All language subtitles for The UnBelievable with Dan Aykroyd S02E05 1080p WEB h264-EDITH_track3_[eng]

[pensive music]

What if I told you a safety demo

once killed a man?

- He wants to showcase the
resilience of the windows

of the building.

- And he decides to show
them his party trick.

- Or tomorrow, you could
be brutally attacked

by an out-of-control lawnmower?

- The lawnmower takes off
and climbs up in the sky.

- People are huddled around
him, blood is everywhere.

- How about dueling with
a cactus and losing?

- They drive deep into the park.

Fires at point blank range.

- These are the
deaths so surprising,

they are truly unbelievable.

[dramatic music]

The statue of Winston
Churchill stands tall

over London's Parliament Square.

Abraham Lincoln sits and keeps
watch over Washington DC.

Monuments erected to people

of enduring
importance are common,

but in a small town in Austria,

there's one built for a
much more unusual hero.

- It's the 16th century

and Hans Steininger is the
immensely popular mayor

of Braunau am Inn.

Everyone loves him.

He's elected for six
consecutive terms,

but that's not what
he's famous for.

- Hans is a sight to see.

He has a beard that's
four and a half feet long,

and when it gets to
the end, it forks.

It's so long, it reaches
all the way to his feet.

- [Dan] Mayor Hans even
has his suits custom made

to keep his beard
neatly rolled up

and tucked into
his breast pocket.

Braunau am Inn flourishes under
his leadership for decades,

until one day, when things
get a little hairy.

- September 28th, 1576,
all mayhem breaks out.

The town of Braunau
am Inn catches fire.

It's 1576, there's no such
thing as a fire engine yet.

There's no such thing
as a fire department.

Now the mayor has an emergency
that he has to handle.

- Atop a really long staircase,
Hans surveys the scene

and he just sees his
entire town in flames.

So to go save the town
and direct rescue efforts,

he takes off running,
straight down the stairs.

However, in his
haste, he forgets

to tuck his beard into
his little beard pocket.

- Almost immediately, his four

and a half foot beard
tangles up in his feet

and he's just tumbling
down these concrete stairs.

- [Austin] Tip over
top, over tip over top,

into the town square.

- [Dan] By the time
he reaches the bottom,

his neck is broken.

- This is probably the
first time in the history

of the world a mayor has
been killed by his own beard.

- [Dan] But the people
of Braunau am Inn

find an unbelievable way to
honor the mayor's legacy.

- Hans may have been lost
that day, but not his beard.

His beard is snipped
off before he's buried

and is kept by his family

and passed down from
generation to generation

until finally in the
20th century, 1919,

the beard is
bequeathed to the city.

- And to this day,

it is in a four and a half
foot long glass box embalmed

for everyone to remember
mayor Hans Steininger.

- And there's even, on the
site, a Hans impersonator

with his own four and
a half foot beard.

- If getting caught
up in your own beard

isn't a strange
enough way to die,

here's another tale of
a fatal entanglement.

- In the early
1900s, Isadora Duncan

is one of the most famous,
world-renowned dancers.

She is known for establishing
all kinds of innovative forms

and movements and essentially
creates modern dance.

So she is this iconic,
glamorous, beautiful woman.

- It's 1927, Isadora
is around 50-years-old

and she's retired in the
south of France in Nice,

going around and partying
with her rich friends

in the French Riviera.

- She is noted for her
very bohemian style.

She wears flowing dresses
and these flowing scarves,

and she's almost famous for
that willowy, flowing movement

that is so common
in her modern dance.

- So one of Isadora's friends
is the socialite Mary Desti,

who gives Isadora
a gift of a scarf,

an absurdly long, crimson scarf.

This thing's gotta be
at least 15-feet long

and it flows down
like a long train,

and follows her as she walks
along, it's very dramatic.

- [Dan] Isadora's unique
style catches the eye

of a race car mechanic
named Benoit Falchetto.

- And Benoit has quite the car.

This is an Amilcar CGSS.

