List of unusual deaths in the 21st century

Antiquity

Middle Ages

Renaissance

Early modern period

19th century

20th century

21st century

Animal deaths

Bernd Brandes

9 March 2001

The 43-year-old engineer was voluntarily slaughtered and eaten by Armin Meiwes following an appointment via the Internet. At Brandes' request, Meiwes first severed Brandes' penis, and they unsuccessfully tried to eat it. Meiwes taped the entire amputation, killing, conserving, and eating Brandes' meat. Meiwes was eventually arrested, tried, and sen

Unknown man

27 April 2001

A man in his mid-50s was visiting his mother's house in Vernon, British Columbia, to attend his father's funeral. While cleaning the kitchen, he tripped over the open dishwasher door and was fatally impaled on knives sticking up out of the cutlery tray.

Michael Colombini

29 July 2001

The 6-year-old died during an MRI scan at Westchester Medical Center in Valhalla, New York, after an oxygen tank was magnetically pulled into the machine and fractured his skull.

Brittanie Cecil

18 March 2002

The 13-year-old died from her injuries at an NHL game in Columbus, Ohio, after a deflected puck struck her in the left temple. She remains the only fan fatality in the league's history.

Roger Wallace

18 May 2002

The 60-year-old auto parts salesman was flying his 5-foot (1 m) wingspan remote-control plane in Tucson, Arizona, when he lost sight of it in the bright sun. It struck him in the chest, killing him.

Miroslav Kukliš

10 September 2002

The 31-year-old Czech tourist committed suicide by stabbing his chest with a knife during a cave diving trip in the Poganica bay near Split, Croatia. Due to the nature of his death, police initially believed that he was murdered. Later investigation concluded that after Kukliš became lost in the underwater cave and ran out of oxygen, he stabbed him

Jane McDonald

27 May 2003

While visiting a friend in Airdrie, North Lanarkshire, the 31-year-old slipped and fell onto an open dishwasher, landing on an upright knife. She was taken to a hospital, where she died of her injuries.

Rebecca Longhoffer

16 August 2003

The 39-year-old tourist and mother of four was electrocuted while crossing Las Vegas Boulevard when she stepped on a cast-iron plate hidden by a deep rain puddle that covered electrical wiring.

Hitoshi Nikaidoh

16 August 2003

The 35-year-old surgical resident from Houston, Texas, was killed after his head was trapped in elevator doors at the hospital where he worked. He was partially decapitated as the elevator ascended, and he also sustained injuries to his ribs and spine.

Brian Wells

28 August 2003

The 46-year-old pizza deliveryman from Erie, Pennsylvania, was killed after a collar bomb around his neck exploded as part of a bank robbery scheme.

Unknown woman

2004

A 45-year-old Taiwanese woman bathed in 40 % ethanol in an attempt to protect herself from SARS during the 2002–2004 SARS outbreak. She lay down in the fluid at 11 p . and was found dead at 11 a . by her family the next day. Her BAC was 1 % and she most likely absorbed the alcohol through her skin.

Francis Daniel Brohm

29 August 2004

The 23-year-old was hanging out the passenger window of 21-year-old John Hutcherson's car when an intoxicated Hutcherson drove off the road in Cobb County, Georgia, and sideswiped a telephone pole support wire, decapitating him. Hutcherson continued the final 12 miles (19 km) to his Atlanta home, parked in the driveway, and went to bed. A neighbor

Kenneth Pinyan

2 July 2005

The 45-year-old Boeing engineer from Seattle, nicknamed Mr. Hands, died from acute peritonitis after his colon was perforated while being anally penetrated by a horse.

Chandler Hugh Jackson

6 July 2005

The 12-year-old was playing at the Dogwood Hill golf club in Cunningham, Kentucky, when he fell on his 9-iron club while retrieving an out-of-bounds ball. The club broke, with a piece of the shaft piercing his aorta through his chest.

Steve Irwin

4 September 2006

The 44-year-old Australian wildlife expert and television personality was pierced in the chest by a short-tail stingray's barb while filming in shallow water in the Great Barrier Reef.

Alexander Litvinenko

23 November 2006

The 44-year-old naturalised British citizen, former Russian FSB officer, and defector, was assassinated by poisoning with polonium-210, which caused acute and irreversible radiation sickness. One of just a handful of recorded deaths attributed specifically to polonium exposure, Litvinenko is the only confirmed fatality from malicious polonium poiso

Jennifer Strange

12 January 2007

The 28-year-old mother was participating in a contest sponsored by Sacramento-based radio station KDND, called "Hold Your Wee For A Wii", in which contestants had to drink excessive amounts of water without going to the bathroom. She vomited during the contest and returned home with a headache, later dying of water intoxication.

