We’ve all heard the tales of people fainting at the site of something horrifying in a newly released movie (true), and most of us have heard the cliché tale of the audience that ran screaming at the site of the first cinema train hurtling towards the screen (false).^[1] When large groups of people come together for a shared experience, there is no telling what might happen, whether it is during a religious service, a movie, or even a trial. This list looks at ten times people reacted in a less-than-ordinary way when witness to various events.

See Also: Top 10 Incredible Recordings

10 Halloween, 1978

Halloween jumpstarted the golden age of slasher films. Unusual for its genre it has won awards, been praised by critics and is as much loved 40 years after its release as it was when it first launched. It can be said that in some ways the film was an early viral success as it relied heavily on word of mouth for its popularity. As you can see in the video clip above, an audience unused to the slasher genre reacted far more excitedly than we would today. In fact, if I were in that audience I might be tempted to do a Michael Myers on some of the loudest!

An interesting fact relating to the film is that John Carpenter (the director) composed the entire music score himself in just three days. He was inspired by the scores of previous horrors such as The Exorcist and Suspira. There are now a total of eleven movies in the entire Halloween franchise with the most recent in 2018 which was a direct sequel to the first and ignores the intervening films. Another two Halloween movies are in the works for release in October 2020 and 2021.^[2]

9 Saw III

This is not a list exclusively about films, but I believe that the three I have included on this list are very deserving of their places here. Saw III was released in 2006 and was expected to be gory. But on the opening night in Hertfordshire in the United Kingdom, ambulances were called three times to assist people who had fainted due to the film. Additionally, a man reportedly collapsed in another town on the same night so we can’t just say that Hertfordshire citizens are a touch more delicate than the rest of us.

Saw III is interesting in that it is either loved or hated by fans of the franchise. It stands out as somewhat unique in that way. It was shot in just 28 days and when they started they didn’t even have a complete script! But the coolest fact about Saw III is that the bathroom used throughout was actually borrowed from the set of Scary Movie 4 which, in turn, had modeled it on the bathroom in the original Saw movie. That is some kind of twisted meta scenario. Watch the clip above if you dare—it’s the pig scene and it is not pleasant.^[3]

8 Playboy of the Western World, 1907

Playboy of the Western World was written by Irish playwright John Millington Synge and first performed in 1907 at the Abbey Theatre, in Dublin. The play, written controversially in Irish English rather than the more common Gaelic, caused a stir before it was even staged due to the nature of its content in which a man attempts to murder his father twice whilst generally cavorting with a bunch of women of relatively relaxed moral principles.

Upon the first performance riots broke out and spread beyond the theater. Eventually the police had to quell the mob. The author writing to the leading lady declared “It is better any day to have the row we had last night, than to have your play fizzling out in half-hearted applause. Now we’ll be talked about. We’re an event in the history of the Irish stage”. An audio recording of the play is above for those who can understand the incredibly confusing accent.^[4]

7 Miracle Of The Sun, 1917

In 1917, three children in Fatima Portugal claimed to be seeing visions of the Virgin Mary. They were greeted with some skepticism in a nation that was, at the time, in its newly established strongly anti-religious first republican stage. Nevertheless, the local Bishop investigated and gave a half-hearted approval, and the children had a number of further visions. News spread and the children (and Fatima) became a boiling topic of conversation between those who believed and those who didn’t.

Eventually the children announced that the Virgin they saw in their visions was going to appear in October and perform miracles so that everyone would know they were not lying. The day arrived and so did 70,000 witnesses including the world’s skeptical media. And lo and behold, according to all present (including the media) a miracle did occur:

“The sun’s disc did not remain immobile. This was not the sparkling of a heavenly body for it spun round on itself in a mad whirl. Then, suddenly, one heard a clamour, a cry of anguish breaking from all the people. The sun, whirling wildly, seemed to loosen itself from the firmament and advance threateningly upon the earth as if to crush us with its huge and fiery weight.”

Reporters who had previously written derisive articles about Fatima converted. The experience was, in their words, so terrifying, that they thought the world was ending. Two of the three children (who died in 1919 and 1920) were declared Saints in 2017, and the third who died in 2005 was declared a Servant of God at the same time, paving the way for her eventual canonization.^[5]

6 OJ Simpson Verdict, 1995

In 1995 America came to a standstill as the nation watched with bated breath to see what the verdict would be in the 11 months long trial of O. J. Simpson for the brutal murder of his wife Nicole Simpson. The video clip above shows us the immediate reaction of a crowd of people gathered in Times Square watching on the big screen. The reaction was split across racial lines, which was not surprising given the incredibly divisive nature of the trial itself in which the defense attorneys sought to use accusations of racism to win. Black Americans generally felt that justice had been done, whilst white and Hispanic Americans felt the opposite.

In a bizarre twist to the tale which can only happen in the US justice system, Simpson was found guilty of the crimes in a civil court two years later and was ordered to pay forty-one million dollars in reparation. In a further insane twist, Simpson went on to publish a book If I Did It which he called a “hypothetical” confession. O.J. ultimately received prison time for nine years on unrelated charges including robbery. He was released in 2017.^[6]

5 First “Talkie” Films

When technology finally allowed movie makers to include spoken dialog in their pictures, they were probably not expecting the reaction they (universally) got: laughter (and these weren’t comedy films we are talking about). At the first showing of the talkie drama War Nurse by Edgar Selwyn in 1930, the audience reacted in a very unexpected way during some of the most poignant moments: at one stage a woman is in the throes of pain during childbirth and she yells “I want my mother!” The audience wept with laughter. And so it went on, time after time. Every time an actor spoke: the audience burst into laughter.

The reason for this was not because the actors had silly voices. It was not because of bad acting either. It was entirely because an audience so used to silence in film found verbosity in the midst of scenes that were rather self-explanatory, to be ridiculous. It left nothing to the imagination. It is one thing to use spoken language for a conversation, it was another to use it to interject mundane and unnecessary comments. One film reviewer rather smartly stated: “When the screen became audible it made silence the principal element of screen art.”^[7]

4 Susan Boyle

Susan Boyle is perhaps the best example of an audience reaction that spread well beyond the confines of her own physical location: she became an international sensation thanks to the Internet after auditioning to be a contestant on season 3 of Britain’s Got Talent.

She first appeared as a dowdy Scottish 47 year old woman “currently unemployed but still looking”. The intro to her performance is, as you would expect, somewhat mocking—a technique used in the media to create a greater contrast (and consequently a greater chance of going viral) between a before and after scenario. So yes, there is some manipulation in the production of Susan’s fame, but there is no denying it: that woman has a great voice.

On Youtube her audition received 2.5 million views in the first 72 hours, and the next day she hit the front page of Digg and Reddit—definitely not the audience you would expect to be adoring a middle-aged Scottish cat-loving, grey haired lady. She appeared as a contestant this year on America’s Got Talent: The Champions where she placed in the top 12 but lost.^[8]

3 Cleansed, 2016

Cleansed is a play by English playwright Sarah Kane who killed herself in 1999 by hanging herself with shoelaces in a hospital toilet. A somewhat unfortunate but poetic end when you consider the nature of her writing and the reason for this entry on the list: Cleansed is the tale of a university run by a sadistic madman. The story is filled with such delights as forced violent sodomy with a metal pole, a character whose tongue is ripped out, and involuntary gender reassignment surgery. There is also a bit of force-feeding, throat slashing, and suicide.

