This Paranormal Life - #043 Spontaneous Human Combustion

Episode Date: January 9, 2018

On December 27th 2017 a man in Hull burst into flames in the street, the police could find no cause. In September 2017 in North London a man burst into flames walking down a street.Emergency services can determine no cause, is it paranormal? Kit and Rory will get to the bottom of it. On this episode of This Paranormal Life!Support us on Patreon.com/ThisParanormalLife to get access to weekly bonus episodes!Buy Official TPL Merch! - thisparanormallife.com/storeFollow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTubeJoin our Secret Society Facebook CommunityIntro music by www.purple-planet.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During the full moon, do werewolves turn into humans? Is Tom Cruise right and Scientology is the only way? Answers to these questions and more on this episode of This Paranormal Life. Hey! Welcome back to the podcast. It is once again Tuesday. This is the only podcast where every week we dissect a different paranormal tale, claim, or case and we get to the bottom of it yep yep yep yep as always rory we're just gonna jump right into it good there's nothing i hate more

than when a podcast f***ing waffles they go freaking pancake day on us and waffle all the way to the bank okay i'm just gonna jump right into it because it's a pretty it a pretty crazy case. Okay. It's 1951 in St. Petersburg. Right. Florida. Oh. That was a weird thing to pause at because you know it would throw me. I was trying to throw you. Granted, keep you on your toes.

It was a sunny day in Rome. Georgia. There were clouds looming in Paris. Texas. So rude whenever they just pick the name of a great place. Yeah. And it's always a tiny shitty town, isn't it? Of course. It was a sunny day in greater New York, but f*** nowhere. So we're in St. Petersburg, Florida in 1951, just to recap for y'all. And Miss Carpenter is walking to the apartment she rents out with a telegram

for her tenant mary while she climbs the stairs and arrives at the floor where she knocks mary's door i should have done that sorry that was kit leaning across the podcast awkwardly i actually pulled my back he knocked over a glass of water as well i don't know if i can finish the podcast also i fried the electronics. Well, she might be out the back. And Miss Carpenter had a key, so she decided to just stick it in the lock, turn the handle on. Oh! The door handle is scalding hot.

What? Roasting. Fire. She recoiled in pain. Jesus Christ, that can only mean one thing. You're right, Roy. It's fire. She immediately runs to the nearest phone to call the emergency services. Before long, police were on the scene

and busting down the door, action movie style, expecting a ferocious blaze, and let's just pray that she's not inside with it. Right. But as the door swings open, the apartment's fine. Where did all that heat come from? They dart around the room to look for clues and signs of Mary's whereabouts.

But to their horror, they find what's left of her in an armchair in the living room. In the chair, one foot still inside its slipper, a single backbone, and Mary's skull also sitting there in a pile of ashes. But her skull is reduced to the size of a teacup. Like shrunk, like a tiny skull, or like that's a piece of the skull that remains? No, it's like a tiny skull. A shrunken little skull! A shrunken skull.

Everything else is in a pile of ashes on the chair. There was almost no signs of a blaze, except anything made of plastic near the armchair was slightly melted out of shape, and in the corner of a room, a digital clock stopped at 2.26am, presumably the time of her death. Weird. When evidence was sent to the FBI for investigation, they couldn't understand the circumstances of Mary's death. Her- Because they sent him a melted Barbie head. That's probably what it looked like. I would love it to be the person

who hands over this evidence without any context. It's like, sir, what can you make of this? A tiny burnt head and a clock that stopped working. The policeman's like, I think I need to arrest you. I don't know what this is. I think you're going to prison. I know. What case did this come from? What side did this come from? Oh, I'm sorry. I don't know what this is. I think you're going to prison. I know. What case did this come from?

What side did this come from? Oh, I'm sorry. I don't work here. I just wanted to show you some stuff. Yeah. What can you make of this? It's like the bit we did about the guy that can't comprehend that he's being executed for what he's done. Oh, yeah, yeah.

And he's like, this dude is brought to the jail. So I was like, you're going to here um and then you're getting the chair and he's like and detective the bars what do you what do you make of these it's like you're not grasping the seriousness of this conversation what is your last meal waffles of course but but what would you make of them yeah they didn't know what to think her body was almost completely cremated, requiring extremely high temperatures, except the blaze did not spread at all. Quote, we request any information or theories that could explain how a human body could be so destroyed and the fire confined to such a small area and so little damage done to the structure of the building and the

furniture in the room not even scorched or damaged by smoke. Mary's remains were... I don't know why I find this funny, but in a room... I don't either, kid, personally. I'm sorry. I think it's pretty messed up. I'm sorry.

