Traffic chaos as German hearse ejects corpse

Reuters ^ | 10/29/03

[martin_fierro]

Traffic chaos as German hearse ejects corpse

BERLIN (Reuters) - A hearse has overturned on a German motorway, shattering the coffin and ejecting the corpse onto the tarmac along with a bag of coffin nails that brought traffic to a standstill.

"The driver had fallen asleep at the wheel and yanked the steering wheel round when he woke up," said Jens O'Brien, spokesman for the regional government in Duesseldorf, western Germany said on Wednesday.

"There were nails strewn over 50 metres and the corpse fell out onto the ground." The A40 motorway was closed for an hour and there was a six kilometre tailback as police collected the coffin nails and took the corpse away.

The hearse had not been driving to a funeral but had been transporting the body from Wuerzburg in southern Germany. The undertaker was slightly hurt.

[Tijeras_Slim]

Praise the Lord he wasn't riding a Segway!

[buffyt]

Sounds horrible, but with the boring unexciting life I have had, perhaps something like that will happen on the way to MY funeral, at last, some excitement! LOL

My oldest son is supposed to pick the music for my funeral. Dust in the Wind. She's Cold As Ice. Don't Fear the Reaper. She's Buying the Stairway to Heaven.

My tombstone is supposed to read:
See, I told you I was sick!

Instead of being sad and scared and morbid about my future death, which is inevitable... we joke about our funerals. No hurry to get there. But I have watched my grandmother, father, mother in law, aunts, uncles die in the past thirty years... and their funerals all turned into family reunions.

Just hope to wake up in Heaven!

[isthisnickcool]

Seems like things turned out OK. That corpse could have been killed!

[martin_fierro]

Atta girl.

[Fighter@heart]

I heard that the dead mans name was C.M. Skidmore!!

[Tijeras_Slim]

I think you'll appreciate this. My dad was the original rebel (if he was alive he'd be over at LP wearing timfoil), but when he died we had him cremated. Mom and I go to the gravesite, small SQUARE box in hand, and there's a ROUND hole. We both cracked up.

Slim :)

[Prince Charles]

A hearse has overturned on a German motorway, shattering the coffin and ejecting the corpse onto the tarmac along with a bag of coffin nails that brought traffic to a standstill.

Neat Halloween trick!

[martin_fierro]

lol

[patton]

LOL, you have made my day.

[biggerten]

Stopped by the drugstore and asked "Got anything to stop this coffin?".

By the way, why was the hearse carrying a bag of cigarettes?

[wimpycat]

We're threatening to put one of those small electric fans and a pair of sunglassses in my father-in-law's casket.

[AppyPappy]

Just hope to wake up in Heaven!

You better do more than hope if that's where you want to go.

I want a U-Haul to follow the hearse, just to make a statement.

[Prodigal Son]

Driver fell asleep? I guess his passenger wasn't too good at conversation.

[martin_fierro]

He was dead tired.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

A tombstone in my hometown cemetary says:

Been here and gone.
Had a good time.

[Consort]

Nails, rocks, cadavers, nuts, bolts, etc = FOD

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

My dad passed away in 1994. My brother and I visited the gravesite on the first anniversary. It was a beautiful autumn day. We each took a swig from a bottle of Dewar's Scotch (dad's favorite) and then poured a nice shot onto his grave. A minute later (I swear) the skies opened up and the rain came beating down. Laughing, crying, and soaking wet, we remembered how dad would always drink Dewar's and water.

[Drew68]

My tombstone is supposed to read:
See, I told you I was sick!

LOL! I really want to steal that one!

[Dinsdale]

Reminds me of an old database app I worked on once.

Inventory management for funeral homes.

Shipped with dummy data as examples including:

Headstones and caskets with intercoms
An ejection casket (triggered by sounds of trumpets, not for use at military funerals).