Humberto Hernandez

21 June 2007

The 24-year-old resident of Oakland, California, was struck in the back of the head by an airborne fire hydrant when a passing car struck it, and the water pressure shot it at him with great force.

Francis Pete Tovey

18 March 2008

The 81-year-old built a device consisting of a jigsaw power tool attached to a semi-automatic handgun containing four bullets. He activated it, which fired multiple shots at his head, killing him. Tovey built the device after downloading suicide plans on the Internet. Tovey, who originated from England and was living in Burleigh Heads, Australi

Judy Kay Zagorski

20 March 2008

The 57-year-old from Pigeon, Michigan, died of blunt force craniocerebral trauma when a 75-pound (34 kg) spotted eagle ray leaped out of the water and knocked her over off the coast of Marathon Key, Florida. The ray also died.

Adelir Antônio de Carli

21 April 2008

The 41-year-old Catholic priest and sky diver undertook a cluster balloon flight to raise funds for charity. During the flight, contact was lost and de Carli disappeared. The lower part of his body was found floating in the sea eleven weeks later on 4 July.

Isaiah Otieno

13 May 2008

The student from Cranbrook, British Columbia, was struck and killed by a helicopter that plunged into a residential street he was walking in. The pilot and two other passengers of the helicopter were also instantly killed.

David Phyall

5 July 2008

The 50-year-old last resident in a block of flats due to be demolished in Bishopstoke, near Southampton, England, decapitated himself with a chainsaw to highlight the injustice of being forced to move out of it.

Unknown woman

7 October 2008

A 43-year-old woman from Limerick died of an allergic reaction after having sex with a German Shepherd. She met the dog's owner, Seán McDonnell, in an Internet chat room for bestiality. McDonnell was prosecuted and added to a sex offender list. The dog was later euthanized.

Jeff Twaddle

27 March 2009

The 54-year-old charter boat deckhand from Huntington Beach, California, choked to death on a bait fish he had placed in his mouth to amuse a group of elementary school students on a fishing trip off Long Beach.

Diane Durre

3 April 2009

The 49-year-old was killed in North Platte, Nebraska, when a Taco Bell sign was knocked over by high winds and landed on a pickup truck, crushing her and injuring her husband Mark.

Mark Fidrych

13 April 2009

The 54-year-old former Major League Baseball pitcher of the Detroit Tigers suffocated to death when his clothes became entangled with the power take-off drive shaft of his dump truck while working underneath it.

David Carradine

3 June 2009

The 72-year-old American actor was found dead in a closet at the Nai Lert Park Hotel in Bangkok with his neck and genitals bound and connected by a cord. His death was ruled a case of autoerotic asphyxiation rather than suicide.

Taylor Mitchell

28 October 2009

The 19-year-old Canadian folk singer was killed by a pair of coyotes while hiking in Cape Breton Highlands National Park, in the only known fatal coyote attack on an adult.

Larry Ely Murillo-Moncada

28 November 2009

The 25-year-old Honduran man became trapped after falling behind a 12-foot tall (3 m) supermarket freezer in Council Bluffs, Iowa after suffering from hallucinations. His body was discovered by contractors removing freezer units almost 10 years later, on 24 January 2019.

Muraka Jenny Vearncombe

3 March 2010

The 42-year-old was struck in the head by a piece of a metal pipe flung by a tractor-pulled lawnmower as she walked to work in Townsville, Australia.

Paulette Gebara Farah

22 March 2010

The disabled four-year-old choked to death in her Huixquilucan apartment after falling in the gap between her mattress and bedrail. It took nine days for her body to be discovered. Despite widespread suspicion surrounding her parents' involvement, police officially ruled it an accident.

Gareth Williams

16 August 2010

The 31-year-old Welsh mathematician and GCHQ analyst was found dead and naked in a bag that had been padlocked from the outside, in the bath of his home in Central London. The inquest found his death was likely criminal, although a Metropolitan Police investigation later found that it was likely an accident.

The 20 passengers and crew of a Filair Let L-410

25 August 2010

20 passengers and crew of a Let L-410 Turbolet were killed in a crash resulting from an escaped crocodile in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. According to the sole survivor of the crash, the animal was smuggled aboard by a passenger but escaped mid-flight. Panicked passengers surged forward, unbalancing the plane and causing a loss of control.