It's a convertible,

and as typical of race
cars at that time,

it has a very long hood that
contains a powerful engine.

It's so long that the driver

and the passenger are
sitting practically

on the rear wheels.

- [Dan] In September 1927,

Benoit and Isadora decide
to take his roadster

for a spin down the coast.

- Her friend Mary tells
her she should be wearing

an overcoat on this trip

because she's driving down
the coast in a convertible.

It's gonna be windy and cold,

but all Isadora wants to
wear is this long scarf.

- Isadora gets into the
passenger seat of this open car

and she's just
feeling the breeze,

and this gorgeous crimson scarf

is fluttering out behind her.

- [Chris] And then the wind
hits in just the right,

or in this case,
just the wrong way.

- The scarf, it gets threaded
in between the spokes

of the wheel and before anyone
realizes that's happening,

it's tightened around her neck.

- Within about a second,
it's wound so tightly

that it pulls her from the seat,

and smashes her to
the road behind.

- The New York Times
says in its obituary

that Ms. Duncan was hurled
from an open automobile

in an extraordinary manner
and instantly killed.

- Death by scarf
is certainly weird.

But there are other
strange ways to die,

like during a halftime
show at a football game.

- It's 1979 and
we're at Shea Stadium

over in Flushing, Queens, where
the Jets are the home team

and they're playing the Patriots
who are dismal, terrible.

- A company called
the Electronic Eagles

is this model air
show organization

and they've been hired
to do the entertainment.

They start the show
and they send up all

these gas-powered model
airplanes and helicopters.

This is super old school.

- Basically what it
is, it's hobbyists

flying their airplanes
around in circles and maybe

doing some dips and dives
and stuff like that.

- [Dan] What every good model
air show halftime extravaganza

needs is a strong ending.

But this finale is something
no one sees coming.

- A man walks out
pushing a full lawnmower.

How is a lawnmower in the middle

of Shea Stadium going
to be the grand finale?

[lawnmower starts]

- They are gonna fly this thing.

- Yes, they removed the
blades underneath it,

but it had this huge
propeller on the front of it,

which arguably makes
it more dangerous.

- The lawnmower takes off
and it climbs up into the sky

and it's actively flying
around Shea Stadium.

- In the stands right now
is 20-year-old John Bowen

and his younger brother.

It's their first time
in New York City.

They came all the way
from Nashua, New Hampshire

to see their beloved
Patriots play.

- You gotta imagine, small town
guy coming into the big city.

The last thing he expects to
see is this ridiculous affair.

This mower flying
through the air.

- So Philip Cushman,

he's controlling it
with a remote control

and he decides, let's
amp it up a notch.

We're gonna do some tricks.

- Philip starts
getting a little cocky

with his aerial acrobatics.

After increasingly
daring swoops the crowd

where he gets closer
and pulls away

and closer and pulls away,
Cushman loses control

of his flying lawnmower.

- And it goes directly
into the crowd,

right into John Bowen.

- Blood is everywhere,
John does not get up.

People are huddled around
him trying to assist and aid

and one man can be heard saying,

"It looks like he's been
attacked by an axe."

- [Dan] John is
carried to the field

where an ambulance rushes
him to the hospital.

- Four days later, after
multiple surgeries,

John Bowen passes away
from the injuries inflicted

by the flying lawnmower.

Needless to say, the
NFL has never fielded

a flying lawnmower
halftime show ever again.

- Perhaps we know now why
most NFL halftime shows today

are musical acts.

- As everyone knows, death
eventually comes for us all.

But for one poor farmer in
Indonesia, death comes in a way

we can only call unbelievable.

- Near a remote village in
Indonesia, acre upon acre

of lush forest has been
cut back to make room

for palm oil farms.

This is big business
in the region.

- Akbar Salubiro is a worker

in one of these deforested
areas, where they harvest palm.

- [Dan] While harvesting
palm fruits sounds simple,

the job comes with its fair
share of occupational hazards.