Not surprisingly when this play was staged in 2016 at the National Theatre in London it caused five people to faint in horror and more than forty people walked out in disgust. And unlike most of the entries on this list which have mostly affected audiences, the cast of this play have also described experiencing “very strange nightmares where very extreme events take place”.

Of the play, theatre critic John Gross sardonically wrote: “The play is miserable stuff—which is not to say, current fashions being what they are, that I can’t foresee Sarah Kane enjoying a successful career.” And no doubt she will . . . move over Shakespeare.^[9]

2 The Exorcist, 1973

The Exorcist was filmed and released at a very turbulent time in the history of the religion it portrays: the Roman Catholic Faith. In 1973 the fallout from the reforms of the second Vatican council were beginning to become apparent. The film itself makes subtle reference to that in the character of father Karras who not only finds himself a councillor to an unending line of priests losing their faith, but he begins to lose his own. The desecration of churches under the supposedly-benevolent eye of Pope Paul VI, in which altars were stripped and statues destroyed, is also reflected in some metaphorical way by the desecration scene in the film.^[10]

This was the background to the release of, what remains to this day, one of the most horrifying artistic expressions of the power of evil. Once witnessed, you will never forget the head spinning or obscene crucifix stabbing scene. It is a miracle that the young actress playing Regan (Linda Blair) had no idea at all what was happening throughout.

Audiences at the time reacted just as you would expect. They fainted, they cried, they fled the cinemas. So well-known and frequent were these reactions upon seeing the face of the devil on the big screen, that ambulances were stationed at some movie theaters. Word got out and the lines to see the film were like nothing that had been seen before. Interestingly similar reactions occurred in the 2000s re-release of the picture. The video above shows actual footage of these reactions.

1 The Rite Of Spring, 1913

The grand opening of the ballet The Rite of Spring by Igor Stravinsky resulted in a very unexpected audience reaction: riots. They were, in fact, so bad, the show was stopped and the orchestra fled! Stravinsky was at the forefront of modern art in classical music and he decided that he would represent the wonder of the spring season in a way no one had before. To do so, he focussed on pagan rites to represent the agony of new birth.

This premiere performance was something extraordinary. The music was written by the greatest 20th century composer, and the costumes and sets were designed by Nicholas Roerich, for whom is named the Roerich Pact which asserts that the “protection of culture always has precedence over any military necessity.” The ballet was choreographed by the great dancer Vaslav Nijinsky (though Stravinsky himself hated the dances he created). For enthusiasts of the classical arts, this is virtually the second coming of Jesus Christ!

For audiences of the day it proved too much; this was, of course, two years before the world became partly immune to horror due to the great war. Stravinsky’s score was met with derisive laughter at the opening strains of its bassoon solo but mirth turned to mockery and then to outright rioting by the time the piece reached its first movement: The Augurs Of Spring. The colorful costumes and sets combined with the bizarre writhing and thumping of the ballerinas to the thunderous cacophony of the movement was simply too much.

The piece is now acclaimed as one of the greatest works of 20th century classical music. Go figure! The video above starts at the moment that the rioting would have begun. Try to watch it with the eyes of someone who had only known such things as Swan Lake to be ballet; you’ll find it quite startling.^[11]

+ JFK Assassination Announced, 1963

Thanks to reader HM8432 who, in the comments, pointed out this video for inclusion as a bonus. “On November 22nd, 1963, at a performance of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, conductor Erich Leinsdorf delivers the news of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination to a shocked audience. Leinsdorf then announces that the orchestra will play the Funeral March from Beethoven’s third symphony.”^[12]

The gasps of the audience are chilling and the performance of the Beethoven funeral march is incredibly moving in its dignity. What a dreadful moment for not just the United States of America, but the free world as a whole.

Most of us are likely to think of a science lab when we hear the term “chemical reaction.” In reality, nature is full of endless chemical reactions occurring all the time. We either just don’t see them, like the ones that take place in our own bodies all day long, or we don’t even think about them. But they’re out there, they’re happening, and some of them are more unpleasant than you might think. 

10. The Chlorine Smell In Pools is Actually a Reaction Between Chlorine and Things Like Pee

Have you ever taken a trip to the public pool and that chlorine smell was just so potent it almost made your eyes water as you approached? It’s like a sting in your nostrils and makes you think they must really take their pool cleanliness seriously if they’re adding so much chlorine to it. We have unfortunate news for you.

Chlorine doesn’t normally have a powerful smell at all. But it is a very reactive chemical and so, when it meets other compounds, it can produce a pungent and even dangerous chemical reaction. That smell from the public pool is one such reaction. 

The pool smell is not from chlorine itself but chloramines. You get chloramines when chlorine mixes with things like sweat, oils, cosmetics, and urine. This is the reason some pools tell you to shower before you swim, to remove many of these compounds from your skin. The urine is another matter. 

Even though it seems like that smell means more chlorine which means a cleaner pool, the opposite is true. When the disinfectant chlorine hits your sweat and pee it breaks down into the smelly chloramines which no longer work to clean a pool. So you may want to rethink a swim if you have a potent pool. 

9. A High School Student Lost Her Fingers to a Chemical Reaction in Art Class

Art class was, for many of us, the most fun class in school. You don’t necessarily need to think super hard and you get to be creative. Hard to go wrong with that. But it’s still possible for things to go very wrong. 

In 2007, an art class took a very wrong turn for a 16-year-old girl who was trying to make a sculpture of her hands. The plan was to put her hands in plaster of Paris to make a mold of the hands and then presumably fill the molds with whatever material she was going to sculpt with. Unfortunately, she misheard the teacher who told her to make a clay mold and then fill it with plaster. She was unaware of the chemical process of how plaster of Paris dries.

Like cement, plaster of Paris creates an exothermic reaction when water is added. The powder starts out as gypsum but then is heated, forcing moisture out. So when water is reintroduced, a reverse reaction occurs.

As the substance dries, the water molecules react with the plaster to create heat. With the girl’s hands fully immersed, the mixture heated to 60 C, or 140 F. By this time the plastic was too dry and too thickly packed for teachers to get her out in time. All she could do was endure the slow, steady burns.

By the time she was freed the damage was too severe and she ended up losing all but two of her fingers. 

8. Adipocere Is The Result of a Chemical Reaction Turning Body Fat Into a Waxy Substance In A Coffin

Have you ever thought about what happens to a corpse once it’s been buried? Most of us know that a body will rot and eventually only a skeleton remains, but the process of rotting is an interesting and off-putting one that has several stages. 

At some point in the process your body will produce a substance called adipocere, otherwise known as grave wax. As long as you have suitable conditions in which a body has moisture but little oxygen, the substance can form. 

When your adipose, or fat tissue, decomposes, it can form this waxy substance thanks to the hydrolysis of triglycerides into glycerin and free fatty acids. This is very similar to how we make soap. It gets the nickname thanks to the fact it will have a waxy texture at first but will crumble over time. That said, it can help preserve a body for years.

7. Pistachios Will Spontaneously Combust In the Right Circumstances

People seem to love pistachios. Americans eat 0.7 pounds of them each per year. That makes for a lot of nuts out there and, all things being equal, that’s potentially dangerous. Pistachios are vulnerable to a chemical reaction that can cause them to spontaneously combust.

Pistachios are one of the most dangerous nuts in the world and they need to be shipped and stored carefully. A room full of pistachios could suffocate you because, even after harvest, they absorb oxygen and give off carbon dioxide. 

