The DEATH Burp, ROMANIA

A circus act in Romania ended in tragedy when fire-eater Vlad Cazacu, 43, belched in mid-performance and was blown to bits. Incredibly no one came to his rescue as stunned onlookers assumed this was part of an amazing illusion. Consequently this unfortunate man, who probably could have been saved, was allowed to just lie there and die.

"In the first part of the performance," said fellow circus performer Nicole Antosu, "Vlad held a flammable cocktail in his mouth to spit fire at a burning torch. Somehow, he must have swallowed some of the liquid, because when he burped he triggered an explosion."

Experts believe fumes exhaled by Vlad ignited and caused an explosion that blasted the 43-year-old man into oblivion. 

"It appears Cazacu accidentally swallowed a flammable liquid used in part of his act," said police sources. "As he put a flaming torch in his mouth to 'eat' the fire, he burped up vapors from his stomach - which were flammable - and exploded."

"It was the most awful thing I've ever see," said one witness. "He was so graceful and everyone was applauding - then he burped and was blown to bits." - Bucharest, Romania

  Via - The Parrot (Accra, Ghana), Weekly World News, 1997

DEATH by Pet (Black Widow) Spider - GERMANY

A reclusive French amateur entomologist and herpetologist is bitten by his black widow spider in a misguided attempt to build an immunity to its venom. Electing to ride out the symptoms of his latrodectism, he suffers a fatal heart attack, knocking over his reptile tanks.

The released animals then feed on his corpse for two weeks before it is found by police.

Mark Voegel, 30, was found dead in his Dortmund, Germany apartment. His body was draped in spider webs and more than 200 spiders, several snakes, thousands of termites, and a gecko were feasting on his corpse.

Proper authorities were alerted when concerned neighbours noticed a horrendous stench emanating from the apartment. His black widow, Bettina, is believed to have administered the deadly bite. Voeger's apartment has been described as both a "zoo" and a "jungle" by authorities. He never let people visit.

A police spokesman said, according to the Sun: “It was like a horror movie. His corpse was over the sofa. Giant webs draped him, spiders were all over him. They were coming out of his nose and his mouth. There was everything there one could imagine in the world of reptiles. Larger pieces of flesh torn off by the lizards were scooped up and taken back to the webs of tarantulas and other bird-eating spiders.”

The spiders and termites managed to escape when the heating elements exploded and opened the lids to their tanks.


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DEATH of an Ancient Wrestler by Wolves - Milo of Croton, GREECE

A man came upon a tree-trunk split with wedges. Testing his strength, he tried to rend it with his bare hands. The wedges fell, trapping his hands in the tree making him unable to defend himself from attacking wolves, which eventually devoured him.

Milo of Croton was a 6th-century BC wrestler from the Magna Graecian city of Croton in southern Italy, who enjoyed a brilliant wrestling career and won many victories in the most important athletic festivals of ancient Greece. In addition to his athletic victories, Milo is credited by the ancient commentator Diodorus Siculus with leading his fellow citizens to military triumph over neighboring Sybaris in 510 BC.

Milo was said to be an associate of Pythagoras. One story tells of the wrestler saving the philosopher's life when a roof was about to collapse upon him and another that Milo may have married the philosopher's daughter Myia. Like other successful athletes of ancient Greece, Milo was the subject of fantastic tales of strength and power, some, perhaps, based upon misinterpretations of his statues. Among other tales, he was said to have carried a bull on his shoulders and to have burst a band about his brow by simply inflating the veins of his temples.

The date of Milo's death is unknown, but he reportedly was attempting to tear a tree apart when his hands became trapped in a crevice in its trunk, and a pack of wolves surprised and devoured him. Milo has been depicted in works of art by Pierre Puget, Étienne-Maurice Falconet and others. In literature, he has been referenced by Rabelais in Gargantua and Pantagruel and by Shakespeare in Troilus and Cressida.

The ancient Greeks typically attributed remarkable deaths to famous persons in keeping with their characters. The date of Milo's death is unknown, but according to Strabo and Pausanias, Milo was walking in a forest when he came upon a tree-trunk split with wedges. In what was probably intended as a display of strength, Milo inserted his hands into the cleft to rend the tree. The wedges fell from the cleft, and the tree closed upon his hands, trapping him. Unable to free himself, the wrestler was devoured by wolves. A modern historian has suggested it is more likely that Milo was traveling alone when attacked by wolves. Unable to escape, he was devoured and his remains found at the foot of a tree.

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DEATH - 3 Hours After Being Cut in Half, USA

A man severed at the waist by an 18-wheeler, lived for more than three hours, as paramedics rushed his torso by air and his lower body by ground to the hospital where he died.

Herbert Lee Grossman, 59, of Quitman, Texas, was crushed about 10 a.m. while walking in a truck stop parking lot. The truck, which was moving at less than 5 mph, was pulling out of a parking space. "We got the call as a signal seven (dead person), and then a few minutes later, I heard (paramedics) saying, "We've got breath,' " said Florida Highway Patrol Trooper Melissa Pestana.

Grossman raised his arms to the paramedics, who airlifted his upper body to West Florida Regional Medical Center by helicopter, while an ambulance carried his lower body. He was pronounced dead at 1:32 p.m. The driver of the truck, Eddie Patterson, 55, of Lake Providence, La., had been talking to Grossman moments before moving his truck. The two had been checking Grossman's truck.

"The driver said he rolled out, looked in his rearview mirror and all he saw was legs," said truck driver Don Leggett, 53. "He just figured there would be a body attached. If you're cut in half, wouldn't you die instantly?"


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Xboxed to DEATH, UK

This is starting to become an all too common thing. Take for instance a 20 year-old  Xbox addict killed by blood clot after a 12-hour gaming session. That's a long time being sedentary! Blood clot victim, Chris Staniforth, 20, died after spending up to 12 hours at a time playing on his Xbox.

The gaming enthusiast suffered a blockage to his lungs when he developed deep vein thrombosis – commonly associated with passengers on long haul flights where they are relatively immobile for hours on end.

Avid gamer: Chris Staniforth was passionate
about computers posting this picture on his
Myspace account three years ago.

Chris, an avid player of popular games such as Halo collapsed after an interview at a JobCentre while telling a friend he’d been experiencing peculiar pains in his chest. He explained how he was woken in the night by a ‘strange feeling’ in his chest and that his heart rate was incredibly low, although this returned to normal and he fell back to sleep.

Chris’ heartbroken father, David told The Sun, ‘As a parent you think playing computer games can’t do them any harm because you know what they are doing. ‘Kids all over the country are playing these games for long periods - they don’t realise it could kill them.’ The serious gamer would play people from all over the world and owned an entire range of consoles including a Playstation.

He had hoped to have a career in computers and was offered a place to study Game Design at Leicester University.

To prevent other parents from suffering the same pain as he is, David has launched a campaign to raise awareness about DVT and computer games.

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