WEEKLY GROSS-OUT: Suicide

Why suicide? Because on this day in 2004, some bellend named Brian Drysdale engaged in a successful suicide attempt and killed six more people (the train driver and five passengers, one of which survived but then died in hospital) in the process. That night at 6:12pm GMT (7:12 the following morning New Zealand Daylight Time), the First Great Western 17:35 service from Paddington Station (in London) to Plymouth (an InterCity 125 led by a Class 43 power car) collided with a stationary automobile at an automatic level crossing close to the rural Berkshire village of Ufton Nervet. The inquest concluded in November of 2007 that the accident was caused by Drysdale, at the time a chef at the nearby Wokefield Park Hotel, committing suicide by parking his car on the crossing. This is a reason why suicide should never be attempted. Killing yourself is one thing, but in this particular case, six others died in the process. And besides, killing others in the process is the main goal of suicide bombers, of which one detonated a bomb in the Hama province of Syria yesterday killing 50 Syrian military personnel. This attack is the largest attack on Bashar al-Assad's forces in the civil war so far.