You even f***ing giggled at that. I actually have a diaphragm issue that causes everything to be fr***ing hilarious to me. Ha ha ha! Sorry, it's just a tick that i have um with my friend i'm actually really sad as shit if only the giggles did reflect my inner mood i don't know why it's so alive why is Why is it so mysterious as well? I don't think we'll ever find who murdered him. It sounded like you murdered him. Sorry, no, it is the giggling.

I really know nothing. Or so you'd think. Well, that was just a weird thing to say. Don't say that if you know you're gonna giggle at the point. Yeah, that bit's not a tick. The blood on your clothes, not a tick. That that's evidence that's what i might want you to think sorry i do that too sometimes you need to see a doctor i think you're dying how did you get this far in life you're pretty well dressed i don't know how those are the most terrible combo

of things that you can do is to scream but because it looks like you're laughing at the fact that you have, you're screaming. If you're waiting in a shop and then just in the woman's ear in front of you and turns around. I have a condition. What's your condition? I'm a dick. I like to scare people. So, yeah, so they go into this room, and the room is pretty much fine. There's some scorching.

Yes, some ashes. Of course, yeah. For Mary, where they basically, like, take the temperature of Mary's ashes, I guess, to see how recent this happened. They're still warm. Well, I guess they might be, yeah? They're 2,000 degrees. Jesus Christ!

2,000. Like, if you want to bake a cake, that's pretty hot. That's probably 180 degrees Celsius. But isn't it if you heat ash, you get glass? Isn't that? You get nano diamonds, I think. You get Bitcoin. I don't know.

Ethereum at least. I don't know a lot about ash. But I'm fairly sure if you heat it and maybe smash it together. I think it is something. I think you get under very maybe smash it together or something, it becomes glass. I think you get under very high pressure, yeah. Oh, is that it? Pressure and heat? Yeah, I think that's why it's explosions. Because we covered that in Tunguska, didn't we?

We said it was aliens, actually. Sorry. So her remains are about 2,000 degrees. You could roast a pretty schmallow on that, bad boy. Sorry, that's so distasteful. No, actually, that's what the uh chief investigator on this is so offensive sir sorry how are you the director of the fbi everyone's afraid of me you wouldn't say no to me i started as a janitor and i giggled my way to the top. Giggled and screamed my way to the top.

The FBI, which of course stands for famous but incompetent, quickly brushed this case aside as an example of what they call the wick effect. Right. Meaning some fire source set her on fire and her body fat acted like candle wax and burned her up like a goddamn candle. Good lord. Case closed as far as they were concerned. Was she a robust woman?

I think so. A hefty lady? I think she was like decently heavyset in the way that, you know, old ladies are. Yeah. But I mean, humans aren't just like little sticks of TNT, you know? I've burnt myself numerous times. And you don't just go up in flames just

explode yeah just like one of those firecrackers twirling like a pinwheel shooting sparks out of my ears exactly that's not what happens to people you know you get a little bit of your uh burnt skin and what this reeks of is some pen pusher just, you know, he wants to clock off for the day. This is the wick effect. Whatever. Next one. Yeah, exactly. You know, this is below my pay grade. But one investigator wasn't satisfied. Professor Wilton

Krogman, a celebrated expert in physical anthropology, also saw the crime scene and he was left disturbed and puzzled by this case. Quote, I find it hard to believe that a human body once ignited will literally consume itself, burn itself out, as does a candle wick. Just what did happen on the night of July 1st, 1951, we may never know. This case still haunts me. The head is not left complete in ordinary burning

cases. Certainly it does not shrivel or symmetrically reduce to a smaller size. In presence of heat sufficient to destroy soft tissues, the skull would literally explode into many pieces. I have never known any exception to this rule. I cannot conceive of such complete cremation without more burning of the apartment itself. In fact, the apartment and everything in it should have been consumed I regard it as the most amazing thing I've ever seen as I review it the short hairs on my neck Bristle with vague fear where I living in the Middle Ages. I'd mutter something about black magic It's a great exit lines good as I think about it now the hairs on my neck rise

the matches that i hid under my bed i will push further into the dark did i kill her yes i did but that is irrelevant is that evidence absolutely not and i will never go down for this did i know the head would shrink to that size? Also yes, I bought a shrink ray. I thought I could hide the body via shrinking. I have since sued the wizard responsible for

the sale. But no compensation is enough for the death penalty I will of course face. Also, he shrunk my dick. I should have known he was a cruel, cruel man by his pointy, pointy wizard's teeth. And at the time of

conversation, he was a goat. So now I sit in a lonely prison cell with a dick too small to pee correctly. It comes out thin but with tremendous force. By utilizing this urine, I shall one day escape this prison.

