crazy anatomical issues or surgeon's mistake.... But because he was apparently allergic to anesthesia. Aside from the tonsils he was super healthy, on the football team. He was the only child. I felt so bad for his mom, who thought her kid was going in for the most routine surgery of all time only to have him d*e.
#7
I remember in highschool having the police, ambulance and fire bridge come to talk to us and try to scare us about various dangers we will face in life. The ambulance woman walks in to the lecture hall and says "one person in this room won't live to the age of 21". One of my mates next to me loudly calls out "bags not me" (bags is akin to dibs in the US). He died at age 19 in a car crash...
I guess maybe it's not weird, but it was eerie and sad.
#8
A building I worked in had a freak elevator accident.
A woman was stepping onto it and it shot up suddenly and k****d her instantly. I rode that exact elevator for years before and after. Really, really, s****y unlucky timing. Very sad.
LookASquirrel 2 hours ago
I hate elevators. Especially when people try to cram into them in hotels with luggage when there's obviously not much room. Just wait 3 minutes, another lift will show up.
#9
A guy I was at school with OD'd on h****n in the waiting room in court just before he was about to be sent to prison.
#10
This one's going to get buried but it's absolutely tragic. About 15 years ago I worked for a homeless shelter and we had this one client named Mike. Now Mike was a super great guy but due to some mental issue he would occasionally get excited and Shout out too loud. At this particular homeless shelter to be able to eat you had to go to a 30-minute service. One of Mike's particular issues was that during the service he would randomly shout amen mid sentence from the pastor. I know for a fact that he was not doing this to be a malicious and he had no control over it. One day the director of the homeless shelter got tired of it and barred him from going to the homeless shelter for a week. Point of reference here is this is the only homeless shelter in the town and it was the middle of winter. Mike was found Frozen one day in a porta potty where he had tried to spend the night. The director of this homeless shelter said when interviewed that this man always had a place to stay and all he had to do was ask for help conveniently forgetting to mention that he was the reason that Mike was out on the street.
#11
I knew someone who died from a snake bite. He was driving on a highway in Panama when one of his tires blew out. He slowed down and pulled over onto the emergency lane.
While he was fixing the tire, a snake bit him. The cellphone signal on that highway was poor, so they couldn't call emergency services. His wife started waving at passing cars, hoping someone would stop and help drive him to the hospital. But no one stopped, because people in Panama tend to be distrustful of strangers. By the time someone finally did pull over, it was already too late.
Snake bites are not an uncommon occurrence, but the fact that it happened this way makes it so bizarre.
#12
I had a friend that went into the hospital for an Asthma attack. She was 18, they kept her because her oxygen levels were low. Her mom and dad left to go home and when they came back in the morning she was face down in the pillow d**d. Why there weren’t machines going off? Good question. This was 93, edit to fix the year.
#13
More rare than weird, but my sister developed an allergy to her own platelets. Her blood got so thin, she spontaneously started bleeding through all her veins. She died of a massive hemorrhage in her brain, but all her organs were full of blood. She was 13 years old.
#14
My friend’s priest died at her wedding ceremony. Actually before the ceremony. Everyone was waiting for him to come out of his little room in the church…. Eventually they checked on him and he’d passed away.
#15
My cousin died after a soccer injury. He stepped on the ball and fell. Hit his head. He went home, was falling in and out of consciousness, and he passed away on the way to the hospital. He was 18.
Barbara Hill 1 hour ago
The coach or another adult should have taken him to the hospital with a head injury.
#16
A young woman in my city was found d**d in her parents apartment while they were away for a long vacation. She was responsible for watering their plants and stuff like that.
She was found in a large pool of blood on the floor and a broken flowerpot next to her. It turned out she had accidentally tipped it over and been severely cut by one of the shards and bleed out before being able to call for help.
Kristiina Männiste 17 minutes ago
2013 in Belarus a fishing man tried to catch a beaver to take a photo with the animal and the beaver bit him. Into his leg artery. The man bled to d***h.
#17
My grandmother was found d**d on the floor of her bathroom. This was over 50 years ago and her house was over 100 years old then. The hot water was installed after the house was built and the hot water pipes were run along the wall inside the bathroom. According to the coroner, she must have been standing up in the bath and then bent over, hitting the hot water pipe with her a**e. The shock of it caused her to stand up so quickly that she cracked the back of her head against the wall, knocking herself out. She then fell out of the bath, hitting the opposite wall with sufficient force to break her neck. My Dad used to visit her every second day to check up on her (His sister took the alternate days) and that's how he found her.
#18
My friend (in 9th grade in the 80's) was on summer vacation at his Grandmother's house in NY. He was mowing her front yard when a pregnant woman went into labor while driving, lost control of her car, ran up into the yard and k****d him.
