STRANGE DEATHS

UNUSUAL WAYS OF SHUFFLING OFF THIS MORTAL COIL

When Colonel Bruce Hampton slowly fell to his knees during the finale of his starstudded birthday concert at Atlanta’s Fox Theater on 1 May, fans and musicians alike thought it was another one of his quirky performance acts. Brandon ‘Taz’ Niederauer tore into a blistering solo as Hampton lay motionless just feet away, his arm draped over a speaker. For several more minutes, dozens of musicians – including Warren Haynes of Allman Brothers Band and Phil Lesh & Friends fame – jammed away to one of Hampton’s favourite songs, “Turn On Your Love Light”. He fans danced and the musicians smiled as they waited for him to get up. But the eccentric guitarist and singer known as the forefather of the jam band was dead. He had turned 70 the day before. He founded several bands, including the Hampton Grease Band and the Aquarium Rescue Unit. Earlier in the evening, he had sung Fixing To Die: “Feeling funny in my mind, Lord / I believe I’m fixing to die / Well, I don’t mind dying / But I hate to leave my children crying.” Victoria (BC) Times Colonist, 3 May 2017. Tanzanian police detained a pastor after two worshippers drowned while being baptised in the River Ungwasi near Rombo in the north of the country. It is not clear how the pastor and the other worshippers involved managed to survive. They are members of a local church, Shalom, part of the charismatic Christian movement. Baptism in a river rather than in church is seen as a way of re-enacting the baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan. BBC News, 17 July 2017. On 9 July, the body of Leo Adonis, 38, was found inside Halemaumau Crater on Kilauea volcano in Hawaii, about 250ft (76m) below a walking trail used by the public. Two hikers walking the trail the previous day had found his dumped backpack containing a suicide note. His body was found the following morning by rangers searching by helicopter. Adonis was born Gregory Michael Ure. According to his father, he lived in Petaluma in California but “really loved Hawaii”. [AP] Sun, 11 July 2017. A leading French philosopher, psychoanalyst and newspaper columnist, best known for her work on risk-taking, drowned after attempting to save two children at Pampelonne beach on the French Riviera. Anne Dufourmantelle, 53, entered the water after the children got into difficulty in strong winds at Pampelonne beach, near St Tropez, on 21 July. Lifeguards later rescued the children unharmed. Dufourmantelle wrote numerous essays on the importance of taking risks and the need to accept that exposure to any number of possible threats is a part of everyday life, including the book In Praise of Risk (2011). “It is said: ‘to risk one’s life’, but perhaps one should say ‘to risk life’, [since] being alive is a risk,” said Dufourmantelle. “Life is metamorphosis and it begins with this risk.” BBC News, 24 July; D.Telegraph, 25 July 2017. Prof Brian Bellhouse, 80, a former Oxford don resident in Winchelsea, East Sussex, was trampled to death by a herd of cows in a field in Guestling on 12 June. He died at the scene despite another walker hearing screams and calling emergency services. A helicopter was scrambled and paramedics from the air ambulance began CPR, but they were unable to save him. Prof Bellhouse, an Emeritus Professor of Magdalen College, invented a device for needle-free injections. He cofounded PowerJect in 1993 and became a millionaire in 1997 when the company was floated with a £50 million market value. D.Telegraph, Sun, 14 June 2017. A week earlier, another millionaire died when his dog jumped on to the controls of his tractor and set it in motion. Derek Mead, 70, was using the 10-ton JCB telehandler to lift hay bales at his 2,000-acre farm in Hewish, Somerset. He had stopped to open a gate on 4 June when the JCB lurched forward and rolled over him. It was thought that his Jack Russell had disengaged the handbrake. He died of a heart attack despite the efforts of air ambulance paramedics. His family founded the Yeo Valley dairy brand and own vast tracts of Somerset. His brother Roger also died in a farming accident when he rolled his tractor on a steep hill. D.Mail, 6 June 2017. A former Czech soldier died after poisoning himself with yew tree needles. Petr Smísek, 42, believed the tree, which has a bark used in anti-cancer medicine, would give him a “natural high”, Oldham coroner’s court heard. However, after he had smoked the needles, his friend checked online and discovered they were a deadly poison with no antidote. Mr Smísek died later that day. Verdict: Misadventure. Metro, 10 July 2017.