Because pistachios have low water and high fat, they can be quite flammable. As the nuts absorb oxygen and give off CO2, they’re breaking fats down into fatty acids and this chemical reaction produces heat. If they get warm enough, the fat in the nuts becomes fuel and they can burst into flames. If you’re transporting millions of nuts together in shipping containers, you may ship a pistachio bomb as a result. 

6. Pit Stains Are Caused By a Reaction To Your Deodorant

The global deodorant market is worth nearly $70 billion so you can safely assume most people don’t want to stink or even look like they might stink with those telltale sweat stains. For most people this isn’t too big of an issue but for some people, especially when they wear white, it can be. Have you ever seen a dreaded yellow pit stain? It’s not a desirable thing for most people. But it’s also not technically caused by your sweat, either.

While it may seem like yellow stains are caused by poor hygiene or excess sweating, that’s not the case. Instead, it’s a chemical reaction caused by the deodorant some people choose to wear. Obviously it doesn’t happen to everyone but the aluminum in your deodorant and antiperspirant can react with proteins in your sweat to produce the yellowing agent that stains clothing. 

If it becomes an issue, using an antiperspirant made without aluminum might do the trick to make the stains go away. 

5. A Chemical Reaction Between Tin Foil and Lasagna Causes “Lasagna Cell”

Lasagna is an immensely popular food and with good reason, it’s delicious. It’s the most-loved pasta dish by Millennials, at least according to one survey. But it hides a secret danger most of us have never heard of. 

Lasagna needs to be stored in a glass or plastic dish or not covered with aluminum foil thanks to a chemical reaction called lasagna cell. In so many words, you risk turning your lasagna into a battery if you don’t.

Lasagna is a prime environment for galvanic corrosion if the dish you’re storing it in is made of metal other than aluminum. Because you have a salty solution working as an electrolyte in the form of the sauce, the lasagna will break down the aluminum in the foil and the molecules of foil act as an anode and will try to bond to the dish, which is now a cathode. 

In as little as a few hours you could notice holes in the foil if you have your lasagna stored in the fridge and tiny blobs of corroded aluminum on the surface of your meal. 

4. The Smell of Pennies Is Actually Your Own Odor After Reacting to Pennies

Have you ever smelled a penny and found the odor unusual or offensive? Before you blame that poor, mostly worthless coin you need to know that it’s not the penny’s fault. Pennies don’t smell, it’s just that they cause us to smell.

If you notice an unpleasant odor on a penny or your hands after handling them, it’s actually the result of a chemical reaction between the copper in the coin and oils in your own skin. The same thing happens when you handle iron or brass. Your body will produce different compounds in reaction to the contact with the metals, some that smell worse than others. 

Not everyone produces the same chemical compounds so what you smell after handling pennies could very well differ from what someone else smells. Regardless of how it manifests, what you think of as a metallic odor is just a misperception and it’s actually body odor. 

3. A Chemical Reaction Causes Beer, Weed, and Skunks to Smell Similar

When beer goes bad, we often call it skunky. This is because skunky beer is an unpleasant situation and if you get one that has gone skunky enough it actually reeks a bit like our smelly little mammal friend. That’s not a coincidence, either. The chemical reaction at play is in the same ballpark as what’s going on in a skunk’s hindquarters.

Beer gets skunky when it’s exposed to light. Light interacts with something called iso-alpha acids, which are released when hops are boiled in the brewing process. You want these normally as they’re part of the bitter flavor in beer. But light destroys them.

When they break down, they bind with other compounds in the beer that have sulfur in them and now we’re in skunk stink territory. The compound is called 3-methyl-2-butene-1-thiol or prenythiol. It’s also in weed and if it’s an especially potent or skunky weed, that’s what causes it.

2. Humans Cause Their Own Indoor Air Pollution

Air pollution has been a cause for concern for years now but usually when we talk about it we mean the air outside. It’s a global sort of concern caused by toxic chemicals being burned and pumped into the atmosphere, right? Well, yes. But that doesn’t mean the air in your house is doing a lot better. Turns out humans are polluting the indoor air, too.

Human skin interacts with chemicals in the air in your own home to produce its own sort of polluting haze. Normally, outdoors, the weather and UV rays take care of a lot of these chemicals but that can’t happen inside. Our bodies create what has been described as an “oxidation field.”

Oil in human skin can react with ozone to produce new compounds. Our bodies produce an oil called squalene. When this meets ozone, which is a compound that exists freely out in the world, it produces a compound that further reacts with ozone to make hydroxyl radicals. These can react to all sorts of things in your house and create toxic compounds.

Out in the wild, hydroxyl radicals are natural and helpful in the air. But in an enclosed space like your house they can be more dangerous. There are potential long-term health effects we can’t know about yet depending on what sort of reactions could occur in any home.

This isn’t a new thing, but it wasn’t until covid and concern over indoor air quality that scientists began inspecting the spaces in which we live and how healthy they are. 

1. Babies Produce a Chemical That Makes Women Aggressive But Does the Opposite to Men

Do you think it’s possible for a smell to change your behavior? The idea that you can use pheromones to do such a thing isn’t new, even though there’s not much evidence to suggest humans work that way. That said, there is some evidence that there are chemicals in body odor which can affect human aggression.

We’re not talking average armpit stink here, rather a chemical produced by babies. Hexadecanal is a compound produced in babies’ heads. Ever seen someone sniff a baby like it was a new car? That’s part of what they’re smelling. Research shows this compound reduces aggression in men but has the opposite effect on women, making them more aggressive. 

It’s believed that a reaction like this is a survival technique. If a baby’s smell makes the mother more aggressive, she may become more protective. Conversely, the father, being less aggressive, is less of a threat as a result. Other mammals have similar reactions to various odors.

“This seems to be on purpose.”

That simple phrase, uttered seconds after the second airplane impacted the South Tower on 9/11, was among the day’s most direct, sober journalistic assessments. Its source? A morning show in Dallas, Texas, of all places.

In those first chaotic moments, media, world leaders and everyday citizens – all various levels of stunned and confused – scrambled to understand what was going on and what it meant. Let’s look at ten initial reactions to the worst terrorist attack in US history.

10 Disturbing Raw Videos From 9/11

10 Flying Blind: WABC’s Naïve Nonsense

Fly one plane into a skyscraper, shame on you. Fly two planes into a skyscraper and have a newscaster call it an accident… well, shame on the newscaster.

WABC, New York’s ABC Network affiliate – whose live coverage was simulcast by CNN that morning – was clueless following the second plane’s impact. First, the anchorman failed to realize that the second explosion was in the other tower. Despite the TV monitor clearly indicating otherwise, he assumed the enormous fireball was the fuselage from the initial plane igniting. That made entirely no sense.

Soon, newsroom colleagues alerted him that it was, in fact, a second plane in the opposite tower. What ensued was among the stupidest monologues in broadcast television history:

“Perhaps some kind of navigating system,” the anchorman mindlessly mused, “or some kind of electronics would have put two planes into the World Trade Center within… it looks like about 18 minutes of each other.”

This ridiculous assessment was then repeated, prompting CNN to cut away from WABC and switch to the feed from another network. Respected WABC anchor Bill Ritter remembers hearing the broadcast live from his shower, of all places:

“I remember that the man who was anchoring… said that, for two planes to crash into the Twin Towers, something had to be wrong with the FAA’s radar system. I recall throwing the bar of soap against the shower wall. Hard. And I remember yelling, loudly, ‘WE ARE UNDER ATTACK!’”

