One day, sooner or later, all of us will meet our end. That’s the inevitable truth of life. Ideally, it happens in our sleep, in old age, after a great and fulfilling time on this planet. Sadly, though, not everyone gets that luxury. Some people experience the very opposite.
One Redditor asked users to share the most horrifying deaths they’d ever heard about, and the responses are enough to send chills down your spine. We’ve rounded them up below—just be warned that they are not for the faint of heart.
#1

As a nurse, I'd much rather go through any one of these acutely terrible but relatively quick deaths than the protracted courses so many families will put a person through just because they can't let go.
Imagine spending weeks, months, years sometimes as a body in a bed, can't control your bowels or bladder, developing pressure wounds, your brain and body don't even know each other anymore, sometimes you can't breathe and they'll force you to by cutting a hole in your neck and putting in a trach, sometimes you can't swallow or eat, so they poke a hole into your stomach through your skin, and put a tube in there so they can feed you liquid nutrition and crush your meds to put in there. And because we've gotten good at this, we can torture a body for a very long time until it finally gives out. It's so inhumane and undignified.
Everyone who has decision making power over another person should have to spend some time looking at what people go through. They need to understand that prolonging life isn't the same as forcing someone to submit to a dragged-out death.
Imagine spending weeks, months, years sometimes as a body in a bed, can't control your bowels or bladder, developing pressure wounds, your brain and body don't even know each other anymore, sometimes you can't breathe and they'll force you to by cutting a hole in your neck and putting in a trach, sometimes you can't swallow or eat, so they poke a hole into your stomach through your skin, and put a tube in there so they can feed you liquid nutrition and crush your meds to put in there. And because we've gotten good at this, we can torture a body for a very long time until it finally gives out. It's so inhumane and undignified.
Everyone who has decision making power over another person should have to spend some time looking at what people go through. They need to understand that prolonging life isn't the same as forcing someone to submit to a dragged-out death.
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52points
#2

John Jones, trapped in the Nutty Putty cave. Just thinking about it gives me chills. Imagine being trapped upside down in a very tight cave, and no one could save you. They did try to save him in a 27 hour rescue attempt, but it didn't work.
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31points
#3

I have seen one - where you slowly die over time. My father's Alzheimer's. Watched him turn into a shadow of himself from the brightest and kindest man I knew.
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29points
#4

Lamara Bell, 2015, on the M9 near Stirling, Scotland. Car driven by her boyfriend crashed off the Motorway, he died right away but she was left in the car for 3 days with serious injuries. The crash was reported to police but never logged so no one went to investigate. She was just left hanging there till a passer by went to investigate and found her. She died 4 days later in hospital but could have lived if the police hadn't [messed] up.
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27points
#5

Russians bombing the Mariupol theatre full of children. It was very clearly labeled "children" so anyone flying over would know. Instead, the Russians took it as an invitation to destroy it and murder every single person inside. They then poured concrete all over it and erected a new building over it, encasing the victims in a concrete tomb.
Disgusting, horrifying and infuriating all simultaneously.
Disgusting, horrifying and infuriating all simultaneously.
27points
#6

Back in the 80s, a 16-year-old Japanese girl was kidnapped, threatened, [exploited], and then brutally murdered over the span of 40 days by the Yakuza.
The details that were made public are sickening enough.
Pleasant_Scar9811:
They tortured her so badly parts of her body started decomposing while she was still alive. Horrific is an understatement.
Mininabubu:
Junko Furuta - I was about to comment on that one. That is def the most horrible I have ever heard. Like if you do your research to really what exactly happened it is shocking.
They even found animal semen in her stomach - a good amount, among so many other crazy things that happened. She was [used] approx to 450 times (probably more). She was burned alive. Her reproductive organs were so badly damaged that she couldn't hold her urine and [feces]. They make her eat it. And this is just the light version I'm writing. I dare anyone to research it. It's what nightmares are made of.
The details that were made public are sickening enough.
Pleasant_Scar9811:
They tortured her so badly parts of her body started decomposing while she was still alive. Horrific is an understatement.
Mininabubu:
Junko Furuta - I was about to comment on that one. That is def the most horrible I have ever heard. Like if you do your research to really what exactly happened it is shocking.
They even found animal semen in her stomach - a good amount, among so many other crazy things that happened. She was [used] approx to 450 times (probably more). She was burned alive. Her reproductive organs were so badly damaged that she couldn't hold her urine and [feces]. They make her eat it. And this is just the light version I'm writing. I dare anyone to research it. It's what nightmares are made of.
25points
#7