It's very much like a power hose. Who is he talking to? This is like the f***ing prestige when someone finds this diary years and years afterwards. One day, I will burrow to freedom and safety the guards like i can hear you why are you talking like that in the second person god damn we're going to transfer you to maximum security yeah shut up tiny dick shut up you guys it was big ones before i joined the fbi i had a hog i was a pig a hog. Now I'm a duck with a chick. Like, we should just send him to a mental asylum.

He doesn't need to be in prison. Just set him free. I don't think he's going to hurt anyone. I don't think he knows where he is. He's just a duck with a chick. Certainly a bizarre case. But anomalies do happen, right? Right.

We're at a one-off. We could maybe accept the FBI's account of, quote, death by burning. But it's at a one-off we could maybe accept the fbi's account of quote death by burning but it's not a one-off fast forward to 1980 and henry thomas a 73 year old man living in south wales here in the uk is found dead in his home this one's a little bit closer to home yeah here's where it all becomes eerily similar to Mary's death back in 51. Lying in an armchair, they found Henry's perfectly preserved legs and feet, still in tri, shoes and socks. But everything else had been completely incinerated.

Just like Mary, his skull lay in a pile of ashes on his armchair. Tiny? Tiny skull? Or regular skull? No, regular skull. So apparently the tiny skull thing did happen again in other cases, but it's not necessarily a regular feature of this type of incident. Right. Nothing else in the room showed signs of a blaze. There was a living room fireplace, but there was no evidence of the fire traveling.

Once again, law enforcement were at a total loss to explain Henry's death, and the case was ruled, once again, death by burning. I mean, that's technically true. It is technically true, but it's kind of like a lazy cop-out. Yeah, it's like someone's getting stabbed in the lung, and then their lungs fill with blood, and it's like, I'm only drowned. That's a shame, isn't it? No paperwork for me, though. That's good.

Or like saying, yeah, someone gets stabbed in the lungs and they're like, death by metal. And so, well, someone had to kind of drive it in there. I think he fell on it. The problem with this is the subsequent explanations by investigators got so far-fetched that people were suggesting that Henry got up from his armchair to stoke the fire, leaned over, and his hair caught fire, but he didn't realize it, and he sat down in his chair and completely burned away. But the chair is fine though, isn't it? It is. Wow, come on. Now, it doesn't take a paranormal investigator to tell you that there is a problem with this theory. If your hair went on fire,

you would not just let it burn you alive as you rest in your armchair you know try and put it out absolutely well what would you do in this situation rory the situation of my hair being on fire we can let's just i've got a lighter right now let's just i'm not idea bad idea bad idea bad idea down there i'm gonna keep every time you let it i'm gonna blow that out. That is a bad idea. But I just want to see what you would do in that situation. No. I just don't.

I know. You're going to do it there. Yeah, I thought you wouldn't notice that. I'm just going to blow preemptively now. All right? Just to keep the lighter. I think if you would. Oh, it's on my hair now.

Oh, shit. I didn't expect this. I'm a fire breather. Okay. Pat me, Don. Oh, crap. You're done. You know what? It's'm a fire breather okay pat me down oh crap you're done you know what's actually what are you supposed to do if you're on fire it's spreading holy stop dropping and and sit and sit what was it stop dropping just sit there okay i'm sitting it's like rory it hurts it's it's like uh it's like a bear make yourself big. Yell, yell, okay. Ah! Ah! Oh, it hurts.

I'm yelling because it hurts not. Oh, Christ. Medical assessment, death by burning. That was very much self-inflicted, to be fair. So, yes, my eyebrows are now gone. Yes, I have multiple burns, but my body is still here. Right. I'm not in a 2,000 degree blaze.