9 Prepared and Practical: FOX News Channel

Other networks got it right from the get-go, including the national, 24/7 FOX News Channel. Even before the second plane hit the second tower – all but confirming nefarious intent – that morning’s anchorman, Jon Scott, was able to conduct an interview with a former investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board. Scott aptly asked him:

“Can you think of any reason for a pilot to slam into a building of this height on a day like today,” he asked, referencing that morning’s crystal clear blue sky, “… if it wasn’t intentional?”

When the expert hemmed and hawed about possible pilot distraction and even the angle of the sun, Scott momentarily relented on his suspicions, correctly noting that the towers were near a major air traffic lane, the Hudson River. Just two minutes later, at 9:03am, the second plane struck the adjacent tower before his – and everyone else’s – eyes.

The newsroom gasps audibly, and Scott was understandably flummoxed for a few seconds. Regaining his composure, he simply and directly states what was both unbelievable and completely obvious: “We just saw another one… Another plane just flew into the second tower. This raises…”

Scott pauses, then finds less careful but more appropriate words: “THs HAS to be deliberate, folks.” Vetted or not, Scott knew when to abandon journalistic norms and say what was plainly true.

8 Business as Unusual: WNYC Radio’s Silly Inflexibility

Many stations – especially radio broadcasts – continued to run commercial breaks through the early moments of the crisis. But WNYC, the New York City affiliate of advertisement-free National Public Radio, had no such constraints. With the World Trade Center in flames within eyesight of its Manhattan studio, the newsdesk had a unique opportunity to cover a global event developing right in their backyard.

At first, they nailed it. The pivotal journalistic moment was when the second plane hit, essentially eradicating any chance that this was merely an accident. For their part, WNYC instantly recognized that this was a separate plane impacting the other tower; there was incredulity, but no confusion. Eyewitness accounts ensued for the next several minutes. And then, less than 10 minutes after the second plane hit…

… they cut away for a story about President Bush’s childhood literacy tour?

That’s right, they ran a canned piece about President Bush’s scheduled trip to Florida promoting childhood literacy, including news that First Lady Laura Bush would be testifying to Congress later that day about early learning (spoiler alert: both Mrs. Bush and Congress had to cancel). The mundane segment ran for FIVE FULL MINUTES as the story of the century unfolded.

7 The Coolest Head in NYC: Pat Kiernan (NY1 News)

If you’ve never lived in New York City, Pat Kiernan is among the most famous people you’ve never heard of. Since 1997, he has anchored the city’s NY1 cable news on weekday mornings. Quick-witted and wryly humorous, Kiernan makes due with the station’s tight budget, including segments where he literally reads that morning’s newspapers aloud.

On 9/11, for a critical half-hour the only camera NY1 had on the Twin Towers was several miles away; Kiernan excelled despite the detriment. Interviewing an eyewitness, he instantly discerned not only which Tower was hit first but which side of it (North Tower, north face). Without going overboard, he dubbed the first crash suspicious – saying an accident on such a clear day was hard to fathom – and worried aloud for those gathered in Windows on the World, the restaurant atop the North Tower.

When the second plane hit, the camera angle was so far away that Kiernan couldn’t instantly tell it was a plane. Still, he recognized that it was the other tower, and quickly verified the impact’s origin.

Kiernan’s finest (albeit horrifying) moment that morning came when the South Tower, the first to fall, collapsed at 9:59am. Most broadcasters, even ones with closer, sharper video feeds, initially thought the collapse was partial. In under a minute, Kiernan drew the correct conclusion, stating simply: “That tower’s not there anymore.”

6 Shockjock and Awe: Howard Stern Calls For Blood

One decidedly unmeasured immediate response came from a media personality known more for his humor.

Syndicated morning radio show host Howard Stern, the self-proclaimed “King of All Media,” was live on the air at his New York City studio when he learned of the first plane’s impact shortly before 9:00am. The shockjock pivoted from a topic indicative of his usual content – a story about how he almost slept with Pamela Anderson – and, along with the rest of the world, speculated about how a plane could have flown into the area’s tallest skyscraper.

Then the second plane hit, and the Howard Stern Show took a darker turn.

Within minutes, Stern opined that “We are entirely too lax in this country.” He proceeds to speak with several of the program’s not-so-sophisticated regulars, dialing in from around the city. By 9:12am, one references “those towelhead bastards”. The conversation devolves into Stern and co-host Robin Quivers calling for the indiscriminate carpet-bombing of the entire Middle East.

Despite the broadcast’s political incorrectness and bellicosity, many appreciated Stern’s real-time raw emotions. Unshackled by journalistic constraints, Stern was able to wear his fear on his sleeve, and say aloud what many others were undoubtedly thinking. Recently, Conan O’Brien praised it as the day’s most honest coverage.

5 “BOMB! RUN!”: The Commuter Crush

Not surprisingly, the World Trade Center had rail tracks underneath it. At Cortlandt Street station, a train operator reported an “explosion” just one minute after the first plane struck. Subway service was halted, and the station destroyed in the collapse. Luckily, no one in the subway system died that day.

But there was another rail line: the Port Authority Trans Hudson commuter trains, better known as PATH. Buried below not only the towers but a subterranean mall, a PATH train packed with New Jersey commuters pulled into the WTC Station right as the first plane struck. No one felt it, and the train deboarded.

I know, because I was on it.

A set of extremely long escalators carried commuters up to the mall, where they either ascended to their WTC offices, exited via street level or transferred to the NYC Subway. A minute or two after impact, those on the standing-room-only escalators heard a cascading, human-telephone cry from above: “BOMB! RUN!”

Too many people + panic running = trampling. I saw a few folks fall in front of me, and was too preoccupied with living to look back. I exited the north side of Tower One – the same side and building impacted by the first plane – less than five minutes after impact. While no official trampling deaths were recorded, it’s impossible to be certain considering the disaster’s magnitude.

4 Pet Goat-gate: George W. Bush’s Bad Rap

When the second plane hit, the president of the United States was reading “The Pet Goat,” a book designed to help young children learn to read. It was not a very presidential look, and Bush drew mockery for remaining seated for seven minutes after Chief of Staff Andrew Card whispered the news in his ear, adding “America is under attack.”

As poor as Bush’s long-term response became – the 2003 invasion of Iraq is universally castigated – criticisms of his reactions that day are undeserved.

First, the book. Yes, it was about a pet goat. He was reading to young kids. Was he supposed to be reading Sophocles? Penthouse Forum perhaps? And upon learning of the second impact, was he supposed to jump up and scream “run for your lives!” in front of six-year-olds? What, pray tell, was Bush going to do about airliners flying into major landmarks from an elementary school in Sarasota, Florida?

From there, the “Where was Bush all day?” critiques are equally silly. Upon learning of a third plane hitting the Pentagon – and after receiving threats that “Angel,” Secret Service code for Air Force One, was next – the smart move was a fighter jet-escorted flight to a military base. That’s what Bush did, staying in close contact with Vice President Dick Cheney, who was directing the initial response from an underground White House operations bunker.

Bush was in an optically impossible situation that day – one that would have made any leader look aloof and aimless.

3 Parties and Panic in Palestine: Yasser Arafat

While Bush was as measured and rational as possible, one world leader was sweating bullets. Palestinian National Authority president Yasser Arafat was reportedly terrified that the United States would blame his questionably loyal countrymen for the attacks.