EDIT: I'm honestly not sure what happened to her, legally. I know she and her baby were not hurt. I honestly think about her more often now than I do him. From what my Mom told me, by talking to his Mom, the lady was beyond inconsolable. I can't imagine living with something like that. The entire situation was awful, from every perspective.
#19
Complications from the flu age 39.
Had another friend have a heart attack at 36.
LookASquirrel 1 hour ago
We had a friend who was super fit, healthy, didn't smoke or drink. Died of a heart attack shoveling snow about 42 years old. My husband was in his 40s when he was hospitalized with the flu, he has asthma, it was really scary but luckily he recovered.
#20
My aunt was k****d when someone drove into her memory care building. They hit her bedroom and she just happened to be sitting in there at the time.
#21
My dads best friend when they were kids fell through a trap door in the hay loft and was strangled by his shirt.
A girl I knew in middle school was letting her little brother bury her in the leaves piled up on the curb when some teenagers decided to drive through and mess up all the piles. Sounds like an urban myth they'd tell new drivers, but unfortunately no.
#22
I live in the U.K.. One of my friends (age 20: very beautiful girl) never returned to college after the summer vacation. She was on holiday in France with her parents, and had been hit by a vehicle when she was a pedestrian, crossing the road. Like a lot of British people abroad, she had been looking the wrong way (we drive on a different side of the road to most other countries). One second of inattention can make such a huge impact.
My Dad also lost someone at around the same age. His best friend had died right beside him in a factory in the 1940s. The two young men had been in the "milling room" (both friends were skilled metal workers), when a large carborundum stone that spun round at speed (and was used for grinding), shattered.
Pieces of the stone went everywhere-Dad's attention was rather taken up dodging the large piece that whizzed past his head and embedded in the wall right beside him (thankfully, Dad always had lightning-fast reflexes). He then turned to his mate, only to see him toppling over and subsequently dying in the most horrific way imaginable. A huge piece of carborundum stone had hit him in the abdomen. There was nothing anyone could do: just be there for him as he died.
Heath and safety is often mocked ("Heath and safety has gone mad"), but never by me. The workplace was so often a deadly place before it was brought in.
#23
I had a coworker who had trouble staying awake while driving. We drove semi trucks to locations, and they made me ride with him to make sure he stayed awake. Didn’t make sense, just have me drive. He was finally let go, and a month later, he fell asleep in his private car and drove off the road and was k****d.
#24
2 people in my life, 2 years apart, fell down the same mountain and died.
#26
I know three people that died on the way home from a funeral. The first one (we'll say Bob) was leaving the memorial for a local high schooler that died in a car accident the day he got his license. Bob had a fatal wreck less than 1/4 mile from where the kids wreck happened, immediately after his funeral.
The 2nd and 3rd were adult sisters. Their grandpa passed and they carpooled with their parents to the funeral because it was an hour away. Half way home their car was hit by a semi and the sisters died instantly, but the parents survived.
Maybe this isn't the type of weird you meant but it was the first thing that came to mind😅.
#27
Liver failure at 26 due to substance a***e. Would’ve thought he was a 50 year old alcoholic or something. It was really shocking.
#28
She broke her ankle. Joked about being a klutz. We made plans to reconnect after she was off crutches because it had been too long.
She died from an embolism caused by the break. It was incredibly sudden: one minute she was talking to her roommates and the next she died.
Maybe not the weirdest overall, but super unsettling for all us 20-somethings.
#29
I guess it's not _that strange_ all things considered but an extended family member went to a country that drives on the other side of the road, forgot I guess, and died getting hit by oncoming traffic.
#30
I have two:
1. I went to high school with a girl who was k****d by a shark
2. I was friends in college with a girl who was standing up in the back of a windowless/roofless/doorless Jeeps. They had all been drinking, and the driver took the curve too sharply. She was thrown forward, onto the road, and then the Jeep ran over her neck.
#31
Welp I guess this is the thread for me.
1. I worked at a betting agency which had a dozen or so TVs on the wall showing a random mix of Teletext racing odds and different horse and dog meets. A regular wanted to change the channel on one of the TVs and instead of asking us to use one of our universal remotes he climbed up on the counter. Lost his balance, grabbed the TV for support, pulled it off the wall and it landed on another regular’s head. That guy spent years in a coma and eventually died during surgery after a medical mistake that I won’t share because it made the news and will dox me.
2. Another regular got trapped upside down in a manhole trying to get his keys and drowned. That was also in the news but shouldn’t dox me.
3. A guy I went to school with got electrocuted by his garden shed. Somehow some wiring made the whole shed live.
4. A girl I went to school with had a fight with her boyfriend and he locked her out of the apartment. She tried to climb back in via the fire escape and it turned out the fire escape wasn’t securely attached to the building. .