I'm a semi-retired oil geologist and certified master blaster. For the past 5 or so years, my teams and I have volunteered our time and talents in closing abandoned mines.
Not just closing these death traps, but also doing rescues and recoveries.
I close these deathtraps permanently, with dynamite, C-4, RDX, PETN, and my special homebrew nitroglycerine.
In the last 5 or so years, my teams and I have rescued over 120 people who thought it'd be a good idea to wander into these murder holes and see what great riches they could grab.
Here's a newsflash for anyone entertaining the idiot desire to go into these dangerous, killer holes: **they are abandoned for a reason.** The simple reason? There's nothing in there of any value. It's all been removed by the owners and they walked from a dangerous pit usually out in the middle of absolute nowhere.
My teams and I have also recovered 173 bodies in the same time period.
Abandoned mines are a Disneyland© of death and dismemberment. Bad air (i.e., CO, CO2, H2S, CH4, etc.), bad water, lethal molds, virii from animal dens, attacks from the larger megafauna that have set up housekeeping in these holes in the ground, feet-thick layers of bat guano, *Hantavirus*, rotted wood, false floors, abject darkness, pits, adits, tunnels, raises and winzes that people march blindly into and find themselves falling for a few hundred feet.
Over the last couple of months, I have rescued 3 family members (mother and daughters) who thought mines were great for a family walkabout. I also recovered the two dead from the same family (father and son) that blindly tumbled down into a shaft over 800' deep.
More recently, I recovered a 12-year-old's body from a mine used by the local kids as a 'hangout'. He had Down's Syndrome and had wandered away from his home over to the mine where he used to hang with his buddies.
I recovered his body from under a pile of breakdown which he triggered only to land on a ledge 300' below the main mine tunnel.
The fall must have been terrifying, only to land at 32'/sec^2 on a narrow ledge of rocks that partially blocked the shaft. Unfortunately, the rocks he disturbed on the way down landed on him, crushing him to death. Plus, as a bonus, the rocks that fell to the bottom of the shaft hit old, stagnant water and caused clouds of noxious gasses to evolve rapidly to fill the shaft. My team and I had to go full P-4 containment suits to recover the poor lad.
That mine no longer exists. DuPont Herculene 70% ExtraFast, a few kilos of C-4, and a gallon of nitro closed that worthless pit for perpetuity.
Unfortunately, there are thousands upon thousands of these potential murder-holes left existing in all western US states.
It's a job I'd gladly quit but between people's greed and ignorance, I doubt I'll ever be out of work.
Not just closing these death traps, but also doing rescues and recoveries.
I close these deathtraps permanently, with dynamite, C-4, RDX, PETN, and my special homebrew nitroglycerine.
In the last 5 or so years, my teams and I have rescued over 120 people who thought it'd be a good idea to wander into these murder holes and see what great riches they could grab.
Here's a newsflash for anyone entertaining the idiot desire to go into these dangerous, killer holes: **they are abandoned for a reason.** The simple reason? There's nothing in there of any value. It's all been removed by the owners and they walked from a dangerous pit usually out in the middle of absolute nowhere.
My teams and I have also recovered 173 bodies in the same time period.
Abandoned mines are a Disneyland© of death and dismemberment. Bad air (i.e., CO, CO2, H2S, CH4, etc.), bad water, lethal molds, virii from animal dens, attacks from the larger megafauna that have set up housekeeping in these holes in the ground, feet-thick layers of bat guano, *Hantavirus*, rotted wood, false floors, abject darkness, pits, adits, tunnels, raises and winzes that people march blindly into and find themselves falling for a few hundred feet.
Over the last couple of months, I have rescued 3 family members (mother and daughters) who thought mines were great for a family walkabout. I also recovered the two dead from the same family (father and son) that blindly tumbled down into a shaft over 800' deep.
More recently, I recovered a 12-year-old's body from a mine used by the local kids as a 'hangout'. He had Down's Syndrome and had wandered away from his home over to the mine where he used to hang with his buddies.
I recovered his body from under a pile of breakdown which he triggered only to land on a ledge 300' below the main mine tunnel.
The fall must have been terrifying, only to land at 32'/sec^2 on a narrow ledge of rocks that partially blocked the shaft. Unfortunately, the rocks he disturbed on the way down landed on him, crushing him to death. Plus, as a bonus, the rocks that fell to the bottom of the shaft hit old, stagnant water and caused clouds of noxious gasses to evolve rapidly to fill the shaft. My team and I had to go full P-4 containment suits to recover the poor lad.
That mine no longer exists. DuPont Herculene 70% ExtraFast, a few kilos of C-4, and a gallon of nitro closed that worthless pit for perpetuity.
Unfortunately, there are thousands upon thousands of these potential murder-holes left existing in all western US states.
It's a job I'd gladly quit but between people's greed and ignorance, I doubt I'll ever be out of work.
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24points
#8