Mike Edwards

3 September 2010

The 62-year-old cellist and founding member of the band Electric Light Orchestra died when a large, round bale of hay rolled down a hill and collided with a van he was driving in Totnes, England.

Jimi Heselden

26 September 2010

The 62-year-old owner of Segway Inc. died after apparently riding a Segway Personal Transport System off a cliff in Thorp Arch, England. The coroner concluded Heselden likely fell from the cliff with the Segway after "getting into difficulty" reversing to allow a man walking his dog to pass him.

Jose Luis Ochoa

30 January 2011

The 35-year-old died after being stabbed in the leg at an illegal cockfight in Tulare County, California, by a bird with a knife-like spur strapped to its leg.

Xavier Tondo

23 May 2011

The 32-year-old Spanish road racing cyclist was crushed to death between a garage door and his car as he prepared to leave his home in the Province of Granada, Spain, for a training ride prior to the 2011 Tour de France.

Unnamed man and woman

6 June 2011

Two unnamed people were killed in an accident on a rural Quebec road when a "flying bear" collided with their SUV. The 200-kilogram (440 lb) black bear had stepped into the path of traffic on Highway 148 and was sent airborne by a car in front of the SUV. The bear passed through the windshield, struck the driver and the passenger seated behind her,

Erica Marshall

10 February 2012

The 28-year-old British veterinarian in Ocala, Florida, died when the horse she was treating in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber kicked the wall, releasing a spark from its horseshoe, causing a fire and explosion. The horse was also killed and another worker was seriously injured.

Anthony Hensley

14 April 2012

The 37-year-old was kayaking across a pond at a residential complex in Des Plaines, Illinois, when he got too close to a swan's nest. The swan attacked him, threw him out of the kayak and prevented him from surfacing; he ultimately drowned.

Elizabeth Watkins

6 May 2012

The 24-year-old field hockey player died in Perth after a deflected ball struck her on the head.

Dieter Strack

27 August 2012

The 74-year-old official was on the field at a youth athletic competition in Düsseldorf to measure a javelin throw when the javelin speared him in the throat. He died in hospital the following day.

Kendrick Johnson

10 January 2013

The 17-year-old was discovered trapped upside down in a rolled-up gym mat in his high school gymnasium in Valdosta, Georgia. Police originally concluded he climbed into it to retrieve a shoe and became trapped, but the case was later reopened as a possible homicide. The homicide case was dismissed, and Kendrick's parents were accused of fabricating

James Campbell

14 January 2013

The 68-year-old man from Cantonment, Florida, had left his 1995 Chevrolet Van to open a gate from his driveway when his dog stepped on the van's gas pedal and ran him over.

Elisa Lam

February 2013

The 21-year-old Canadian tourist was missing for several weeks before being found dead in a large water tank on the roof of the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles, after guests complained about low pressure and foul smell of the water.

Unknown man

11 April 2013

A 60-year-old fisherman bled to death in Brest region, Belarus, after being bitten by a Eurasian beaver which he had tried to grab to have his picture taken with it.

João Maria de Souza

12 July 2013

The 45-year-old was sleeping in bed with his wife when he was crushed in his bed by a cow falling through the roof of his home in Caratinga, Minas Gerais, Brazil. He subsequently succumbed to internal bleeding whilst waiting to be treated at a nearby hospital. The cow had climbed on top of the house from a steep hillside behind it. His wife was unh

Noah Barthe, Connor Barthe

5 August 2013

The brothers, aged 4 and 6, respectively, were killed by an African rock python during a sleepover at their friend's apartment in New Brunswick, Canada. The snake had escaped from its inadequate enclosure, moved through ducts it could easily access, and fallen through the ceiling where the boys slept 3 metres (9 ft) away. Though the snake suffoca

Roman Pirozek Jr.

5 September 2013

The 19-year-old model airplane enthusiast was decapitated by the blade of his radio-controlled helicopter while performing aerobatic maneuvers in Calvert Vaux Park in Brooklyn, New York.

Denver Lee St. Clair

21 December 2013

The 58-year-old was asphyxiated by an "atomic wedgie" during an altercation with his stepson, Brad Davis, in McLoud, Oklahoma. After he had been knocked unconscious, the elastic band from his torn underwear was pulled over his head and stretched around his neck, strangling him. Davis was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

J .

