January
Every
New Year, several Japanese choke to death on mochi cakes. This year the traditional
seasonal sticky rice treat dispatched six old folk, aged 75 to 88, between 26 December
and 3 January. Six others, aged 55 to 71, were in critical condition. One 70-year-old
man in Noboribetsu was saved on 5 January by the quick thinking of his family, who
whipped out his dentures and used a vacuum cleaner with the switch on 'high' to suck
the mochi cake from his throat after it got stuck. Japan Times
- 3 + 5 January 2001; Mainichi Interactive, Sunday Express - 7 January 2001.
Natalie
Waldinger, 24, a Peace Corps volunteer from Huntingdon, Long Island, was trampled
to death by an elephant in Ruaha National Park in central Tanzania on 7 January after
she and another American woman left their car to take photographs. The animal was
apparently enraged by the clicking sounds of their cameras and charged at the women.
Waldinger's friend scrambled to safety. The deadly attack is the first of its kind
in the Ruaha park. which has a large number of elephants. NY
Post - 10 January; Associated Press - 11 January
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.
A 26-year-old
amateur Indian actor called Kumar burned to death in a Madras theatre in early January
in front of an audience of 1,000 while re-enacting the murder of Australian missionary
Graham Staines who was touched by Hindiu Zealots in January 1999. He had doused himself
with petrol to make the murder scene more realistic. Staines , 58, and his two sons
- aged seven and ten - were burned to death while asleep in their car. It is thought
to be the work of the Hindu hardliner Dara Singh. Brisbane Courier
Mail - 19 January 2001.
February
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 Zoo keeper in the eastern Chinese city of Jinan was mauled
to death by a tiger after apparently defecaing on it. Evidence at the scene, including
lavatory paper, excrement and a loosened trouser belt, sugested 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.
March
Archie Tyler, 43, clearing debris from a drainpipe in a
nearly empty reservoir basin in upstate New York on 2 March, drowned after he was
sucked more than 200ft (60m) down the drain. He was standing in about 2-3ft (60-90cm)
of water as he tried to unclog the drain. When he removed the debris a vortex was
created, causing him to lose his footing and get sucked into the 20in (50cm) wide
drainage pipe. "It's very similar to what happens when you drain a bathtub,"
said Environmental Protection Commissioner Joel Miele. The 60-acre reservoire is linked
to an aqueduct that provides more than 10 percent of New York's water. Associated
Press - 3 March 2001.
As large
crowds surged across the Jamarat bridge near the holy city of Mecca for a symbolic
stoning of three giant pillars representing the Devil on 5 March, 23 women and 12
men of various nationalities were crushed or suffocated to death. By tradition, the
pillars mark the spot where the Devil tried to tempt Abraham to disobey God by refusing
to sacrifice his son. Abraham, his with Hagar and their son Ismail are said to have
thrown stones each at the Devil. It is the duty of each of the haj's 1.8 million
pilgrims to cast 21 pebbles the size of chick-peas at the pillars. The ritual must
be completed by dusk. The bridge was the scene of similar stampedes in 1994 (270 killed)
and in 1998 (at least 118 killed). In 1990, 1,426 haj pilgrims were crushed
in a tunnel stampede. Guardian; Scotsman; Metro - 6 March
Herbert
Lee Grossman, a lorry driver from Texas, survived for three hours after being knocked
down and cut in half by a reversing lorry in West Pensacola, Florida. "When the
paramedics got up to him," said a highway patrol office, "he was breathing
and he raised his arms to them." His torso was taken to hospital by helicopter
and his bottom half by ambulance. He was pronounced dead in hospital. Eddie Patterson,
55, who was reversing the lorry wasn't charged. Pensacola (FL)
News Journal - 23 March 2001.
April
Ruben
Powell, Nine, was crushed to death in July 2000 when a 5ft (1.5m) gravestone fell
on him in a graveyard in Harrogate, North Yorkshire. A verdict of accidental death
was recorded on 18 April this year.
