Labourer dies under a heap of floor tiles
A gang of labourers unloading a consignment of floor tiles at a building site in Galle were pinned under a heap of tiles that came down the container causing instant death of one of them and serious
However, they took about 45 minutes to take out the victim who was already dead
injuries to two others. The injured were admitted to Karapitiya (Teaching) Hospital.
The victim A. H. Anura (34), father of two children, was a resident of Unawatuna in Galle.
Municipal Fire Brigade rushed to the scene and evacuated the three labourers after cutting and removing the stock of tile. However, they took about 45 minutes to take out the victim who was already dead.
Galle police have initiated a formal inquiry into the incident.
A95-year-old Chinese woman thought to have passed away stunned her neighbours - after waking up six days after she had been placed in a coffin.
Li Xiufeng was found motionless and not breathing in bed by a neighbour two weeks after tripping and suffering a head injury at her home in Beiliu, Guangxi Province.
When the neighbour who found her could not wake the pensioner up, they feared the worst and thought the elderly woman had passed away.
She was placed in a coffin which was kept in her house unsealed under Chinese tradition for friends and relatives to pay respects.
But the day before the funeral, neighbours found an empty coffin, and later discovered the 95-year-old, who had since woken up, in her kitchen cooking.
Neighbour Chen Qingwang, 60, who originally found Mrs Xiufeng, said: ‘She didn’t get up, so I came up to wake her up.
‘No matter how hard I pushed her and called her name, she had no reactions.
‘I felt something was wrong, so I tried her breath, and she has gone, but her body is still not cold.’
As Mrs Xiufeng lived alone, Mr Qingwang and his son made preparations for her funeral, and the ‘dead’ woman was left in her coffin two days after she was discovered.
The day before she was due to be permanently laid to rest, however, Mr Qingwang arrived at his neighbour’s property and found her ‘corpse’ had disappeared.
Mr Qingwang added: ‘We were so terrified, and immediately asked the neigh- bours to come for help.’
Neighbours searched her property before finding the pensioner in her kitchen cooking.
She reportedly told villagers: ‘I slept for a long time. After waking up, I felt so hungry, and wanted to cook something to eat.
‘I pushed the lid for a long time to climb out.’
Medics said Mrs Xiufeng had suffered an ‘artificial death’, when a person has no breath, but their body remains warm.
A doctor at the hospital was quoted as saying: ‘Thanks to the local tradition of parking the coffin in the house for several days, she could be saved.
Despite cheating death, however, the same Chinese tradition left Mrs Xiufeng without any possessions, according to ritual, after a person dies, all their belongings must be burnt.