18 January 2014

A 52-year-old man, identified only as J ., attempted to commit bestiality with a sow in Tapurah, Mato Grosso, but was attacked by the animals and wounded in the genitals. He died from cardiac arrest. His arms and face were also mutilated by the animals. Initially, police believed that the man had been murdered and disposed of at the farm, but th

Grant Adams

9 June 2014

The 17-year-old had just woken up when he tripped on a wire and fell into a free-standing tanning bed in his bedroom on the morning of 8 June 2014, breaking one of the bed's glass tubes and piercing his neck in two places. He was airlifted from his house in South Shields to the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, where he died

Heval Yıldırım

3 October 2014

The 13-year-old was killed when a sacrificial goat bought for Eid al-Adha jumped off the roof of his apartment building in Diyarbakır, over a protective fence, and fell onto him. His father had placed it on the roof where he lived because he could not find another suitable place to keep it.

Peter Biaksangzuala

19 October 2014

The 23-year-old Indian football player from Mizoram state died after sustaining spinal cord injuries while awkwardly landing a somersault, celebrating a goal.

Christophe de Margerie

20 October 2014

The 63-year-old CEO of Total S . was killed when his corporate jet collided during take-off with an airport snowplow reportedly driven by a drunk driver in Moscow.

Vera Williams

October 2014

The 75-year-old from Rhyl, Wales, died a couple of weeks after swallowing a sharp piece of toast that tore her esophagus. Her ultimate cause of death was ruled to be from gastrointestinal bleeding.

Gary Anderson

3 November 2014

The 58-year-old from Somerdale, New Jersey, was delivering drywall to a construction site when a worker accidentally dropped a 1-pound (0 kg) tape measure which plummeted 50 stories, or approximately 500 feet (150 m), ricocheted off a piece of metal 10 feet (3 m) from the ground, and smashed into Anderson's head. He was rushed to Jersey City Med

Phillip Hughes

27 November 2014

The 25-year-old Australian Test and ODI cricketer was killed by a bouncer striking his neck during a cricket match, causing a vertebral artery dissection.

Joshua Harrison-Jones

7 January 2015

The 16-year-old from Stretford, Greater Manchester, died when his neck became trapped between his exercise bench and a onesie he was using as a resistance band.

Maxee

28 February 2015

The member of American R&B group Brownstone died after falling backward while holding a wine glass. During the fall, the glass shattered on the ground behind her head, and the shards pierced her neck, causing profuse bleeding.

Stephen Woytack

30 March 2015

The 74-year-old was decorating his family's grave plot at St. Joseph's Cemetery in Throop, Pennsylvania, for Easter with his wife when the tombstone of his mother-in-law toppled over, pinning him underneath and crushing him to death. The stone had reportedly been dislodged when the previously frozen ground was thawed by the early spring temperature

Randy Llanes

29 May 2015

The 47-year-old fisherman from Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, was impaled in the chest by a swordfish he had harpooned when he jumped into the water to retrieve it.

Chelsea Ake-Salvacion

19 October 2015

The 24-year-old beauty salon employee in Henderson, Nevada, was suffocated while using a cryotherapy machine set to the wrong level, which eliminated the oxygen in the chamber.

Tom Wilson

9 December 2015

The 22-year-old British field hockey player died after being struck in the head with a stick during a practice match in Loughton, Essex, and suffering a cerebral haemorrhage.

Ravi Subramanian

16 December 2015

The 54-year-old Air India technician was sucked into the jet engine of a plane grounded at Mumbai Airport when it was started prematurely by the plane's co-pilot.

V. Kamaraj

2016

The 40-year-old Indian bus driver was claimed in local newspapers to have been killed by a meteorite which left a two-foot (60 cm) crater, although officials from NASA oppose that view, saying that the most likely explanation was a land-based explosion. According to a preliminary report by the National College Instrumentation Facility (NCIF) in Tri

Irma Bule

4 April 2016

The 29-year-old Indonesian dangdut singer who performed with live snakes died during a concert after being bitten by a king cobra and refusing treatment.

Joshua Brown

7 May 2016

The 40-year-old crashed at full speed into the back of a semi-trailer truck in Williston, Florida, while his Tesla Model S was on Autopilot. The car's front camera failed to recognize the truck in harsh sunlight. According to the National Transportation Safety Board report, "there was no driver interaction with Autopilot, no change in steering angl

Lottie Michelle Belk

6 June 2016

The 55-year-old was fatally stabbed in the chest by a beach umbrella blown by a strong wind in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Wind speeds at the time reached 20–25 miles per hour (32–40 km/h).

Lane Graves

14 June 2016

The 2-year-old boy from Nebraska was on vacation and playing on the beach at Seven Seas Lagoon around 9 p . at Disney's Grand Floridian Resort & Spa, just outside of Orlando, Florida, when an alligator approached him and dragged him under the water. Graves's body was found nearby the next day, intact and apparently drowned.

