pjc (01/10/83)
I get extremely upset when people decide to commit suicide
by hanging themselves, and don't do it correctly. Of course
I can not claim myself as being an expert, because the experts
learn by experimentation; better a live amateur than a dead
expert.
Getting back to the subject, I would like to talk about the
most common mistake people make when they decide to hang
themselves, incorrect choice of rope length. Rope that is too
short or too long will both bring about undesirable results.
If it is too short, than the person will choke to death, which
is said to be a very uncomfortable death. If it is too long,
than the force of the person drop will rip his or her head off,
resulting in a messy cleanup situation. However, if chosen
correctly, the right length rope will snap the neck and break
the spinal cord. Ahaa! For the benefit of you as well as
others, a humane and clean termination of one's life!
I have no specifications or charts of a persons weight versus
rope length; perhaps someone can assist me in this area. If
this all seems a little complicated, than a guillotine is
probably more of what you had in mind. The results are the
same, but there is less room for operator error. Then again,
if you decided to kill yourself, one more screw-up wouldn't
make a hell of difference!
Peter Chokolageo (01/13/83)
Seriously, your article reminded me of an article I read on the net some time ago. Someone talked of a french scientist who, when he was sentenced to the guillotine, arranged to have one of his students standing by, to time how long he was able to blink, and thus to determine how long consciousness would last once your head was struck from your body. Would the original author, or any other knowledgable soul fill us in: who was the scientist? how long *did* he maintain consciousness? Geo Swan, Integrated Studies, University of Waterloo
soreff (01/22/83)
Are the two expiration modes really different? A broken neck normally severs the spinal cord, paralysing the muscles needed in respiration. Isn't halting respiration the immediate cause of death in both cases?
billw (03/09/83)
#R:houxq:-24300:sri-unix:2200003:000:683 sri-unix!billw Jan 19 19:08:00 1983 Actually, There are too methods of dying by hanging. One is strangulation, and the other by a broken neck. Rumor has it that when you are hung for committing a crime, the way you die is at the discretion of the hangman. You can help to insure the neck snapping by placing the knot of the noose towards one side of neck, rather than right at the back. This insures stess in several directions. I suspect that in order to use a rope long enough to cause your help to be pulled off would require an outdoor arena, where the mess wouldnt matter much anyway (skin and bones are tough stuff). If you want to create a mess, try wire, which will much more PSI than the thicker rope...