- Just steps from
where Akbar is working

is a dangerous
world of the jungle,

Komodo dragons, saltwater
crocodiles, deadly cobras,

and the longest, largest
snake in the world,

the reticulated python.

- Unfortunately, the
normal prey for pythons,

medium-sized mammals
like deer and bush pigs,

tend to become scarce
in these cleared areas.

The presence of large predators
without their normal prey

is a bad combination
for anything else

in the neighborhood
that might be edible.

- [Dan] When Akbar doesn't
come home from work

one evening in March 2017,

his wife, Luna, is
understandably concerned.

- Luna goes to the police

and they tell her
there were reports

of someone screaming in the
fields the night before,

which of course is the last
thing she wants to hear.

- The search party
and police find

an abandoned tool of Akbar's.

They find a disruption
in palm leaves

and palm fronds
all over the place

and the unmistakable
prints of what appears

to be a very large python.

- And they follow
these snake prints

and eventually reach
this large bush

under which they see a python.

It's a big python,
I mean, enormous.

- [Dan] 23-feet
long, to be exact,

but its massive size is
not the only remarkable

thing about its appearance.

- It's all bloated and deformed.

- They also see an outline

of rubber boots in
the python stomach.

- [Dan] Just what did
the python swallow?

- They cut the snake open

and inside, their worst
nightmare is true.

- It's unmistakably Akbar
covered in digestive juices.

His hair is intact, his
clothes are intact.

It's 100% him.

- Python's kill by constriction,

wrapping their bodies
around their prey

and then squeezing hard
enough to even cause

internal hemorrhaging
and cause spinal injury.

They strike with
incredible speed,

usually from behind
and often at the head.

They are not venomous,

but they have recurved fangs
like rows of fish hooks

that when they bite

and pull back, are almost
impossible to remove.

- Pythons aren't
successful predators

because they're
slow and lethargic.

They're only slow and
lethargic after they've eaten.

Before that, they
are deceptively fast

and adept at killing, finding,

and consuming things
as large as boars

or water buffaloes.

- The bite of a
python is dangerous,

but what happens
next is even worse.

- The python slowly
extends his jaws

and then squeezes his
head inside the mouth,

then his shoulders
and then works his way

down the body and finally
consumes him whole.

- Python attacks on
people are extremely rare,

but it's notable that
the last five fatalities

have all occurred in
Indonesia where demand

for palm oil is
driving deforestation

and leaving behind a
lot of hungry snakes.

[dramatic music]

- The odds of being bitten
by a python are just 0.0045%,

and even less for
being swallowed by one.

But that's nothing compared
to the unlikelihood

of another strange
animal attack.

- There is a domestic flight

that is happening in the
Democratic Republic of Congo.

The flight is starting
off in Kinshasa,

then heading to Kiri, Bokoro,
Semendua and Bandundu.

It's not one of these
commercial jet liners.

- The Let 410,

it's a twin engine,
passenger carrying aircraft.

You've got 18 passengers

and you've got three
crew members that consist

of two pilots and
a flight attendant.

- [Dan] Unbeknownst to the
crew or other passengers,

someone carries a duffle
bag onto the flight,

a bag that will soon
upend what should be

a perfectly normal trip.

- A flight attendant
notices something a bit odd.

The duffle bag in
the rear of the plane,

that's been under the
seat the whole time,

starts to move.

- She goes to investigate.

She opens it a little
bit and lo and behold,

there's a three-foot
long crocodile inside.

- This crocodile locks eyes

on this flight attendant
who naturally freaks out

and runs to the
front of the plane.

All the other passengers
now are trying

to figure out, why is
this person screaming?

And they now see this crocodile,

just sauntering
through the aisle,

so they all run to the
front of the plane.

[dramatic music]

- As that happens, it
forces all the weight

in the center of gravity to
the front of the aircraft.

So now the aircraft begins

to start tipping over straight
nose down towards the ground

and they are unable to
recover from that situation.

[explosion booms]

The airplane tragically crashes

into a house about a
mile short of the runway.