Anton Yelchin

19 June 2016

The 27-year-old American actor, known for portraying Pavel Chekov in the Star Trek reboot movie series, was found pinned between his Jeep Grand Cherokee and a brick wall. His driveway was on an incline and his car was found running and in neutral. The manufacturer had recalled the car make in April 2016 for concerns about its gearshift design that

John William Ashe

22 June 2016

The 61-year-old Antiguan diplomat and politician, a former President of the United Nations General Assembly who was awaiting trial on bribery charges, died when a barbell fell on his neck at his home in Dobbs Ferry, New York, causing traumatic asphyxia and laryngeal fractures.

Kristopher Moules and Timothy Gilliam Jr.

18 July 2016

Moules, a 25-year-old correctional officer, and Gilliam, a 27-year-old out-of-county inmate being housed at the Luzerne County Correctional Facility in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, fell to their deaths after an altercation between them caused them to slam into the exterior of the fifth-floor elevator doors. Despite the elevator having a valid lice

Unknown girl

26 July 2016

A 7-year-old girl died after being struck by a stone thrown by an elephant from its enclosure at the zoo in Rabat, Morocco.

Caleb Schwab

7 August 2016

The 10-year-old was decapitated when he was ejected from his raft on Verrückt, a 168-foot-tall (51 m) water slide at Schlitterbahn Kansas City.

Julio Macías González

26 August 2016

The 17-year-old from Mexico City died from a cerebrovascular accident caused by embolus formed on a neck hickey.

Ten people

21 November 2016

A powerful southerly change in Melbourne, Australia, resulted in 10 asthmatic people dying from respiratory failure due to a stark 60-kilometre-per-hour (37 mph) wind that distributed ryegrass pollen into the moist air, rupturing them into very fine specks small enough to enter people's lungs.

Kyle Thomson

26 December 2016

The 22-year-old Iowa State University student was bench-pressing about 315 pounds (143 kg) at a gym in Ankeny, Iowa, when the barbell slipped from his hands, crushing his neck. Thomson had spotters for the lift.

Akbar Salubiro

March 2017

The 25-year-old was killed and swallowed by a reticulated python in West Sulawesi, Indonesia, in the first fully confirmed case of a snake swallowing an adult human.

Charlie Holt

14 April 2017

The 5-year-old was killed at the Sun Dial, a rotating restaurant at the top of Westin Peachtree Plaza Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia, when his head was caught in a small space between the rotating and non-rotating sections.

Robert Dreyer

10 May 2017

The Melbourne, Florida, resident drowned on his 89th birthday in Viera after he crashed his 2016 Mercedes-Benz C300 into a fire hydrant and was then swallowed by the sinkhole created by the broken water line which had fed the hydrant.

Theunis Botha

19 May 2017

The 51-year-old South African hunter died while leading a hunt in Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe. After Botha opened fire on three elephants who were charging his hunting party, a fourth elephant picked up Botha with her trunk. Another hunter fatally shot the elephant, which fell on Botha, crushing him to death.

Debra Bedard

2 June 2017

The 58-year-old died after falling from a golf cart onto shards of wine glasses that had broken in her hands in Calaveras County, California.

Rebecca Burger

18 June 2017

The 33-year-old fitness blogger and model died after a whipped-cream charger exploded and struck her in the chest in her home in Mulhouse, causing her to go into cardiac arrest as a result of commotio cordis.

Karanbir Cheema

9 July 2017

The 13-year-old from London, England, died in the hospital days after having a severe allergic reaction to a piece of cheese thrown at him by a classmate. Cheema was severely allergic to wheat, gluten, all dairy products, eggs, and all nuts.

Jasmine Beever

7 September 2017

The 16-year-old from Skegness, England, died of peritonitis brought about by Rapunzel syndrome. She had a long-time habit of chewing and swallowing her own hair, which formed a hairball in her stomach that led to an infection in her abdomen, damaging her vital organs.

Elizabeth Isherwood

September 2017

The 60-year-old from Wolverhampton, England, walked naked into an airing cupboard at the villa at Pennal she was renting and shut the door. When she tried to leave, part of the door handle broke off in her hand. She dug into the wall in an attempt to escape, but struck and burst a pipe, which sprayed water into the cupboard and caused her eventual

Raildo Matias Santos

22 October 2017

The epileptic 49-year-old in Jaguaquara, Brazil, tried to fetch a 20-litre (4 imp gal; 5 US gal) bucket of water while intoxicated, tripped, and fell in a kneeling position, drowning in the bucket.