I think it's ALS / MND a terminal illness which I sadly have. You slowly lose control over every muscle in your body, you can't do anything for yourself. Eventually you lose the ability to swallow and have to be fed through a tube. Then your lungs get too weak to breathe, and you have to be on a ventilator…all of this while your mind is unaffected, basically being locked in your own body.
Bonus points there is no cure or treatment. We don't know what causes it, and it can happen at any age.
Bonus points there is no cure or treatment. We don't know what causes it, and it can happen at any age.
24points
#9

Duncan MacPherson
February 3, 1966 – August 9, 1989
Duncan MacPherson’s body was found to have suffered significant trauma, including amputation of arms, hands and legs. The damage is consistent with rotating machinery; his snowboard also had a uniform pattern of damage and was cut apart, which indicates that it too had gone through a machine. Leake’s conclusion was that MacPherson had a snowboard accident and injured his leg, and was lying on the slope waiting for rescue. During that very foggy day, a snowcat driver did not see MacPherson and ran him over by accident, killing him. Instead of reporting it, that driver (or his supervisor) buried MacPherson in the shallow crevasse. His body stayed hidden there for fourteen years, until the glacier melted enough for it to be seen.
February 3, 1966 – August 9, 1989
Duncan MacPherson’s body was found to have suffered significant trauma, including amputation of arms, hands and legs. The damage is consistent with rotating machinery; his snowboard also had a uniform pattern of damage and was cut apart, which indicates that it too had gone through a machine. Leake’s conclusion was that MacPherson had a snowboard accident and injured his leg, and was lying on the slope waiting for rescue. During that very foggy day, a snowcat driver did not see MacPherson and ran him over by accident, killing him. Instead of reporting it, that driver (or his supervisor) buried MacPherson in the shallow crevasse. His body stayed hidden there for fourteen years, until the glacier melted enough for it to be seen.
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24points
#10

Kid in Ohio (I think) that got stuck upside down in the back of his car. He slowly asphyxiated and police even did a drive by and didn't detect anything and left.
IndigoButterfl6:
Kyle Plush, and I didn't even have to look that up because it's etched in my brain. The cops came twice, barely looked around the parking lot, did nothing and left, even though he had said he was trapped and suffocating and gave a description of his minivan. They failed him horribly.
IndigoButterfl6:
Kyle Plush, and I didn't even have to look that up because it's etched in my brain. The cops came twice, barely looked around the parking lot, did nothing and left, even though he had said he was trapped and suffocating and gave a description of his minivan. They failed him horribly.
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22points
#11

Hajna de Kaplany in San Jose, CA, 1962. She was a stunning, blonde woman who had been married to Geza de Kaplany for about 5 weeks. He was a physician and was sure that his new wife was having an affair or flirting with someone. He stripped her, tied her to the bed, and mutilated her with knives. He then poured sulfuric and nitric acid over her entire body.
The neighbors called police after hearing her screams of agony. The first responders burned their hands trying to handle her body, the bed was pretty much disintegrated beneath her. Her genitals were obliterated from the acid. She lived for 36 days in a San Francisco hospital while her mother sat bedside praying for her quick death. I was 12 when that happened and I’ll never forget that one.
The neighbors called police after hearing her screams of agony. The first responders burned their hands trying to handle her body, the bed was pretty much disintegrated beneath her. Her genitals were obliterated from the acid. She lived for 36 days in a San Francisco hospital while her mother sat bedside praying for her quick death. I was 12 when that happened and I’ll never forget that one.
21points
#12