#32
Partying with a bunch of rock climbers when this guy decides to climb off the 3rd floor balcony to the roof using the rock facade wall. One of the pieces he was holding onto broke loose and he fell. He ended up dying a few days later.
#33
My colleague, her daughter, and a man who tried to help them, were all swept out to sea and drowned.
Her daughter was first knocked in by a wave and then the other two got knocked in while they tried to reach out to her, not one of them went into the water intentionally. It was a terrifying reminder of how wild and powerful the sea is.
I had worked closely with her and it sounds like such a cliché but she really did light up the room, she was such a beautiful soul. This only happened at the beginning of this year and I'm still reeling from it.
#34
One of my friends was a food delivery rider in Malaysia. He died during an aircraft crash. The plane literally crashed into him when he was on the highway.
#35
Type 1 diabetic, went into a diabetic coma in their sleep, was found d**d in the morning still in bed.
#36
A guy I went to HS with was on his 9th day at a new job and he didn’t have the necessary safety equipment or training and fell into a vat of molten iron. His autopsy report says thermal annihilation. Only half of him fell in. His colleagues had to see the other half of his body that DIDN’T fall in.
#37
A friend of mine from high school had an affair with a married man who was about 20 years older than her. They had a baby together and 3 years later she was going after him for child support and he didn’t wanna pay it so he took her and her son into the woods and k****d them. Absolutely horrible.
Barbara Hill 1 hour ago
Yes it was horrible, and then he went to jail and ended up with nothing as he should have. Hope he got life.
#38
A guy I worked with had a massive heart attack while he was driving and plowed his car into a tree. He was badly injured, but he survived.
The heart attack did so much damage that he ended up needing a transplant. He got one about six months later and came through the surgery okay.
About six months after that, he and his wife were coming home from a day trip and using their gps to navigate. It was a dark, unfamiliar road and he ended up driving off a ferry landing and into the river. His wife made it out safely but he drowned.
#39
In high school a classmate went hiking with his family on a trip. He fell to his d***h and his brother and parents watched it all happen.
#40
Not my immediate circle but when my Dad was teens/20’s (he was born in 1940) they were all out drinking at a park / water quarry after closing & a guy threw his beer bottle against a big rock & a shard of glass slit his jugular..
#41
Best friend was shot by some teenager over his car. Kid wanted his Durango, and my friend wouldn't give him the keys. Kid pulled out a gun and shot him. Didn't even take the car. His GF turned him in. Still waiting for trial 2 years later.
Barbara Hill 1 hour ago
Give them the keys, wallet, can't get another life, but can get another car. It's f/up that these crooks would rather take what people worked hard for, than work for their own stuff.
#42
My grandma’s sister in law was driving my grandmother and her three oldest kids down a narrow country road in the 60’s. A woman turned from her mailbox, two feet from the side of the road, and stepped into the road in front of their car. She was just looking at her mail. The woman died instantly. As my grandma would say “it was the sixties, on the backroads you went as fast as the car would let you.”
The woman’s children were watching from the front window of her house across the street. Their father was already deceased. They died in a car wreck with a grandparent a few years later.
#43
A guy in the circle I used to hang out in posted a Facebook post about how he's never received a "whooping" from someone and he says if anyone has beef with me come on, so everyone can see who's walking and who's talking.
Basically the next day he burned to d***h in his car.
#44
My gay/queer/drag/punker friend was k****d by a polar bear in Svalbard.
Naturally we were all shocked and sad when it happened (and it caused a huge drama to get the body repatriated.) And at the same time we were also sort of: ‘Iconic!’
He definitely had a memorable d***h.
#45
When we were sophomores, we had a couple of odd ones. One of my classmates hit a bridge, was ejected, and ran over his chest with his truck, k*****g him. The other got in a fight with his dad and jumped from a moving vehicle. This resulted in a skull fracture. He survived that, but while he was recovering in the hospital, he fell and struck the point of impact on a toilet, causing a massive stroke which finished him off.
#46
There was a family near me. The dad was much older and looked his age. An alcoholic. The mum held everything together. She fell down the stairs whilst carrying a basket of washing. Broke her neck, d**d.
The daughter, who was amazingly beautiful was in a car with some wannabe gangster type. The car crashed and went on fire, he ran and left her to burn to d***h. Less than 6 months later.
Then a few months after that the son was going to visit a friend and took a short cut over a field. It was snowing and the gap in the fence that had been there my entire life had been repaired. He climbed the fence and fell, banging his head. Died of hypothermia.
Old alcoholic father lost his entire family in 9 months and is still alive, still drinking every day well into his 80s.