Arafat had good reason to be nervous. For starters, Palestinians were seen celebrating the Towers’ collapses; in the West Bank city of Nablus, about 3,000 people poured into the streets, chanting “God is Great” and — in their traditional gesture of celebration — handing out candies. Not a good look, Yasser.

Nor was the timing great. The attacks occurred just a year after the failed 2000 Camp David Summit, after which most participants – including US president Bill Clinton – blamed Arafat for never bringing a serious peace offer to the negotiating table. Arafat was reportedly furious with Clinton’s assessment, even though his priorities were plain as day: Ararat did little to quell the riots that broke out throughout Gaza shortly after the summit began, indicating his reluctance to strike a deal.

Fortunately for Arafat, it quickly became clear that his organization had neither a realistic motive nor the competence to pull off four simultaneous suicide hijackings. Given the terrorists’ Saudi roots and Osama bin Laden’s recent history of tightly coordinated mass bombings, Al Qaeda was rightly fingered and Arafat was off the hook.

2 “This is Not a Drill”: The FAA and US Air Force

At 8:34am, American Airlines Flight 11 hijacker Mohamed Atta mistakenly broadcasted a message to air traffic controllers instead of the plane’s petrified passengers. “If you try to make any moves,” he said, “you’ll endanger yourself and the airplane. Just stay quiet.”

Just six minutes later, Boston’s Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) informed military air defense officials that “we have a hijacked aircraft and I need you to get some sort of fighters out here to help us out.” The scramble order was made official at 8:46am – just as Atta slammed the plane into the North Tower.

The military, then, had an order to scramble jets… but to where? The frantic confusion is evident from the FAA/NORAD audio recordings. Soon, though, it became evident that other airliners had been hijacked, and the first fighters took off at 8:53am.

They didn’t have a chance to do anything about the next two impacts – Tower Two and the Pentagon, respectively. However, it’s likely the fighters would have intercepted United Flight 93 before it reached its target – the Capitol Building or White House – had passengers not stormed the cockpit and forced it to crash into a Pennsylvania field.

Horrifically, the fighter pilots en route did not have missiles on their jets, and instead would have been forced to ram the airliner, sacrificing their own lives in addition to those of the passengers.

1 When the Networks Couldn’t: The Photojournalists

There was a reason television stations didn’t broadcast up-close images of the towers burning that day, and it had nothing to do with technological limitations. They didn’t zoom in because doing so would have clearly shown people leaping to their deaths from the upper floors.

Instead, the day’s most harrowing images came from photojournalists, including freelancers and amateurs. Most notably, Associated Press photographer Richard Drew captured a man plummeting to his death from the North Tower. Dubbed “The Falling Man,” the picture was so riveting that most newspapers refused to publish it. Later, the photo became the basis of a documentary in which the doomed man’s identity was discovered.

But it wasn’t just professionals snapping shots that day. The event left millions of people with a clear sightline of the devastation, many of whom took some of the most compelling, horrifying photos of that day. Others shot with handheld video cameras, including footage so close that desperate victims trapped in the upper floors can be seen stacked atop each other, leaning out broken windows for air.

One photojournalist even lost his life that day. Freelancer William Biggart took dozens of dramatic shots, including the South Tower’s collapse from shockingly close. Unfortunately, Biggart tried to get even closer to the North Tower, and died when it imploded. Rescue workers found his body four days later along with his intact digital cameras.

10 Chilling Voices From 9/11

The escalating Coronavirus crisis has dominated world news for more than two months. As the world shuts down, whole industries grind to a halt, and we practice “social distancing” (avoiding others) and self-isolating in a bid to halt the spread of the virus. Families are separated as politicians rediscover the benefits of borders and close them, and supermarket shelves are stripped bare. The global economic and personal impact of the virus will be felt for some time.

Top 10 Fascinating Facts About Toilet Paper

However, as well as the serious implications, society has shown we still have the ability to laugh in the face of adversity.

An unexpected side effect of the coronavirus has been a worldwide shortage of one of life’s daily necessities. Toilet paper has become the new “Buttcoin” as shoppers around the world face empty shelves in the toilet tissue aisle.

In an inexplicable panic-buying phenomenon not seen since tulip bulbs were all the rage, shoppers have been stockpiling trolley loads of toilet paper instead of food in preparation for a lockdown. What anyone will do with two years’ supply of bathroom tissue is unfathomable.

With supplies of paper products stripped bare, shoppers queue for hours for just one roll of two-ply, reminiscent of scenes from WWII rationing. Riots over toilet paper and extra security surrounding this sought-after commodity are becoming commonplace, with social media memes becoming funnier each day.

As shoppers around the world grapple with the unique crisis, some hilarious news stories began to surface of humorous responses to the great toilet paper crisis.

10 Sinking Supplies

Most of us know that sinking feeling when we arrive at the supermarket too late to grab our emergency supplies. Many of us even resort to setting the alarm to join the early morning queue, only to have our hopes dashed by empty shelves.

Two Los Angeles musicians recently brought a note of light-hearted humor to the situation. Bemused shoppers watched as the two professional violinists donned life jackets and headed to the ransacked toilet paper aisle. Without missing a beat, the straight-faced musicians began playing the 9th-century hymn “Nearer my God to Thee” in front of the empty toilet paper shelves.

The parody of the bandmaster’s performance in James Cameron’s 1997 movie “Titanic” went viral as essential supplies continued to sink as quickly as the Titanic.^[1]

9 Toilet Paper Emergency

Nearing the final sheet of loo roll may be a major domestic emergency. However, it seems some people needed reminding that this was not necessarily a life-threatening situation. U.S. police in Newport, Oregon, actually had to issue a public message asking people not to dial 911 because they were out of toilet paper.

Officers assured the public they would survive without police assistance, suggesting old-fashioned remedies to the crisis, such as newspaper or cloth rags.

In Australia however, police have actually had to resort to handing out toilet paper and paper towels at local supermarkets in a bid to ease the emerging “roll-rage” situation.^[2]

8 Pricey Roll

Profiteers are inevitable during every shortage, so it is not surprising that hoarders are now targeting desperate online shoppers to capitalize on their precious loot.

Some, however, have taken to eBay to add a humorous note to the crisis, listing toilet paper for sale as a joke.

In Australia, an NSW man listed a generic brand two-ply roll for AUD 1000 as a send-up of the crisis. Not actually intending to make a sale, he listed the roll at the ridiculous price, thinking he would not even get a bid. However, he was obviously taken seriously and was astounded when a purchaser actually accepted the “buy it now” price, telling news reporters he “didn’t even think anyone would even bid AUD 10 for it.”

In Queensland, a similar joke saw a 24 pack of Kleenex (RRP AUD$15) sell for AUD$500. Neither purchaser has yet to receive full payment for their toilet humor.^[3]

7 Prized Roll

A UK arcade owner had a “loo-crative” idea to highlight the stupidity of people clawing for toilet paper in the supermarket aisles. The frantic scrambles to grasp a loo roll reminded him of the arcade games, where players claw for the chance to win a toy inside the machine.

The East Yorkshire businessman emptied the usual plush toys from these vending machines, where for 30p gamers could claw for the prize of a fluffy bear.

Instead, he filled them with rolls of toilet paper, with seaside visitors flocking for the opportunity to “spend a penny” while securing a somewhat unusual but now popular prize.