21 souls perished
in this accident,

22 if you count the crocodile,

and one person survives
to tell the tale.

In all of my time looking
at aircraft accidents,

I have never seen anything
remotely close to this.

- Next time you fly,

you might wanna think twice
about opening the overhead bin,

but if you think a croc
on a plane is strange,

you won't believe
what's up next.

- It's time to hit the hay.

You brush your
teeth, get into bed,

kiss your wife goodnight,
and close your eyes.

But you can't fall asleep.

So maybe you try counting sheep

until you're interrupted
by something surprising.

- It's the middle of the
night in Caratinga, Brazil.

45-year-old Joao Maria de Souza

is lying in bed
with his wife, Len.

- Caratinga is a hilly
region, typically known

for dairy production
and cattle raising.

And Joao's house
butts on the side

of a cattle raising
dairy pasture hill.

[cow moos]

- And one of the cows
on that farm escapes

and he just grazing
across the area,

walking through the hills
near the Souza home.

- [Dan] Somehow, the
lost and hungry cow

steps off the hill onto the
couple's corrugated roof.

- It's a very heavy cow
and it's a very thin roof.

Eventually, as the cow
puts its full weight

on the thin corrugated
roof, it gives way.

- And this 3,000 pound cow
falls eight feet right

onto the bed that Joao and
his wife are sleeping in.

[dramatic music]

As crazy as it seems,
even though Joao

and his wife are sleeping
side by side in the same bed,

she is unscathed untouched,
but she is awakened.

- Joao's wife wakes up next
to her husband under a cow,

immediately calls
for medical care.

[intense music]
[police sirens]

Unfortunately for Joao,
his legs are fractured

and he has massive
internal bleeding

and he will
eventually pass away.

[heart monitor flatlines]

There's a local news
report of the cow disaster

and you just have to
see it to understand

how large this hole is

and how massive this cow must
be to have caused this damage.

- This isn't actually the
first time this has happened.

There have been three
other cases of cows falling

through roofs, but
this is the only time

a cow fell on a person.

This is a terrible way to go,

not just unexpected,
it's terrible.

- It's a tragic
and bizarre death.

Joao's brother
says, "Being crushed

by a cow is the last way you
expect to leave this Earth."

And his mother said,

"I did not raise my son
to be killed by a cow."

- [Dan] As for the cow?

- The cow actually
escapes unharmed.

There's nothing
wrong with the cow.

- If death by a falling cow
sounds too strange to be true,

you won't believe what
lands on one man in Arizona.

- When you drive in Arizona
and go out into the desert,

one of the things you
notice are those very unique

and very iconic
Saguaro cactuses.

The biggest species
of cactus on Earth.

They grow almost to
50 feet, some of these.

I mean, they're huge.

- Saguaro cacti are
American treasures,

so they are also
protected wildlife.

If you damage or harm one

or kill one, you're looking
at 25 years in prison.

- Despite it being
illegal, there happens

to be a pastime in the
area called cactus plugging

in which you take a shotgun

and you shoot at
a Saguaro cactus.

- [Dan] On February 4th, 1982,
27-year-old David Grundman

and his roommate James Suchochi

drive to Lake Pleasant, Arizona

for a little cactus plugging.

- They drive deep into the
park, probably far enough in

that nobody's gonna
hear the shots

and they won't get bothered
by park authorities.

David and his roommate
come out with two rifles

and a 16-gauge shotgun
they want to test.

- Grundman decides to take aim

at his first target
of the night,

a 10-foot tall Saguaro.

[gunfire]

After several rounds of firing

and cactus plugging,
it topples over.

He turns to his roommate

and he says, "Let's
take on a bigger one."

- Next, David chooses
a particular cactus

that is 27-feet high

and probably aged
about 125-years-old.

- [Austin] From four feet
away of a 27-foot tall cactus,

he takes aim with his 16 gauge.

- And he fires at
point blank range.

[gunshot]

- And the 23-foot portion of
the top starts falling over.

[cactus collapsing]

[eerie music]

David Grudman is crushed by
multiple tons of Saguaro cactus.