Hidr Korkmaz

12 November 2017

The 42-year-old Turkish-Dutch drug dealer and informant died when he threw his fishhook into an electrical cable while fishing somewhere in Eastern Europe. Though he was a witness in the case against Dutch criminal Willem Holleeder, he was not considered a crucial asset by authorities, who treated his death as an accident.

Ateef Rafiq

16 March 2018

The 24-year-old was looking for his dropped mobile phone in a movie theater in Birmingham, England, when his head became wedged under the electronic footrest of a seat, causing him to die from cardiac arrest.

Elaine Herzberg

18 March 2018

The 49-year-old from Tempe, Arizona, died after being hit by a self-driving car operated by Uber as she crossed the road, in what was reported to be the first death of a pedestrian struck by a self-driving car on public roads. In response to the fatal accident, Uber suspended self-driving car tests in all U . cities.

Kyle Plush

10 April 2018

The 16-year-old died from asphyxia after being trapped in his Honda Odyssey in his school's parking lot in Cincinnati, Ohio. Attempting to reach his tennis equipment, he leaned over the third row of seats into the trunk. When the seats "squashed his chest", he became pinned and later died. During the incident, he called 9–1–1 twice by using his sma

Jennifer Riordan

17 April 2018

The 43-year-old bank executive and businesswoman aboard Southwest Airlines Flight 1380 died after debris from an engine failure destroyed a window near her seat and she was partially blown out through it.

Hildegard Whiting

27 July 2018

The 77-year-old from Seattle died of asphyxiation from the carbon dioxide vapors produced by four dry ice coolers in a Dippin' Dots delivery car. The deliveryman's wife had borrowed the car to take Whiting home.

Richard Russell

10 August 2018

The 28-year-old stole a Bombardier Q400 owned by Horizon Air and operating for Alaska Airlines from Seattle–Tacoma International Airport. After an unauthorized takeoff, he flew the plane for just over an hour and performed aerial maneuvers including a barrel roll before intentionally crashing on Ketron Island, Washington, killing himself. No one el

Sam Ballard

2 November 2018

The 28-year-old from Sydney died from angiostrongyliasis after eating a garden slug as a dare eight years earlier.

Unknown man

January 2019

A 54-year-old construction worker from Massachusetts died after eating a bag and a half of black liquorice every day for a few weeks, which caused such low potassium levels in his body that his heart stopped.

Salvatore Disi

10 January 2019

The 62-year-old was using a power cart to jump start a helicopter in Hernando County, Florida, when its unexpected up-and-down motion caused the rotor blades to strike and decapitate him.

Margaret Maurer

5 March 2019

The 21-year-old Tulane University fourth-year student from Forest Lake, Minnesota, died at a highway rest stop in Mississippi when she was struck by a pair of tires that came loose from a passing tractor-trailer.

Julian Nott

26 March 2019

The 74-year-old British-American balloonist was mortally injured after landing safely near Warner Springs, California, at the end of a test flight of an experimental high-altitude balloon. After Nott and his passenger reentered the balloon's gondola, it rolled down a steep ravine.

Patrick McGuire

April 2019

The 67-year-old American tourist died from positional asphyxia at a hotel near Inverness when a 72-kilogram (159 lb) metal garden bench he was sitting on toppled backward, pinning him against a wall which had knocked him unconscious. It was later found that such benches had a risk of sinking into the grass and there were no appropriate checks to pr

Darren Hickey

5 April 2019

The 51-year-old wedding planner from Horwich, England, died after eating a scalding-hot fishcake at a wedding. The cake burned his throat, restricting his ability to breathe. The pathologist who performed the autopsy called the case "extremely rare" and likened it to those of victims who inhaled smoke during house fires. Hickey had received a set o

Marvin Hajos

12 April 2019

The 75-year-old exotic animal collector living at a farm near Alachua, Florida, was attacked and killed by his recently purchased pet cassowary. The large bird repeatedly kicked Hajos, which punctured his skin and severed the brachial artery in his arm. Hajos was declared dead by the time paramedics arrived at the scene, and the cassowary was aucti

Paul McDonald

17 April 2019

The 47-year-old was attacked and killed by a pet deer, said to be an elk, on his property in north-east Victoria, Australia.

Joemar Jungco

22 June 2019

The 18-year-old worker at a meat processing facility in Iloilo City, Philippines, died after half his body from the head down to the waist was pulled into a meat mixer.