Other similar vending machines have joined in on the joke, with some adding hand sanitizer, another sought-after basic personal hygiene product also in short supply to the prize pool.^[4]

6 Have Paper, Will Travel

Well, we all know how important it is to pack everything you need for a long trip. However, if you forget your toothpaste or deodorant, you can always pick up something at the chemist shop at your destination, right? Well, in the panic buying atmosphere that swooped in with the Coronavirus, you might be out of luck. So, on a flight from Melbourne to Japan, one Twitter user noted that another passenger prepared for all contingencies while traveling—even bringing their own toilet paper on the plane.^[5]

I wonder if they had to buy this multi-pack of TP its own ticket?

10 Creative Ways We’ve Gotten Through Wartime Rationing

5 Precious as Gold

A Los Angeles jeweler felt that a roll of toilet paper had become more precious than gold, using the shortage as a clever marketing ploy.

Perhaps hoping his excess stock of rings would clear as fast as a toilet paper delivery, a Nevada jeweler was offering a single roll of quality toilet paper for USD 3,999. While this would seem a little exorbitant even in the current shortage, the deal does include a free one-carat diamond ring.^[6]

4 Forgotten Loot

Hidden treasure is often found when clearing out the homes of elderly relatives. Precious artworks, valuable antiques, hidden loots of jewelry or stashes of cash are often uncovered, But who would think a five year supply of toilet paper would ever be an exciting find?

In Sydney, Australia, a man was trawling through the contents of his late father’s storeroom when he discovered what would have been quite a boring find a few months ago. Stacked in the corner were some 270 rolls of 1980s toilet paper, which his father must have bought in bulk forty years ago and forgotten about.

He was inundated with responses to a Facebook post offering the stash to the desperate or needy.^[7]

3 Should Have Bought 2-Ply

We’ve all witnessed the scenes of greedy shoppers filling trolleys with toilet paper, paper towels, and tissues. “Where on earth will they store it all?” is a frequently asked question.

A UK driver failed to consider when he stacked his van full of the sought-after paper products. When police pulled the driver over in Blackwell, they discovered his selfish loot had placed his vehicle over the legal tare limits. His savings went down the toilet when he was slapped with a GBP 300 fine. Perhaps if he had stuck to two-ply, he might have stayed underweight.^[8]

2 Floral Bouquet

Remember floral toilet paper? Some of the premium brands featured floral printed rolls, with a choice of bouquet scents to enhance your bathroom experience.

If you miss these floral bathroom tributes, for just $75 US, an Arkansas florist will provide you with a blooming bouquet—of toilet rolls.

Just ordinary two-ply, nothing fancy, but these days most of us will grab what we can get. Created from his personal “pre-corona” stash, the extraordinary “floral” tribute contains the usual ribbons and greenery highlighting the bouquet’s centerpiece, multiple rolls of toilet paper. If you get really desperate, you might even be able to resort to using the greenery.^[9]

1 Old-Fashioned “Dunny Squares”

We Australians are known for our cheeky responses to any crisis, with many social media memes reminding us of the benefits of newspaper. Or “dunny squares” as they used to be known in our grandparents’ days.

A Northern Territory newspaper gave its readers a hilarious solution to the toilet paper crisis, maintaining the relevance of print media in the modern world.

Reviving the old tradition of cut-up newspaper hanging from a string on the door of the outdoor loo, the “NT News” printed 8 blank pages for readers to use as an emergency supply. The pages even provided handy cutlines so readers could maximize the capacity of their emergency bog roll supply. Unfortunately the free gift didn’t come with disposal instructions.^[10]

See Also: Top 10 Tips To Prepare For A New Great Depression

No one likes to feel embarrassed for any reason. It’s one of the more unpleasant sensations you can deal with that doesn’t include any physical pain and in the worst instances it can really harm someone emotionally or psychologically. 

There are ways to deal with embarrassment to make sure it doesn’t affect you but not everyone is able to cope with it as well as others. Sometimes the reactions are completely unexpected and extreme.

10. KISS Made a Movie No One Was Allowed to Talk About

KISS was hands down one of the biggest rock n’ roll acts of the ’70s and well beyond. Their shows were theatrical in ways few others were and the band members created personas to go along with the makeup they wore for their performances. It’s no wonder that there was some crossover appeal, and the idea arose that maybe the band should be involved in a movie. So along came 1978’s KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park. 

The movie is a made for TV feature and it was produced by cartoon company Hanna-Barbera which explains the nearly Scooby Doo name for the film and its plot which involves the band using magical powers to protect an amusement park from a sinister inventor who wants to tear it down.

The movie was objectively bad. We know this because even KISS hates it. Paul Stanley says they were sold on the idea of the movie when they were told it was like A Hard Day’s Night meets Star Wars. He also said he and the rest of the band were idiots who didn’t know anything. 

Stanley said it’s kitsch these days, but it was never meant to be while also acknowledging that no one in the band read the script. He said he was so embarrassed upon his initial viewing he basically slid down onto the floor.

Stanley said it’s kitsch these days but it was never meant to be while also acknowledging that no one in the band read the script. He said he was so embarrassed upon his initial viewing he basically slid down onto the floor.

Though the band seems to have more or less come to terms with how bad it is, for years no one who worked for them was even allowed to mention it around them.

9. King Francis Found the Erotic Artwork of Pompeii So Embarrassing He Locked It Up

The city of Pompeii was destroyed by the sudden and devastating eruption of Mt. Vesuvius all the way back in the year 79. The remains were only discovered in the year 1748 and the stark contrast between Victorian sensibilities and those of the ancient residents of Pompeii did not go unnoticed. 

The people on Pompeii were not ashamed of art that included depictions of sex and nudity. But the Victorians certainly were, at least publicly. The erotic artworks were so shocking that Kin Francis had what he considered the worst of it locked away in a secret room after viewing a display in 1819.

The secret room was not fully secret, of course. It could be accessed by “people of mature age and respected morals” which seemed to mean rich men who could afford to see the King’s historical peep show. 

To outsiders it was just an example of the King being embarrassed by what he’d seen since he had gone to the museum exhibit with his wife and daughter for his initial viewing. . 

8. A Russian Chess Master Who Lost to Bobby Fischer Was Punished by His Government

The Soviet Union had a chip on its shoulder when it came to international competition. Rocky gave us a nice fictional version of this with Ivan Drago taking on Rocky, but in real life their chess champ Mark Taimanov dealt with a much worse fate when he proved himself unable to show Soviet dominance. 

In 1971 Taimanov faced off against US champion Bobby Fischer. Taimanov lost 0-6. This loss wasn’t just the loss of a chess game for the Soviets. Mired in the Cold War as they were, it was symbolic and it was considered a massive embarrassment to lose so badly. So they responded in the worst way possible by punishing Taimanov for his failure. 

He was stripped of any titles he had earned and forbidden from traveling. Taimanov had been a pianist aside from being a chess player and the travel restriction meant he had no real way to earn a living anymore, which was intentional. As a Soviet grandmaster, his salary was entirely from the government. They took it from him and left him nothing for two years. 

7. The Guillotin Family Changed Their Family Name

The guillotine is one of the more infamous creations of the French Revolution and synonymous with both the end of the aristocracy and, of course, beheadings. It’s named for Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, a doctor and the man often listed as the device’s inventor. 

Not only did Guillotin not invent the guillotine, he didn’t even like it. He was against the death penalty entirely. However, as a doctor, he wanted to ensure those who were executed were executed as humanely as possible and it was his opinion that the guillotine was the best method France had available when compared to being burned or drawn and quartered. So he reluctantly and unintentionally became the tool’s spokesman in that regard. He convinced the government to use it as the only method of execution.