- A cactus of this size

and weight produces
a very unique injury.

While you obviously
have blunt force trauma

from just the sheer
weight of this cactus,

you also have sharp
force injuries

from these long,
three-inch, spiky needles.

So while you are being crushed
by the weight of this,

you're effectively
also being stabbed

by hundreds of needles.

It has to be
excruciatingly painful.

- The medical examiner in
Maricopa County was quoted

as saying, "I've been
at this job for 25 years

and have never heard of someone
being killed by a cactus."

- We are all familiar
with the old saying,

"Pride goeth before a fall."

But in the case of one very
confident safety expert,

this expression becomes
quite literally true.

- Garry Hoy is a highly
regarded Toronto lawyer

who specializes in building
safety and compliance.

On top of that, he also has
a degree in engineering.

This is a guy that
absolutely loves his job.

- His offices are in the
Toronto Dominion skyscraper

and he is oddly house proud
when it comes to their offices

because they have these windows

that are the absolute
apex of security,

made to withstand anything
that can come at them.

- July 9th, 1993, and
Garry Hoy is there

at the Dominion Tower
skyscraper in Toronto

for an office party.

It's a welcome party
for young, college,

soon-to-be-grads applying
for apprenticeships

at his law firm.

- Because he is so passionate
about building safety

and about engineering
structures,

he wants to showcase
the resilience

of the windows of the building.

- His offices are
on the 24th floor

and he decides to show
them his party trick.

[tense music]

- So he tells everybody to step
back and they give him room.

He backs up and starts running.

- [Sami] He launches
himself at this window.

- And he bounces right off of
it and he says to everyone,

to a round of applause,
cheers and laughs,

"Look how strong that glass is."

- Feeling the high of
the crowd's reception

to his party trick, he goes,
"I'm gonna do it again."

- [Dan] Garry backs up and
he sprints at full speed

towards the shatterproof window,

24 stories above Toronto.

- The window doesn't shatter.

However, the glass
and its entire frame

separate from the side
of the skyscraper.

And now Garry, to his surprise,

is riding a full, intact
pane of skyscraper glass

down to the ground of Toronto.

- Unfortunately, he's
killed, but he's right.

His windows are actually as
resilient as he always claimed.

He just isn't taking
into account the frame,

which is the failure point.

And that was the
ultimate demise.

- Garry's tragic death
truly defines the phrase,

a bad day at work.

Well, that's
something the victim

in our next story
will also experience.

- It's 1980 and
Mayor Monica Myers

is in charge of
Betterton, Maryland.

- It's a small beach community

across the bay from Baltimore.

Mayor Monica sees herself
as a true municipal worker.

- She takes this job
extremely seriously.

She feels like if she is
gonna be in this leadership

position, she needs to know how
everything in the town runs,

especially in those
infrastructure type jobs.

- And one of these things

is inspecting their
sewage treatment facility.

- One morning, at
6:00 AM like normal,

she goes to test
the sewage plant.

- This sounds benign,
but it's not.

These are giant
15-foot tall vats

of human excrement and waste.

- She climbs up
the narrow stairs,

gets to the catwalk that
is above these tanks,

and she slowly leans
over the railing

to try to get just a small
sample from the top of the vat.

- But in reaching for it,
she loses her balance,

and she falls into
disgusting sludge.

- As the sewage is
aerated to treat it,

it actually makes it frothy.

So it's not something that
you can tread your way out

of or kick your way out of.

- But also the
mechanisms are causing

a current at the base of these.

So it's a losing battle.

There's almost no way a
human could actually fight

their way out of
this foamy sludge.

- About an hour later, around
7:30 AM, a plant supervisor,

Carl Gustafson comes to
begin his day on the job.

And he notices on the catwalk

above the vats,
Mayor Monica's kit,

but there's no Mayor Monica.

- He quickly starts
looking around

and then finally he sees one

of the vats has something in it.

And unfortunately when
he gets a closer look,

that's something is
Monica's dead body.