Yulia Sharko

8 September 2019

The 21-year-old from Žabinka, Belarus, was celebrating her birthday with friends when she tried to pull her two-year-old daughter out through the window of her car. Her daughter activated the window control button, closing the window and strangling Sharko.

Yuri Alferov, Natalya Monakova, and Valentin Didenko

28 February 2020

Pharmacist blogger Yekaterina Didenko was celebrating her 29th birthday at the sauna complex in Moscow. Her husband Valentin brought 25 kg (55 lb) of dry ice, which was dumped into an indoor swimming pool, releasing a layer of carbon dioxide fog. Several party-goers jumped into the water and started to lose consciousness. Two of them drowned; Valen

Christian Bolok

26 October 2020

The 38-year-old lieutenant, who was the police chief of San Jose, Northern Samar, Philippines, died during a raid to shut down a cockfight, which the government had banned due to the COVID-19 pandemic. He was trying to grab a cockfighting rooster when the metal blade attached to the rooster's leg to kill its opponent cut a gaping hole in his leg an

Luke Ramone Harper

2 April 2021

The 8-year-old from Ringsend, Dublin, died after inhaling helium from a balloon that he placed over his head. The balloon had been bought for his birthday a week prior.

Amy Carlson

April 2021

The corpse of the 45-year-old leader of Love Has Won was discovered by police on 28 April 2021, with estimates placing her death c. 16 April 2021. Her remains were mummified and wrapped in a sleeping bag, decorated with Christmas lights; her eyes were missing, and her eye sockets had been decorated with glitter. An autopsy determined that she died

Unknown man

May 2021

A 39-year-old man's body was found wedged inside the hind leg of a papier-mâché statue of a Stegosaurus in Santa Coloma de Gramenet, Catalonia, Spain. Initial police reports did not suspect foul play. A police representative hypothesised that the individual may have crawled inside headfirst to retrieve a lost mobile phone before his leg became stuc

Unknown man

30 October 2021

A 30-year-old man was fishing with two friends at a lake in Brasilândia de Minas, Brazil, when the group was attacked by bees. He and his friends jumped into the lake to escape the bees, but the man drowned and was partially eaten by piranhas; his friends survived.

Victims of the 2021 Hillcrest Primary School accident

16 December 2021

An unusually strong gust of wind in Devonport, Tasmania, lifted an inflatable jumping castle approximately 10 metres (33 ft) in the air whilst seven children were inside. Five of them fell to their deaths, while the sixth victim died from a falling leaf blower that was used to inflate the castle.

Teddy Balkind

6 January 2022

The 16-year-old student at St. Luke's School in Connecticut fell during a junior varsity ice hockey game when another player, who was unable to stop in time, accidentally cut Balkind's neck with his skate's blade. Balkind died following an emergency operation.

Dolores Olive Boschert

24 May 2022

The 23-year-old paramedic was exercising alone on a Smith machine at a Planet Fitness gymnasium in St. Charles, Missouri, when she was pinned by a barbell due to unknown circumstances. Another patron found her 30 minutes later, and she was pronounced dead at the scene.

Maya Murmu

June 2022

The 68-year-old from Odisha, India, was trampled to death by an elephant. Later, at her funeral, what may have been the same elephant came back and attacked her corpse by picking up her body and throwing her in the air.

Klil Kimhi

21 July 2022

The 32-year-old fell to his death when a sinkhole opened under a swimming pool he was in at a house party in Karmi Yosef, Israel.

Anne Heche

11 August 2022

On 5 August 2022, while driving in Mar Vista, Los Angeles, the 53-year-old American actress crashed her Mini Cooper three times in close succession. The car crashed into a wall in an apartment complex parking area and a Jaguar before embedding itself in a two-story house, which caught fire, trapping Heche in her burning car for 45 minutes. After be

Coi Ngaa-sin

20 January 2023

The 61-year-old butcher was killed by a pig at the Sheung Shui Slaughterhouse, Hong Kong. The pig had already been stunned by electric shock, but suddenly woke up, knocking him to the ground. He suffered a cut to the artery near his left knee from a 15-inch cleaver and later died at the North District Hospital.

Joseph Smith

21 January 2023

The 30-year-old man was shot and killed by his dog after the animal stepped on a loaded rifle in the back seat of his pickup truck, causing the gun to fire through the front passenger seat and hit him in the back near Geuda Springs, Kansas. The driver of the truck, who was sitting next to Smith at the time of the accident, was unharmed.