His family hated that the machine was named after him and even tried to get the government to change the name. They refused. As a last resort, out of sheer embarrassment, they changed their own name to avoid any association. 

6. Stethoscopes Were Invented by a Doctor Too Embarrassed to Listen to the Chest of a Female Patient

A stethoscope is a pretty ubiquitous tool in the world of doctors today but it wasn’t always so. The device only exists because one doctor in the 1860s was too embarrassed to do his job properly.

The stethoscope is used to listen to a heartbeat. Most doctors did this by just putting their ear to a patient’s chest. But French doctor Rene Laennec felt too uncomfortable doing this to female patients. And, in fairness, female patients of male doctors are probably happy to have less direct contact.

In order to get past the discomfort of actually touching his patient, Laennec rolled a tube of paper and used that. He was surprised to notice it worked better than his ear alone. He went on to refine the design by using a wooden tube and they evolved from there.

5. Edward De Vere Farted in Front of the Queen and Exiled Himself for 7 Years

Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford was born in 1550 and had an experience no one ever wants. When in the presence of the Queen. His claim to fame comes from a book called Brief Lives by John Aubrey. In it, Aubrey describes the incident in which the Earl met the Queen and let loose a fart in her presence.

So embarrassed was De Vere that he immediately left court and stayed out of England for 7 years in an effort to try to live it down. When he finally returned the Queen was more than welcoming and remarked “My lord, I had forgot the fart.”

4. George Levick Observed Embarrassing Sexuality in Penguins So he Wrote About Them in Greek To Hide the Truth

There’s a reason that we use words like “animalistic,” “savage,” and “bestial” to describe when people are acting a certain way. We describe extreme behaviors in terms we’d use to describe the behavior of animals because they lack the reason and intelligence we expect from human behavior. Usually these words describe violence but they can also describe something remarkably stupid, clumsy or, in some cases, sexual. And that’s where the embarrassment comes in. 

If you’re describing animal behavior, you shouldn’t expect it to have any of the same decorum or morality of human behavior, but explorer Dr. George Levick was not prepared for that when he made it to Antarctica in 1910. When confronted by penguins for the first time, birds he would go on to describe as “hooligans” but not in a way that was meant to be funny, he was shocked. 

The sexual activities he observed among penguins included necrophilia and other unpalatable behaviors. So, despite writing about them, he was too embarrassed to actually share any of his observations. The pamphlet he wrote, “Sexual Habits of Adélie Penguins,” was written entirely in Greek so few if any people back home in England would understand it. Only the “educated” would be able to understand and deal with the shocking truth of penguins. 

3. Orson Welles was Embarrassed By His Own Nose 

To this day, Orson Welles is regarded as one of the best filmmakers of all time. His masterpiece Citizen Kane is considered one of, if not the single greatest film of all time by many critics while some consider Touch of Evil to be even better. 

He was a writer, a director and an actor of great acclaim so it’s kind of curious to note that he suffered a remarkable insecurity in his work life. Welles was terribly embarrassed by his own nose. 

If you watch enough of his films, you’ll notice something unusual about his face. His nose changes from role to role and it almost never looks the same twice. That’s because he was wearing a fake nose in every film he made. He was constantly wearing prosthetics so no one could see his real nose. 

Welles felt his real nose was too small and lacked character. This became such a problem that, on one film, they had to wait two days to film anything because Welles’ nose was lost in transit.

2. Hail to the Chief Was Used to Prevent James Polk From being Embarrassed That No One Noticed Him

If you’re an American or even just someone who’s seen a movie featuring an American President entering a room, you’ve probably heard the song Hail to the Chief. It’s the standard music to introduce the President to a crowd and signal that they have arrived. 

The history of the song dates back to a poem well before it was set to music. It was used to honor George Washington once sometime after his death but the first use of the song for a living President was in 1828 when it was performed for John Quincy Adams. 

Julia Tyler, wife of John Tyler, was the first to ask that it be used to announce her husband’s arrival. But we can thank Sarah Polk, wife of James Polk, who decided it should be standard routine for the song to be played every time the President arrived somewhere. 

The reason for Polk was that her husband was not a man with a commanding presence and it seemed like no one noticed when he arrived most times so, to avoid the embarrassment of no one realizing he was there, the song would make sure everyone knew. 

1. Japan Has Many Sound-Masking Toilet Technologies

There aren’t a lot of things that are so embarrassing on a cultural level that whole industries spring up to profit off of it but there is at least one such case in Japan. 

The cultural taboo around the sounds made in the bathroom has become so prominent that numerous products have been developed to help mask, subdue, overwhelm and disguise those noises so everyone can pretend they don’t exist. 

The Sound Princess or Otohime is one such device. It creates the sound of running water to mask the sound of urination. For a time, the embarrassment over having to hear their own urination had led some women to just constantly flush the toilet again and again to mask it. The Sound Princess was a much simpler and more ecologically friendly way to accomplish the same goal. 

Japan has dozens of high-tech toilet designs these days, all of which seem to include some kind of sound masking technology to assist those who want to mask their own noises. This actually dates back to at least the Edo period in Japan in the 1600s. Bamboo taps would allow water to flow to disguise the sounds of anyone using the facilities.

For a lot of people food is something in which they can take joy and comfort. We indulge in junk food, try to eat healthy food, make too much food to celebrate special occasions and, thanks to the internet, we can learn about new and exotic foods to try from all over the world. But there are issues we need to be wary of, like over indulging, and food allergies, and safety in terms of food prep. But even the most wary and responsible among us would be unlikely to have seen any of these bizarre reactions to food coming. 

10. A Collapsed Lung Caused by Ghost Peppers

If you’ve ever tried to eat a ghost pepper before you know that you should probably never eat a ghost pepper. They average about 1 million Scoville heat units. Compare that to sriracha which, at best, is about 2,500. For most people, eating a ghost pepper will cause extreme discomfort, sweating, drooling and potentially some stomach upset. That’s a good reaction, though, relatively speaking. 

A 47-year-old man who had entered a ghost pepper eating challenge. After suffering some severe pain and vomiting he was taken to the hospital. Doctors discovered that he was suffering from an esophageal rupture, which means he ended up tearing a hole in his throat as a result of eating the pepper. He also suffered a pneumothorax, better known as a collapsed lung. 

The hole in the man’s throat was leaking food into his chest cavity including hamburger, onion and “green vomitous material.” It’s been suggested he wasn’t even eating pure peppers, but a burger with peppers on it, then he chugged a bunch of water afterwards. He spent 23 days in hospital as a result, and still had a breathing tube when he left. 

9. Carb-Heavy Foods Leading to Drunkenness

You’ve probably experienced some stomach upset at least once in your life after eating something that wasn’t necessarily bad, it just didn’t agree with you. Maybe it made you feel sick, or maybe it just made you gassy, who’s to say? The stomach is a weird and wonderful place, and no one knows this better than a 61-year-old Texas man whose claim to fame is an inexplicable beer gut.

Rather than excess weight from drinking beer, this beer gut refers to the way the man digests food. He went to the hospital suffering from dizziness and related issues and a blood test revealed his blood alcohol was 0.37% which is indicative of being pretty drunk. The weird part, of course, was that the man had not had any alcohol. 

As it happens, the man suffers from a condition called auto-brewery syndrome. Doctors initially brushed it off as the man basically being a liar. They assumed he was drinking in secret and not admitting to it. After keeping him under observation and determining his alcohol levels would rise even when he clearly wasn’t drinking, they discovered that he had an abundance of brewer’s yeast in his digestive tract. As he ate any carbs, the yeast and sugars combined to start producing alcohol inside his body.