- [Dan] The police are
called to retrieve the body

and they rule the
death an accident.

As part of their official duty,

they issue what must
be the strangest cause

of death this town or
any other has ever seen.

- They basically have to make
a statement that she has died

by drowning in human waste,
which has gotta be one

of the absolute most nightmarish
scenarios I can imagine.

- And in thinking about the
story, one starts to consider

what would be the
absolute worst way to go?

No, there's nothing
worse than that.

- Being buried alive has
long been considered

one of the worst ways to die.

Even scarier, that it could
happen nowhere near a cemetery.

- November 24th, 2009, three
days before Thanksgiving.

You have a man by the
name of John Jones,

his brother Josh, and a couple
of friends who are going

to be entering a cave known
as the Nutty Putty Cave.

- The Nutty Putty Cave
is not what you think of

when you normally
think of a cave.

This is not one that you can
just walk in and walk through.

You actually have to like
worm your way through

these narrow crevices.

- [Dan] From the
surface entrance,

the journey takes you a
whopping 145 feet below ground.

- Additionally, to be able
to pull yourself through one

of these very narrow crevices,

you have to be able to know
how to control your breath

because you have to
completely exhale all

of the breath outta your body
so that you can be as small

as possible to be able to put
yourself through that crevice.

You can't be claustrophobic

and enter a type
of cave like this

because it's not going
to go well for you.

- [Dan] Despite the danger,
John and his group of friends

enter the cave at 8:00
PM on November 24th.

- As they're making their
way through the cave,

at a certain point, John
reaches an area known

as the birth canal.

- [Hakeem] He's at
this crossroads,

you could go right or left.

- [Dan] Within
minutes, John realizes

he's gone the wrong way.

- So at this point, John
is 100 feet underground,

wedged in this tight
8.5 inch passageway,

but he's also pitched
forward almost upside down

because of the angle of the
passageway, and he's stuck.

- Imagine how
terrifying this is.

- Before long, over 100
rescuers are upon the scene

and they are gonna do
everything in their power

to see if they can pull
John out of the cave.

- The rescuers set
up a pulley system

and they tie ropes
to John's legs

and they attempt
to winch him out

of the place where he's stuck.

But when they pull the
pulley, it brings his legs up

to the roof of the
cave, creating friction

that stops him from moving.

And because he's been
upside down all this time,

he has no feeling in his
legs and he can't move them.

- So at one point they
think to themselves,

do we just break his legs?

'Cause if we break his
legs, we'll be able

to move them however we want.

But the problem with that
is because he's been sitting

in this position for so
long, they're worried

that if they break
his legs, the shock

of breaking his
legs will kill him.

On top of that, one part
of the pulley system

ends up just shattering.

- The situation is dire.

The rescuers are working,
his family shows up,

he has his wife there,

and so the rescuers lower
a speaker down there

so that his family can tell him,
"It's gonna be okay, John."

Even though John can breathe,
he has another problem.

Our bodies are designed to
pump blood up from our feet

to our brains because
we're normally upright

in a gravitational field, so
our body works against that.

If you're upside
down for a long time,

blood begins to
pool in the brain.

The heart has to work
extra hard to get it out.

So John is starting to
have issues with his brain.

He's hallucinating and things

are getting bad
slowly but constantly.

- At this point, it's
been over 20 hours

that he has been
in this position.

Ultimately, John dies
of a cardiac arrest

on November 25th, 2009,
shortly before midnight.

- [Dan] Rescuers worry
that recovering John's body

from the cave is too
risky for their team,

so they decide against it.

- The Nutty Putty Cave will
be filled with concrete,

thus intombing John Jones
in his final resting place.

A plaque is put up
to commemorate him.

And to this day, the cave is
forever closed to the public.

- If you're not claustrophobic
yet, you might be after this.

- It's New Year's Day 2015,

and this 50-year-old man
named Steven Winfrey decides

to go rabbit hunting in
Squirrel Woods Scout Camp.