Two weeks later, James Wies, nine, died when his skull was crushed by a tombstone during a school field trip with 60 other children to the central Ohio cemetery, which contained graves dating from the 18th century. He may have climbed atop the 5ft (1.5m) tombstone before it toppled. Guardian - 19 April; Associated Press; Reuters - 3 May
As a
final tribute, Floyd Hightshoe spent 20 April at a cemetery in Bemidji, Minnesota,
digging a grave for his mother, Stella Hightshoe, who had died the week before aged
78. He collapsed and died as he was chatting with family and friends who dropped by
to keep him company as he worked. On 26 April, the 39-year-old self-emplyed logger
was buried next to his mother in a grave dug by family and friends. Associated
Press - 28 April
A man
in his mid-50's was killed on 24 April when sharp objects in his mother's dishwasher's
cutlery rack pierced his chest. The man was in Vernon, near Vancouver, visiting his
mother's home after the death of his father. He was standing near the appliance when
he apparently began to feel unwell and collapsed on top of the open door. Vancouver
Sun - 28 April 2001.
May
Seven
people died in succession while trying to rescue each other in southern China on 2
May, according to Beijing backed Wen Wei Po daily. Ding Yonghua fell into a
well in a village in Baiyun district, Guangzhou. Five of his relatives, including
a husband and wife, followed each other into the well, each one going down after the
others failed to emerge, "not realising it was filled with odourless and colourless
poison." A security guard at a nearby roadworks was summoned, but he too succumbed.
Villagers called the police, who brought in exhaust fans and oxygen tanks, and pulled
out seven bodies. AFP - 4 May
A man
of 51 from St Austell, Cornwall, was found dead after he fell out of bed onto a bottle
that shattered and slashed an artery at a hotel in Paignton, Devon. News
of the World, Sunday Telegraph - 6 May 2001.
Gary
Turpin, 36, slipped on a footpath yards from his front door in Stockport, Greater
Manchester, in November 2000, landing on his back in a puddle 6in (15cm) deep. The
impact sent a rush of water down his throat and the shock of it stopped his heart.
He was found dead with his nose sticking out of the water. He was a victim of an accident known as dry-drowning - responsible for 10-percent of all drowning deaths. Mr Turpin suffered from the brittle bone condition known as osteoporosis in his back. He was also an epileptic, and his fall may have been caused by a seizure. The Sun - 17 May 2001.
June
Jenny
Grahn, 30, principal soprano at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, was found hanged
at her home in Hornsey, north London, on 25 May. The evening before, she had performed
in Tchaikovsky's Queen of Spades, in which a compulsive gambler loses everything
and then shoots himself. The reasons for the apparent suicide of the Swedish singer,
who was born in Velhelmina near the Arctic Circle in 1970. were not known. Evening
Standard - 1 June; Sunday Times - 3 June
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.
An American
whose body was found 19 months after she disappeared near her home in Malaysia was
murdered in a bizarre ritual to ascertain winning lottery numbers, according to police.
A man who confessed to the murder of Carolyn Jamica Noraini Abdullah, 35, led them
to her body buried on an oil palm estate at Sungai Siput in the northern state of
Perek. She had been reported missing in November 1999 after her car was found abandoned.
Cockerels, goats - and occasionally humans - are sacrificed to spirits by groups of
men who leaders go into trance and supposeddly reveal winning combinations to the
four-digit national lottery. Daily Telegraph - 25 June; Brisbane
Courier Mail - 26 June 2001.
July
Two
fishermen bled to death in seperate incidents in June 2001 along the Sepik
river in north-western Papua New Guinea after having their penises bitten
off by pacu fish. The fish are related to piranha and follow urine strams
in the water, swimming to its source and then biting it off with razor
sharp teeth.