#47
Girlfriend of a dude who studied with some of my best friends. Choked to d***h with a piece of gum
Same dude would lose another gf in a bizarre accident before any of us even turned 30, but I don't remember the details.
#49
Our neighbor was a guy who drove a limo. He took it to one of those self-serve car washes where you do the work. He was washing the front when the car slipped out of gear and moved forward, pinning him against the wall of the car wash.
Another guy I knew died of self-immolation, he just went onto his cement patio and set himself ablaze.
Another friend just walked into traffic on the highway.
#50
Not my circle - but a guy I worked with in high school came into work real sad, and when we asked what was wrong he said his one friend was playing russian roulette the night before with a group (alcohol involved) and offed himself.
#51
Classmate during high school became entitled to his deceased mother’s estate when he turned 18. He bought a high end rocket of a street bike amongst many other purchases. He eventually sold his bike, and while riding it to meet to sell it, a semi kicked a board up on the interstate. It caught my class mate across the neck, breaking it. He was d**d before he hit the ground.
#52
A distant relative died from being crushed from a lawnmower you can drive. He was cutting the grass at a golf course. I guess he was close to a body of water, and the land gave way and he fell in, overturned. He was stuck upside down in like a few inches of water and died before he could get rescued.
#53
Two acquaintances got impaled in the span of a few years. The first in a dirt bike accident. The second falling out of a window. The two were best friends to each other.
#54
A friend of mine was sending his younger brother to the hospital for a routine checkup. After the younger was done, he found my friend slouching on a seat in the waiting area thinking he just snoozed off. Only to find he passed away. Tragic.
#55
An ex gf’s friend in college lost her brother because he broke into a block of flats and chose to hide at the bottom of an elevator shaft when the cops inevitably turned up. One of them called the lift to take them to the higher floors and it crushed him underneath it.
#56
My great aunt had been sick for a couple of days but she was starting to get better so the family felt it was ok to attend her niece’s wedding. She died as the niece was getting married. People had to leave the ceremony to go to my great aunt’s house. The reception hall was half empty and the people that stayed behind weren’t in the mood to celebrate.
#57
My cousin was smoking near her oxygen tanks & blew herself her husband to bits in London. Was watching Sky news at home in Ireland, when I saw news about the explosion. Didn't find out till later that it was my cousin & the circumstances. Mental. She really did love smoking.
#58
My uncle. he was involved in a minor multi car wreck on a highway in Colorado. the officer was taking his statement and briefly looked down at his note pad then up to see my uncle briefly standing there with no head before falling over. a semi tire had come off and decapitated him. here's the twist, his vehicle had almost no damage, just some minor paint scuffing. he was the last one there and the last to give his statement because he was translating for everyone else.
#59
My wife died of an undiagnosed heart condition, age 27. Long QT syndrome. It might not fit here, as sadly it's not that weird. It turned out her father was.a.carrier for the genes. Her sister has it. And my daughter has it. It's well managed with both of them. But man, that was a tough time. She doesn't know her mum as my daughter was 17 months when my wife died.
What was weird (annoying is a more appropriate word) was health professionals, later on and once my daughter had been diagnosed, constantly asking me how I knew she had a heart condition. An attitude of 'how would you know?' among dentists, nurses etc... like it's fucken serious and I'm going to act like a hawk if you are thinking of using lignocaine, novacaine and many other d***s on my daughter... there's a big list and it's not hard to check when the patient's parent tells you. After they had given me their attitude, you could see them squirm when they asked how was it diagnosed... and I told them that my wife had died from it. Got sick of justifying myself. Well in the past now.
What do you think ?
Willow 59 minutes ago
Had a cousin get hurt on the job and his boss was refusing. His l&is claim. He took his gist UT ers g*n went to his bosses house, knocked on the door and when his boss opened the door he s**t himself in the h**d. Also I had a neighbor, an old man. Wvery day he would sit and wait for him in the lobby and visit while he worked. Then he a ould ago to the office and visit the managers. Three weeks later after many complaints of a nasty smell they finally went to check on him and there he was on the fl*(r. I couldn't believe no ody went to che Kong him sooner. The smell was - there's no words to describe it.
Willow 59 minutes ago
Had a cousin get hurt on the job and his boss was refusing. His l&is claim. He took his gist UT ers g*n went to his bosses house, knocked on the door and when his boss opened the door he s**t himself in the h**d. Also I had a neighbor, an old man. Wvery day he would sit and wait for him in the lobby and visit while he worked. Then he a ould ago to the office and visit the managers. Three weeks later after many complaints of a nasty smell they finally went to check on him and there he was on the fl*(r. I couldn't believe no ody went to che Kong him sooner. The smell was - there's no words to describe it.
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