- As a rabbit hunter, Winfrey
is gonna bring along a dog

and a couple of ferrets.

- And the ferrets
go down in the hole

to flush out the rabbit,

and then once the rabbit
comes out of the hole,

the dog goes and catches the
rabbit and he's good to go.

Dinner is served.

- [Dan] Steven, the
ferrets, and his dog

have some early success
catching the rabbit,

but he spots another
going into a distant hole

and pursues it.

This perfectly reasonable choice

will unlock a deadly
chain of events.

- Steven goes about his routine.

He sends the ferrets
into the rabbit hole,

but no rabbit comes out.

So he realizes he
has to go to plan B.

- He ties up the dog,
takes off his jacket,

and then pulls out a
shovel and starts digging.

And his idea here is
to excavate the hole

so it's deep enough
where he can reach in

and grab the rabbit himself.

[dramatic music]

- So he sticks his arm in
and he can't find the rabbit.

He's reaching around everywhere,

and he know he saw that
rabbit go in that hole.

So he comes up with plan C.

- He gets even further
into the hole with his arm

and then decides to stick
his head into the hole

to look for the rabbit.

- And he's looking around
and he's reaching around,

and he still can't see a rabbit.

So he decides to
abort the mission,

but he can't pull
out. He's stuck.

His head and his arm are both
stuck in this rabbit hole.

- At this point, panic sets in.

[dog barking]

He's got to get his
head out of this hole.

He's pushing with his hands.

He's writhing with his body
and flailing his legs back

and forth, trying to
get some leverage.

And that action is so violent

that he actually throws
off both of his boots.

- He is now in an enclosed space

with no oxygen and struggling.

[upbeat music]

Not a good combination.

- [Dan] The next day,
on January 2nd, 2015,

a hiker arrives at
the strange scene.

- It's a man's body
splayed out on the ground

with his head and one arm
stuck in a rabbit hole.

The hiker can see that there's

been a lot of
violent action there.

- There's scratch
marks all around.

You can see his struggle.

His boots are on the
ground off of his feet.

His body's twisted 45 degrees

and it looks like
he's not breathing.

- And his poor dog is still tied

to the tree patiently
waiting for his owner

to emerge from the hole.

- So the hiker
calls an ambulance,

but alas, it's too late.

This guy is dead as a
doornail laying there

with his head in the ground.

- [Dan] What isn't there?

Any sign of a rabbit.

- The autopsy report

that is ultimately done on
Steven reveals that his cause

of death is positional asphyxia
in that he is upside down,

locked in a position with
not a lot of air circulation.

- And I'm sure somewhere on it,
it said, "death by rabbit hole."

- They say it's impossible to
have too much of a good thing,

but could something
as simple as pure water

turn out to be deadly?

- Sacramento-based
radio station KDND

has a morning show
called the Morning Rave.

- And the contest
that they're holding,

it seems innocent enough.

- The contest is called
Hold Your Wee for a Wii.

You drink copious
amounts of water

and the person who
holds their pee longest

wins a Nintendo Wii.

- The 20 contestants are given
eight ounce bottles of water

that they have to
consume every 15 minutes.

And if they vomit or urinate,

they're disqualified
from the contest.

- In that group of 20

is one of the contestants,
Jennifer Strange.

She is a young mother and she
is hoping to win this Wii.

This is a really hard to
get video game system,

so she figures this is her
opportunity to get it for free.

- [Dan] Ironically, this
free prize will go on to cost

a lot more.

On the morning of January
12th, 2007, the contest begins.

- 90 minutes in, people
have to go to the bathroom.

Others are vomiting.

- There's a woman
laying on the floor,

her teeth are chattering.

No telling if this is
from over hydration

or just the stress of
holding it in this long.

- All the while, by the way,
the jocks on the Morning Rave

are having a ball.

- Oh, she looks sick.

- They're just taking
so much delight

in seeing all these people go

through various stages of pain.

- [DJ] Oh my gosh,
look at her belly!

- [Dan] After an agonizing two
hours, Jennifer has managed

to make it down
to the final two.

