1. Walter Williams Alive Inside Body Bag
Workers at a Mississippi funeral home say they found a man alive and kicking when they opened a body bag. Holmes County Coroner Dexter Howard calls it a miracle that 78-year-old Walter Williams is alive. The coroner was called to Williams’ home in Lexington, a community north of Jackson, where family members believed he had died. Luckily he returned to consciousness before the embalming began.
2. Student Dies, Wakes Up in Morgue
A computer programming student was undergoing surgery in Costa Rica, when she died, experienced the afterlife, then returned to her body—in the morgue.
Graciela H. shares her story on the Near Death Experience Research Foundation website:
“I opened my eyes, everything around was metal doors, people on metal tables, one body had another body on top. I recognized the place: I was in the morgue.
“I felt ice on my eyelashes, my body was cold. [I] could not feel anything. … [I wasn’t] even able to move my neck or talk.
“I was feeling sleepy. … [Two or three hours] later, I heard voices, [and I] opened my eyes again. I saw two male nurses. … I knew I had to make … eye contact with one of them. I barely had strength to blink my eyes again and again, but I did. [It] took a lot of energy.
“[One of the nurses looked] at me, scared, … [telling] his partner: ‘Look, look, she is moving her eyes!’ Laughing, [he] said, ‘Let’s go, this place is scary.’
“Inside of me, I was screaming, ‘Please, don’t leave!’
“I didn’t close my eyes until the nurses came, and doctors. All I heard is [someone say], ‘Who did this? Who sent this patient to the morgue?’ The doctors were mad. I closed my eyes until was sure I was far away from that place. I didn’t wake up until three or four days later.”
Read more of Graciela’s story by clicking here.
3. Kenyan Man Attempts Suicide, Pronounced Dead, Returns to Life
Earlier this year, Paul Mutora attempted to kill himself by swallowing insecticide. He was pronounced dead and brought to the mortuary at Naivasha hospital, about 50 miles north-west of Nairobi, Kenya.
When Mutora began to stir, a witness told local publication the Star, “The mortuary attendant and a worker took to their heels screaming.”
A doctor said Mutora’s pulse may have been faint due to a drug used to treat him, causing medical staff to wrongly declare him dead. Mutora said it was a mistake to attempt suicide and he apologized to his family.
Image of a body in a morgue via Shutterstock
4. Venezuelan Man Wakes Up During His Own Autopsy
In 2007, Carlos Camejo was thought dead after an automobile accident. Examiners began to cut into his body during an autopsy. Camejo told local publication El Universal: “I woke up because the pain was unbearable.”
His wife thought she was arriving at the morgue to identify his body, but instead she found him alive, albeit perturbed.
5. South African Man Spends 21 Hours in Morgue, Screams as He Awakes
A man in his 60s who did not wish to be identified woke up in the morgue with a scream. Sizwe Kupelo, spokesman for the Eastern Cape Health Department, told ABC News following the incident in 2011: “Two workers heard screaming from the refrigerators. ... They thought it was a ghost and they ran for their lives.”
The man had suffered a severe asthma attack, which his family thought killed him. They contacted a private undertaker instead of paramedics.
