h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'd no idea of this story. Sounds fascinating.

Do you think they used a Lurgan spade to dig the graves?

I expect she had a face like one when she woke up.

She can't have been impressed with her husband or the blokes who severed her finger.

Well, I don't see what her husband did wrong .... death was very difficult to diagnose in those days ... hell, it's hard to diagnose nowadays - people still wake up in the morgue.

I wouldn't imagine she was overly enamoured with the grave robbers though.

Well how would you feel if your husband buried you alive?

It couldn't happen today because I'd like to think he'd send me to the undertakers to have me embalmed ..... no chance of me wakening up after that.

There was a woman fairly recently who woke up in the morgue of an Australian hospital .... luckily before the autopsy - but it's rare.

At least she didn't wake up in the middle of it. Ouch!!

I think that has happend in recent years too .... so while medical science has come a long way .... it still has a way to go to get it right every time.

Would've thought we didn't do that anymore.

Autopsies ..... I don't think they're that rare.

You know what I mean. Never heard of anyone waking up on the slab in recent years.

Well I saw a programme on the discovery channel about this very thing and there's a woman in Australia that it's happened to 3 times in the 1960s, 1970s and again in the 1990s. She woke up one time in one of those filing type cabinets in the morgue.


There was also a woman in America that woke up when the scalpel cut her at the Autopsy, and that was fairly recent - the trouble with thier medical condition is that it generally isn't discovered until the 'die' at least once.


Nowadays both ladies wear those medical bracelet/necklace things to let everyone know that they may appear dead - but aren't *actually* dead.

So what happens when they *actually* die? Do people poke and pord them for three days and then decide it's the real thing?

I have no idea - the people interviewed hadn't died for real yet.


I suppose they'll do a whole barrage of tests and check and recheck the findings - or wire up the brain just to triple check.

They'd have to. Like you don't want to bury them thinking it was it and it wasn't, and you don't want to keep the family waiting either.

Well, they'd be dead if they were buried .... in the western world anyhow - assuming they'd have the services of an undertaker they'd be embalmed and if they weren't dead going into the undertakers - they'd be dead coming out of it.


The chances of being buried alive are therefore nil - even in Lurgan - so don't worry.

It's just a scary thought that this has actually happened....and more than once.

Yes it is, but the comforting thing is that it's unlikely to happen now - all things considered I'm kinda happy that even with all the distractions and worries of modern life - I live today and not back then.


While there's a chance nowadays that you can be mis-diagnosed as dead - the chances of you being buried alive are nil.

Good to know. No more bells tied to toes then.

Oh you can tie a bell to your toe if you like, but the only thing that'll be ringing it the wind or the little critters chewing on your toes.