STRANGE DEATHS
UNUSUAL WAYS OF SHUFFLING OFF THIS MORTAL COIL
More than 270 election officials in Indonesia died from exhaustion caused by long hours and excessive work in sweltering conditions, counting votes when about 80 per cent of the country’s 193 million eligible voters took part in a poll on 17
April – the first to combine the presidential, parliamentary and regional authority elections. Some 800,000 polling stations were required to allow the country’s diverse population to cast their ballots across its 18,000-island archipelago. Ten days later, 272 election officials had died and 1,878 others had fallen ill. BBC News, Sky News, 28 April 2019.
A factory worker was decapitated by a lift in India after she “absentmindedly” tried to free her headphones that got tangled in the lift’s collapsible grille as she arrived for work on 27 May. The severed head of Sushila Vishwakarma, 48, was discovered on the ground floor of the plastics factory in Vadodara, while her body was in the lift that travelled to the third floor. The headphones were still in the ears of her detached head — and a playlist was running on the phone in her hand. Indian Express online, nypost. com, 28 May; thaivisa.com, 3 June 2019.
A 45-year-old motorcyclist from Charlotte, North Carolina, died on 9 June when he was struck by lightning and then crashed on the I-95 highway in Volusia County, Florida. A photograph showed the biker’s shattered helmet with cracks and burns from the bolt. It was unclear whether the cause of death was the lightning strike or the subsequent crash. Only 10 per cent of those struck by lightning are killed. Since 2016, there have been 11 motorcyclerelated lightning deaths. Over the last three decades, the US has sustained an average of 43 lightning deaths per annum, although since 2009 (for some reason) the average has dropped to 27. Washington Post, 10 June 2019.
Isabel Bytautas, 55, was killed when she was struck by lightning in the Scottish Highlands on 8 June. The healthcare worker from Selkirk and six other members of the Linlithgow Ramblers were caught in a ‘fluke’ storm while climbing a mountain ridge on Na Gruagaichean (3,465ft/1,056m) near Fort William. Another woman was injured and was in a stable condition in hospital. “It was almost like a bomb had gone off,” said a rescuer. “Rocks and big clods of turf had been uprooted and flung into the air.” Times, D.Telegraph, 10 June 2019.
César Cuauhtémoc González Barrón, 51, a Mexican wrestler known as Silver King, died mid-bout in the ring at the Roundhouse, Camden Town, north London, on Saturday night, 11 May, after being pinned by his opponent, Juventud “The Juice” Guerrera. The former world champion – who had appeared as Ramses in the film comedy Nacho Libre alongside Jack Black in 2006 – had suffered a suspected heart attack. The referee rolled him on his back as he counted him out, not realising he was seriously ill. Medics arrived within five minutes, but he was pronounced dead at the scene. González was what is known in lucha libre (“free fighting”, the Mexican version of wrestling) as a rudo. Wrestlers, or luchadores, divide into two main groups: the rudos and the técnicos. The former are the bad boys, the “heels” in American wrestling parlance, who bend and break the rules. The técnicos are the good guys, the “babyfaces”. A third category, the exóticos, who are often gay, bring camp flamboyance to the ring. D.Telegraph, Sun, Eve. Standard, 13 May 2019.
Ehud Arye Laniado, 65, a short-statured Israeli who founded Omega Diamonds, based in Antwerp, died during penis enlargement surgery at a private clinic in the Champs Élysées on 2 March. A substance injected into his virile member caused a fatal heart attack. A friend of the billionaire trader said he was “always focused on his appearance and how others perceived him.” In 2015, Laniado sold “the Blue Moon of Josephine”, a 12.03 carat blue diamond, in Geneva to Hong Kong businessman and convicted felon Joseph Lau Luen Hung for £36.8million. dailymail.co.uk, 6 Mar; Times, 7 Mar 2019.
On 27 April, Chutikarn Worachote, 54, was bitten on the right foot by a takhap (centipede) and was taken to hospital in Nakorn Pathom, Thailand. She was given an injection and medication and sent home to recover. Her son said she was in great pain and there was swelling around the bite. She had an evening meal and went to bed, but the following morning her son went to rouse her but found her dead. thaivisa.com, 29 April 2019.