Shivdayal Sharma

18 April 2023

The 82-year-old former electrician of India's National Railway Company was urinating on the Vande Bharat line railroad tracks in Alwar when a Vande Bharat train struck a cow, launching the animal nearly 100 ft (30 m) into the air before it landed on Sharma, killing him instantly. The cow was also killed.

Barry Griffiths

June 2023

The 57-year-old man, who had suffered a stroke that reduced the mobility of one arm, accidentally stabbed himself in the stomach while attempting to separate frozen burgers with a knife in his home in Llandrindod Wells. Atherosclerosis was also a contributing factor in Griffiths' death. Police did not discover Griffiths' body in his apartment until

Mikala Jones

9 July 2023

The 44-year-old was killed in a surfing accident in North Sipora, Indonesia, after the fin of his surfboard severed his femoral artery.

Justyn Vicky

17 July 2023

On 15 July 2023, the 33-year-old bodybuilder and influencer was squatting over 180 kilograms (400 lb) at a Denpasar gym, assisted by a spotter, when the weight snapped his head forward, breaking his neck. Vicky died in the hospital 2 days later.

Giacomo Chiapparini

6 August 2023

The 74-year-old cheesemaker was inspecting his warehouse in Romano di Lombardia when one of the shelves collapsed, crushing him under thousands of Grana Padano cheese wheels, each wheel weighing approximately 40 kilograms (88 lb).

Adam Johnson

28 October 2023

The 29-year-old member of the Nottingham Panthers professional ice hockey team died after his neck was cut by a skate during a game between the Panthers and the Sheffield Steelers.

Sanjay Shah and Raju Datla

20 January 2024

The 55-year-old CEO of Vistex was celebrating his company's 25th anniversary at Ramoji Film City studio in India. As part of the celebration, Shah and company president Raju Datla were being lowered from the ceiling to a stage in a cage or basket, when a cable broke and both men fell 20 feet (6 m), killing Shah and leaving Datla in critical condi

Lucy Morgan

5 June 2024

The 6-year-old girl was with her family on vacation in Limerick, Maine, on 1 June, when, while playing badminton with her family, her brother's aluminium racket shaft broke and pierced her in the skull. She was taken to hospital, where she died from her injuries four days later.

Giulia Manfrini

18 October 2024

The 36-year-old Italian surfer died while surfing near the coast of West Sumatra, Indonesia, after a swordfish pierced her chest.

Johnnie Turner

22 October 2024

The 76-year-old member of the Kentucky Senate died of injuries sustained in an accident on 15 September 2024, when he drove a riding mower into an empty swimming pool.

Lester Clayton Harvey Jr.

9 December 2024

A group of hunters chased a bear into a tree, and as the group retreated from the bottom of the tree, one hunter shot the bear. As the animal fell, it struck the 58-year-old from Phenix, Virginia, who stood about 10 feet (3 m) from the tree, killing him. The bear also died.

Ethan Alexander Ackerman

25 January 2025

The 20-year-old Clemson University student was cleaning up debris around fallen trees in South Carolina when one of the trees sprang upright, trapping him under its base. Ackerman died of "blunt force chest trauma resulting in traumatic asphyxiation".

Davi Nunes Moreira

14 February 2025

The 14-year-old boy from Planalto, Bahia, injected the remains of a dead butterfly mixed with water into his leg, which led to septic shock that was possibly caused by toxins in the butterfly.

Keith McAllister

17 July 2025

The 61-year-old man died after he was sucked into an MRI magnet at a medical center in Westbury, New York, while wearing 20 pounds (9 kg) of chains for strength training. He died in the hospital the following day.

Daniel Owen and Cooper Owen

15 October 2025

The 47-year-old private school teacher and his 15-year-old son, both Americans living in Vietnam at the time, were stung over 100 times by an unexpected swarm of giant hornets while zip lining on an adventure holiday in Laos. They were transported to a hospital where they died hours later.

Two unknown men

7 December 2025

A pilot and a navigator, both Russians, died of injuries sustained upon collision with a hangar ceiling after the aircraft ejection system unexpectedly activated on a parked Sukhoi Su-34. Both men were thrown upward at a sufficient vertical speed to cause 'injuries incompatible with life'.

Brooke Day

30 January 2026

The 22-year-old Australian was boarding a ski lift at Tsugaike Ski Resort, Otari, when her backpack's waist belt buckle became caught in the lift carriage. She was dragged along the snow and suspended in mid-air, where she suffered a fatal cardiac arrest.

Jeff Webb

19 March 2026

The 76-year-old American businessman, executive, publisher, and conservative activist died from a severe head injury sustained in a fall while playing pickleball and was pulled from a life-support system two weeks following the incident.