The guy that was hit by the lady drunk driving and was lodged in her windshield still alive, but she just pulled her car in the garage and went to bed.
latawalker31:
Yeah, at first I thought she was blackout drunk but it seems like she was conscious enough to realize what she had done.
There was a similar case where a drunk man drove home with his decapitated friend in the passenger seat. They were driving back home from a party and his friend was leaning out the window to vomit where he had struck a lamppost. The friend was unaware because he was drunk and didn’t find out until the next morning when a neighbor seen the body and called the police.
But wow, considering the fact that the lady actually spoke to the man while he was alive and could’ve gotten him help, makes it ten times worse.
latawalker31:
Yeah, at first I thought she was blackout drunk but it seems like she was conscious enough to realize what she had done.
There was a similar case where a drunk man drove home with his decapitated friend in the passenger seat. They were driving back home from a party and his friend was leaning out the window to vomit where he had struck a lamppost. The friend was unaware because he was drunk and didn’t find out until the next morning when a neighbor seen the body and called the police.
But wow, considering the fact that the lady actually spoke to the man while he was alive and could’ve gotten him help, makes it ten times worse.
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20points
#13

Omayra Sanchez.
This 13 year old girl was trapped after a landslide. She got stuck with her legs in the debris, head above water. They tried to rescue her but to no avail. She died after 3 days.
augustbluemoon:
The worst part is she wasn't just trapped by rubble, but her deceased aunt had a stranglehold on the poor girl's legs and feet
This 13 year old girl was trapped after a landslide. She got stuck with her legs in the debris, head above water. They tried to rescue her but to no avail. She died after 3 days.
augustbluemoon:
The worst part is she wasn't just trapped by rubble, but her deceased aunt had a stranglehold on the poor girl's legs and feet
19points
#14

Hisashi Ouchi was kept alive for 83 days after being blasted with radiation during a nuclear plant accident. He was the “most radioactive man alive”.
Basically his body just disintegrated slowly.
Basically his body just disintegrated slowly.
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18points
#15

Sylvia Likens
16 year old girl who was [abused] and tortured in a basement by other kids and the woman who was taking care of her. Eventually Sylvia died and there's photos online. I cried when I saw it the first time. No one should EVER go through something like that.
16 year old girl who was [abused] and tortured in a basement by other kids and the woman who was taking care of her. Eventually Sylvia died and there's photos online. I cried when I saw it the first time. No one should EVER go through something like that.
18points
#16

Tied between the guys at Chernobyl who were actually exposed to the reactor proper and were unfortunate enough to live until their bodies quite literally disintegrated or those who survived in thr North Tower on 9/11 who were forced to choose between being burned alive or jumping half a mile up.
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18points
#17

My Mom died at age 50 from a rare neurodegenerative disease called Creutzfeld Jakob disease. It’s basically Alzheimer’s and a little Parkinson’s rolled into one. Instead of a disease progressing over years and decades it happens in about a year. By the time the person has symptoms and gets diagnosed, they typically decline very rapidly. Prion diseases are horrible, devastating and traumatic.
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17points
#18

Kyle McGarity.
Pushed down a manhole, and was boiled alive over several hours.
He had no broken bones or blunt force trauma, and steam doesn't kill nerve endings, so he felt the whole thing until it killed him.
It took several hours before his body could be recovered due to the heat of the duct, but his death may not have taken hours. I re-read an earlier post and it says he was still alive when first responders showed up; and that the cause of death was scalding, and not shock or cardiac arrest or suffocation. Either way it was not quick.
Pushed down a manhole, and was boiled alive over several hours.
He had no broken bones or blunt force trauma, and steam doesn't kill nerve endings, so he felt the whole thing until it killed him.
It took several hours before his body could be recovered due to the heat of the duct, but his death may not have taken hours. I re-read an earlier post and it says he was still alive when first responders showed up; and that the cause of death was scalding, and not shock or cardiac arrest or suffocation. Either way it was not quick.
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16points
#19

Timothy Treadwell being eaten by a grizzly along with his girlfriend.
AutoDefenestrator273:
Right up there with the Russian woman who was actively being eaten alive by a bear and called her mom as it was happening so she could send help. Apparently bears don't kill you before they start eating.
AutoDefenestrator273:
Right up there with the Russian woman who was actively being eaten alive by a bear and called her mom as it was happening so she could send help. Apparently bears don't kill you before they start eating.
16points
#20

My friend died out at sea, fell off a cruise in the middle of the night into the arctic ocean. Can only imagine how cold and scary that must of been in the pitch black. Still miss him to this day :(.
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15points