Some believe the killer may be a fish introduced from Brazil in 1994 as a protein substitute, but marine biologist Ian Middleton blamed another pacu species, introduced from Indonesia. "The killer fish have the most human-like teeth on the bottom jaw I have ever seen and quite possibly feed on insects," he said. The Brazilian pacu grow to 44lb (20kg) and have no teeth. Melbourne Herald Sun - 6 July 2001.
While
cleaning animal pens at his family home in Romania, Florin Pirliceanu misplaced his
Nokia 3310 cell phone. He hanged himself after leaving a suicide note that read "I
have lost my phone so I have no alternative but to take my own life." This
Week - 6 July 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.
August
A German
man and his son, aged 57 and 25, were killed while diving in the Adriatic Sea when
a Croatian threw dynamite into the sea to harvest fish. Birmingham
Evening Mail - 13 August 2001.
A bolt
of lightning struck a metal guard rail around the municipal football stadium in Chiquimulilla,
Guatamala, creating a charge which knocked everyone on the pitch off their feet.Two
players, Rosbin Yuman and Lester Marrioquin, were killed and 10 others severely burned.
The spectatos in the stands were unaffected. The Sun - 13 August;
Queensland Times - 14 August 2001.
Peter
John Robinson, 28, from Reefton on New Zealand's South Island, slipped
on ice while walking down his back-door ramp to feed his cat, Piper, on
5 July. He hit his head on the concrete ramp, landed face down and drowned
in 2.6in (4cm) of water in the plastic cat bowl which was deep enough
for him to breathe the water into his lungs.
He had balance problems caused by curvature of the spine and the fact that he was born with only one ear. An artificial ear was fitted when he was 5 years old. The New Zealand Herald - 16 August 2001.
September
A 75-year-old
woman got her arm caught in a sofa bed in Cape Coral, Florida, in August 2001. Though
she was just inches from a telephone and a whistle, she was stuck for at least two
days and died, probably from dehydration and stress. She might have been trying to
lift the bed out of the sofa, perhaps to pick up something that had fallen under it.
Dallas (TX) Morning News - 6 September 2001.
October
A driver
decapitated himself by tying a long rope from his neck to a lamp-post and accelerating
away. A passer-by found his head on the pavement in the Lancashire Hill area of Stockport,
Greater Manchester, on 10 October.
Police found the headless torso at the wheel of a Citroen Saxo which had crashed through a fence a short distance away. At the time of the report, the man had not been formally identified. The Sun - 11 October 2001.
Elmer
Casellano, 16, of Netcong, New Jersey, was crushed to death when he was pulled into
a 3ft (90cm) wide pizza dough-mixing machine at Frank's Pizza shop in Newark on 21
October 2001. His hand or clothing might have snagged on the machine's paddles, but
the exact circumstances, including how the machine came to be turned on, were not
known. Reuters - 24 October 2001.
November
Leon
Resnick, 31, was trying out a customized jet-propelled water bike on a lake noth of
Fort Lauderdale, Florida on 15 November, travelling at about 55 mph (88km/h), when
he was killed in an apparent collision with a flying duck. A co-worker who was watching
turned to pick up a radar gun to check Resnick's speed, and when he turned back Resnick
was no longer aboard the craft. He died of a blow to his head, while the unfortunate
bird's carcass was found nearby. There were feathers on the water bike's handlebars.
Associated Press - 20 November 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 saughter 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 hospitalized
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 19-year-old
man, of Inisfail, northern Queensland, died after being electrocuted when a wave crashed
through a cabin window and swamped him while he was using a Sony Playstation. He was
taking a break from his duties as a deskhand on the trawler Arrow Sea. His
game console was on a metal table and plugged into an on-board power supply. Three
other crew members sufered electric shocks and burns as they tried to help him. Daily
Star, Metro - 30 November 2001.
December
Andreas
Plack, 23, bled to death in Merano, Italy, after persuading his cousin, Christian
Kleon, 29, to cut open his leg with a chainsaw so that he could claim £330,000
on an insurance policy. Keon was charged with murder. Reuters
- 1 December 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.