- Jennifer has consumed
around two gallons

of water at this
point without having

gone to the bathroom yet.

- Clearly, the DJs did
not read the instructions

on the human body.

One DJ jokes, "Can you, like,
die from water poisoning?"

Someone else says,

"I think that guy's
gonna die over there."

And one DJ, to uproarious
laughter says,

"Make him sign the release."

- [DJ] Jennifer, I heard that
you're not doing too well.

- [Jennifer] My head hurts.

- Still not getting the
gravity of this situation,

the DJs are looking at her

and making fun of her,
saying she looks pregnant.

- [DJ] She said it
looks like her belly

like when she was pregnant,
look, it's totally sticking out.

- [DJ] Oh my gosh.

- [Dan] Three hours later,

Jennifer's in too
much pain to continue.

She quits the contest

and takes what is probably
a very long bathroom break.

Then she heads home, but
something isn't quite right.

- Because Jennifer's
taken in all this water

in a short amount of time
and she's unable to urinate,

it runs into the cells,

especially the
delicate brain cells,

and you get swelling
of the cerebrum.

Some cells may rupture and
then the brain itself swells,

and you can have what we
call a cerebral herniation,

which destroys your
brain stem and that's it.

- Within five hours of
the Wii contest beginning,

Jennifer Strange is found
dead on her bathroom floor.

- There are no criminal charges

because these contestants did
enter of their own free will.

But there's a civil suit
brought by Jennifer's husband

and the jury awards
Jennifer's family,

$16.5 million in compensation
for wrongful death.

- Next up, another unique
death that costs a fortune.

- It's the second century, BCE

and Manius Aquillius is a very
prominent Roman consul, general,

and notoriously greedy and
power hungry individual.

- In 89 BCE, he is sent

to quell a rebellion in Pontus,
which is modern day Turkey,

led by Mithridates the sixth,

who raised a rebellion
against Roman rule.

Manius marches into
Pontius with 6,000 men.

As a Roman general, he's
thinking, "I've got this,

no problem whatsoever.

I'm going to crush
this rebellion."

However, when he gets
to Pontus, he finds

that Mithridates
has 100,000 men.

And so Manius is
seriously outnumbered.

- Upon seeing his
insurmountable odds,

Manius Aquillius turns tail.

He's fleeing, he's outta here.

- [Dan] Unfortunately, his plan
of retreat also falls short.

After his capture,
Manius Aquillius

is ordered to be put to death,

but this is not your
normal, everyday execution.

Mithridates has something
quite special in mind.

- He is shackled atop a donkey

and paraded back to the city
of Pergamum for his punishment.

- [Dan] It turns out
watching an execution garners

a pretty good
audience in 89, BCE,

and the crowd likes
to contribute.

- The whole while,
he's being pelted,

just hit with animal
innards, probably manure.

- But it's not enough
to simply kill him.

This is not a simple
beheading or crucifixion.

- [Dan] Mithridates
has something

a little richer in mind.

- Mithridates' men
hold his throat open

and they pour, from a vat,
molten gold down his esophagus.

A truly brutal
means of execution.

[Manius screaming]

- And the heat from
that molten metal

essentially bursts his organs.

As soon as it hits
the soft tissue,

it just splits it
like a sausage.

[sizzling]

- [Dan] A death as
excruciating as it is costly.

But why gold?

- Lead was commonly
used for forms

of execution in
the Roman period.

But gold may have been used
in this case specifically

as a means of mocking
Manius' greed.

- [Dan] While Manius'
life is now over,

the strange spectacle
of his death is not.

- Mithridates is not about
to lose that amount of gold.

And eventually, after
his body's cooled a bit,

they dissect Manius'
body to excavate the gold

that is in his abdomen
and in his throat.

[dramatic music]

- If these stories
teach us anything,

it is that death,
just like life,

can be full of surprises.

But for those done in
by their own beards

or killed by flying lawnmowers,

the end came in ways that
were truly unbelievable.