The condition is pretty rare and not enough studies have been done to verify much about it, but it does seem linked to the use of antibiotics, which may kill off other gut bacteria. 

8. Black Licorice Heart Attacks

Black licorice is a bit of a maligned treat in the candy world and routinely shows up on lists of the worst candy ever. Still, some people have a taste for it and, as if to validate all the haters out there, that could be a very bad thing. Eating large quantities of black licorice carries some serious health risks that you might not expect from run-of-the-mill candy.

Black licorice has been linked to at least one death due to a heart attack. The man was 54-years-old and had been eating an entire bag or two of black licorice every day for weeks. He collapsed and then died 24 hours after getting to the hospital.  His blood tests showed incredibly low potassium which is caused by something called glycyrrhizin. It’s what makes black licorice sweet, but it’s clearly dangerous. 

Low potassium can dangerously alter heart rhythms and that, combined with the man’s already poor health owing to smoking and a poor diet, led to the fatal heart attack. Obviously you need to consume large quantities of licorice to suffer this fate, but it can happen.

7. A Throat Swelling Shut From Hot Food

Getting your food piping hot is usually a good thing because most meals just taste better that way. But there are levels of heat and you’ve probably burnt your tongue at least once when you realized something wasn’t cool enough to eat yet. So what do you do when food is too hot? Most of us wait, or maybe blow on it to speed the process up. Sadly, that was not what Darren Hickey did. 

The 51-year-old man worked as a wedding planner and was at a venue where a chef offered him a fish cake to try. He must have eaten too quickly as the cake was hot and, rather than spit it out, he simply swallowed it. The fish cake burned the back of his throat and for a time he seemed fine. However, as the day progressed, the burn began to swell until it caused his throat to constrict so much he could no longer breathe. He died as a result of his injuries.

6. Death Caused by Fermented Corn Noodles

Most of us in the Western world eat noodles made from wheat, and occasionally we’ll have rice noodles as well. But you can make noodles out of a lot of different ingredients and that includes corn. A Chinese dish called suantangzi is made with fermented corn noodles and that’s where the problem arose for a family in China that consumed the dish back in 2020. Nine family members ended up dying.

There is a bacterium that can grow in corn which produces something called bongkrekic acid as a by-product. The bacteria that produces it is nearly impossible to get rid of, you can’t wash it off and you can’t cook it out, either. It has no taste or odor so you can’t tell if your food is infected.

Consuming infected grain leads to vomiting and abdominal pain and the mortality rate is pretty high. The only method of prevention is to basically not eat fermented grains at all. 

5. Severe Gastrointestinal Distress from Escolar

The saying “there’s plenty of fish in the sea” is typically a reference to romantic prospects but it’s also just an accurate observation. There are lots of fish in the sea and humans tend to only consume a small number of them as a food source. Tuna, salmon, and bass are all very common. But what about escolar?

Unscrupulous fish sellers will sometimes swap escolar for tuna because it’s cheaper. By all accounts, escolar is a tasty fish, but it’s not ideal for most people to eat thanks to a natural wax in the fish’s flesh that can, in some people, cause keriorrhea. Even if you don’t know that word, the suffix must be ringing a few bells. It’s a specific kind of diarrhea that you can Google if you’re feeling adventurous and is known to be caused by escolar anywhere between 30 minutes and 36 hours after eating it.

While some people will hide the fish, pretending it’s tuna, other places sell it openly as white tuna, butterfish, rudderfish or Hawaiian walu, because it really is considered tasty and it doesn’t cause the adverse reaction in everyone, making it kind of like the seafood version of Russian Roulette. It earned escolar the nickname of Ex-Lax Fish. 

4. Dreamfish Hallucinations

Along the coasts of Africa and Europe you can find a fish called salema porgy, but it’s more often called dreamfish. People have been eating them since Ancient Rome and probably before, but it’s definitely not an everyday sort of thing owing to the fact these little fish will make you trip out. They contain hallucinogenic compounds similar to LSD. 

Despite the effects, or because of them, you can find the fish on menus throughout Europe, you just need to be cautious when eating it. Some people have noted that they’re pretty incapable of doing even basic tasks after eating the fish. At least one diner claimed to have seen the Angel of Death while other people have hallucinated Batman or the chatter of birds. As in, they could see the sounds birds were making. 

It’s not all fun and games, however, as abdominal pain, amnesia and paralysis are also potential effects, along with “brain electricity.”

3. Popcorn Lung from Microwave Popcorn 

Microwave popcorn is over 40 years old at this point and has been a staple of movie nights at home for that entire time. Who doesn’t love a bag of pre-buttered popcorn that’s ready in two minutes? But there is a little known dark side to microwave popcorn that’s known as popcorn lung. Sounds a bit silly, but it had the potential to be fatal.

Popcorn lung happens when the bronchioles of your lungs become damaged and inflamed from inhaling toxins. It gets its name because of how closely tied to popcorn the disease was. In fact, it was first identified in workers at a popcorn factory and later popped up in some people who ate large amounts of microwave popcorn at home.

Popcorn used to be processed with a chemical called diacetyl. That was what made it taste like butter without having to use real butter which would go bad in a package of popcorn. 

If that wasn’t bad enough, the chemicals in the popcorn bags themselves were also determined to contain perfluorinated compounds, which have been linked to cancer. 

2. Nardoo Poisoning

Most of us have likely not heard of nardoo, but it’s an edible fern you can find in Australia. Aboriginal people have known of it for ages and they can show you how to cook and eat it too, if you want. And, if you don’t want to suffer the potential lethal consequences of eating it, you really should follow their instructions.

Nardoo’s big claim to fame dates back to 1861 when Robert O’Hara Burke and William John Wills tried to be the first non-aboriginals to cross Australia from South to North. Within three months their supplies ran low, and some locals showed them how to make nardoo. With an abundant supply, they continued to eat it, up to five pounds of it a day, but there was a problem. Despite eating, they were growing weak. They lost weight, their heart rates slowed, and they began to shake frequently. They were starving, but didn’t realize it.

Nardoo contains an enzyme called thiaminase. It prevents the body from processing thiamine, which is vitamin B1 and that, in turn, prevents you from metabolizing energy from the food you eat. So you can eat and eat and eat but get no nutritional benefits. 

What Wills and Burke failed to realize was that the aboriginals had been roasting the seed pods of the nardoo before preparing it. Heat breaks down the thiaminase and makes it edible. They were eating it raw. Both men died from it as a result.

1. A Sexually Transmitted Allergy

Nut allergies are so commonplace that kids can no longer have peanut butter in most schools and peanuts were replaced by pretzels on airplanes. But the extent to which a person may suffer a nut allergy is not something most of us fully understand because, in some cases, it’s almost unbelievable. That’s the case with a couple who were written about in a medical journal back in 2007.

In this case, the man in the couple had eaten Brazil nuts two or three hours before getting together with his girlfriend, who they were both aware was allergic to the nuts. He claimed to have already bathed and brushed his teeth before seeing her so there was no chance of a reaction. However, there was still a reaction, and a very specific one in a very sensitive location that manifested after they had sex, if you catch our meaning. 

Further testing showed that the allergens from the nuts were actually transmitted through her boyfriend’s semen during intercourse causing her to have an allergic reaction. There’s evidence of a similar situation happening to another woman indicating allergies can be essentially sexually transmitted.