Burial Blunder & a Tour de Hearse | 4M #28

Welcome to the twenty-eighth edition of Morticians’ Monday Morning Mashup, where we’ll serve up bite-sized, easily-digestible nuggets of the deathcare news you need to crush conversations in the week ahead. Bon appetit!

Nobody wins in transport van vs. horse trailer

A five-vehicle crash in New Jersey last week proved that a standard funeral home transport van is no match for a crew cab pickup towing a horse trailer. Three people were taken to the hospital with minor injuries, and the horse was unharmed. However, the occupant in the back of the van wasn’t so lucky. The van driver had just picked up a body and was en route to the funeral home when the pickup plowed into the back of the vehicle, ejecting the deceased. Or, in the eloquent words of the local police chief, the “corpse” actually “popped out of the vehicle.” Thankfully, the body didn’t suffer further injury, and another funeral home employee completed the transport of the precious cargo.

Ukranians using AI technology to identify dead Russians

Several weeks ago we wrote about how the Ukrainians and the Russians were each handling their deceased soldiers. We reported at the time that the incredibly courageous and gracious Ukrainians were trying to notify Russian families via social media and a website of the status of their deceased or captured soldiers — something the Russian leaders weren’t doing. Last week we heard that Ukraine had taken this one step further, using facial recognition technology to identify dead Russian soldiers in order to notify their families of the deaths and add transparency to the growing death toll in the Russian army. The technology is controversial — the potential for misuse in the wrong hands is terrifying. However, you have to applaud the Ukrainian people for even taking the initiative to do something so brave and good, even if there is a bit of an ulterior motive.

Bronx burial goes horribly wrong

What would you do if you arrived at a cemetery, only to find that the hole dug at the plot wasn’t wide enough to receive the casket? Hopefully you wouldn’t handle it the way the workers in a New York cemetery did. A lawsuit alleges that even though the grave was noticeably too small for the casket, workers “continued to push and pull the coffin from all sides, with one worker even removing its flowers” in an attempt to make it fit. They tried so hard that the casket lid opened, the deceased was jostled to the point that her hands unfolded, and the casket was bent and unable to fully close — and all of this happened in full view of the family, the pastor, and the shocked funeral director. Only after the pastor and the deceased’s children begged the workers to stop did they raise the casket — only to leave it in the hearse in the June heat for over an hour as they tried to enlarge the grave. Eventually, the director returned the body to the funeral home, transferred her to a new casket, and — three hours later — continued the burial service.

Accidental cremation means man will be Left Behind?

Many Christians believe in the Rapture, when God’s chosen people will ascend into heaven, leaving everyone else on Earth behind. This belief extends to those who are already deceased; when the Rapture happens, their bodies will also be “preserved for eternity.” That’s why one “extremely religious” family is suing a funeral home in Arkansas for accidentally cremating their loved one in 2019. The family believes that since he was cremated, his body will be excluded from the Rapture. The funeral home has admitted their mistake, waived the funeral expenses, and returned a $5,000 fee the family paid for burial insurance, but the suit is still pending. Yet another reason to invest in a chain of custody system!

Proposed Colorado program should be law everywhere

Colorado lawmakers realize that you deathcare professionals are the most stoic, compassionate, and empathetic individuals on the planet — but even heroes need help sometimes. That’s why they’ve introduced House Bill 22-1221, which would require the state’s Behavioral Health Administration to create the County Coroner and Mortuary Mental Health and Wellness Program. The program would provide mental health services to all deathcare workers, from the coroner to funeral home volunteers. Funeral homes and businesses would have to pay for their employee’s service if health insurance wouldn’t cover it, but the program will open the door for anyone in the field to get help — something not everyone is willing to admit they need. One has to wonder, though, if this deathcare bill will somehow make up for the other one that was just signed into law in the state, which allows regulatory agencies to inspect funeral homes and crematories without notice or consent.

South Africa expo celebrates deathcare’s need for speed

From the “bespoke” bat-wing hearse to the blue BMW-themed casket, the displays at last week’s Funerex funeral industry expo exposed South Africa’s population of “hardened petrolheads.” The celebration continued outside, where 120 hearses paraded around a racetrack in the hopes of beating the standing Guinness World Record for the number of hearses gathered in one place. The current record of 107, by the way, was set at the same venue in 2019.

FAKE NEWS!!!!!

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