See, I wouldn't be in trouble if my hair ever went up because i have made sure throughout my life that i am never more than three feet away from an ice cold bud light it's kind of like a weird thing that i do um i just make sure there's always a beer close on me what's the reason you think it's to put out fires put out fires so why wouldn't you keep me buzzed you know anywhere between those zones i'm glad you said that because that definitely seems like more of right why you do it yeah do you have anything you want to talk about look all i'm saying is the fires aren't showing up something's gonna happen with these beers so so you drink the beer i drink a lot of the beers okay most of the beers is just consumed yeah uh have you ever put out one fire uh no

i actually consumed so many of the anti-fire beers i started a small fire really yeah yeah i i get bernie when i have too many when i get drink i get drunk i get bernie i have to warn you it's a vicious cycle really the more i drink i the more i get burny and the more i keep drinks around to put out the fire it's a vicious it's a vicious vicious cycle um i stab in my sleep and i burn when i get drunk you're an awful person yeah it's pretty bad yeah it's pretty bad that would explain the kind of michelin man style safety suit you wear at all times yeah i mean you're wearing borderline mittens at this point oh yeah you should see me in a car it's bad i vomit in cars unless of course i got one of them icy cold bud lights to calm my nerves using his giant

flame retarded mittens to grasp a giant bottle of bud light. Yeah. Oh, it's fresh. Ah. I'm feeling Bernie. I will say. I'm feeling Bernie tonight. So as I say, this isn't a once-off. By 1995, one man claimed that there was more than 200 documented cases of such spontaneous combustion globally. Scientists started wrestling with all of the issues surrounding this phenomenon. They started to look at all the cases of combustion. What are the threads that connect all of them? As early as 1823, one scientist had noted some of the similarities of these cases.

One, the victims are all chronic alcoholics. Oh. Two, they are usually elderly females okay three the body my kind of girls elderly alcoholics my demo the hands and feet usually fall off so this is like a list that someone put together i don't believe this to necessarily be true i don't think they're necessarily all elderly females anymore if i was to drink like a bottle of bourbon or one of those high proof alcohols and then like smoke a cigarette or um eat some fire yeah would that kill me would i blow up this was a victorian idea was that alcoholics they have so much booze in their bloodstream that if you just light a cigarette near them, they'll blow up. That's mad.

I don't know. I've seen a lot of booze haunts. Yeah. And they're fine. I think so as well. People will be blowing up left, right, and center, but it doesn't really happen that much. That's true. I mean, one guy that we know that used to booze more than anyone when we were kids.

That's true. He had a trick where he would put a lit match in his mouth and hold it there and then he could take it out with the match still lit yeah that's true yeah and he didn't explode or anything yeah when i think about it that was really cool yeah shit actually damn we need to get him on the podcast i'm gonna see if he's on facebook he combusted oh okay he's dead granted shit i him his Facebook picture. He's got like a tiny f***ing head. I'm like, yeah, tiny Steve. Love that guy.

He put a match in his mouth. It was like a whole cigar. So that note about alcoholism did cause people to closely examine the lifestyles of each victim. Could it be true they're all alcoholics? There is a lot of alcoholics in the world. In the case of Mary in Florida, she certainly did smoke and take sleeping pills, so she kind of partied, but there was no record of her drinking a lot. So how could that explain anything?

The fire? The smoke? No smoke without fire, right? Although I think this explanation doesn't fit many cases, it might explain this one. In 1967... Mary drank gasoline. She thought it would... Oh, shit, no!

A group of office workers were waiting for the bus around 5 a.m. when they noticed flames in the window of a nearby building. They immediately called the police who rushed to the scene where they found the burning body of a homeless man, Robert Bailey. They reported a blue flame was bursting out of a gash in his stomach four inches wide. They managed to extinguish Bailey only by forcing a hose into his stomach to quench the blaze.

At first, they were puzzled because there was no sign of a fire around him, but they did learn that Robert was known to drink rubbing alcohol. So there's a good chance that he sparked up a crack pipe and set himself ablaze. Is that even, like, nice? Rubbing alcohol? No. That's not going to be good, is it?

Oh, my God, it's not going to be nice. It's just going to be, like, it's going to get you from zero to blackout drunk, like, instantly. What percent is rubbing alcohol? I don't know. Like, what would it be? Like, 90? 100? What? I guess it's 100. That's enough. Just poison? Yeah, I guess. instantly what percent is rubbing alcohol i don't know like what would it be like 90 100 what i guess

it's 100 that's enough just poison yeah i guess because it didn't end well for him i would assume that it is just poison blue flames right coming out of a giant hole in his stomach so so what like 48 i guess 49 that sounds like a pretty lit night on the town, actually. Oh, nice. I see what you did there. But despite easily solvable cases like that, there are many that defy science and God to this very day. You know, you haven't said human combustion yet.

Huh? It's just we're into this maybe half an hour into this podcast yet. You haven't once said human combustion. What's that spont i'm about to blow your mind uh-huh it's when humans right spontaneously combust dude that's so dumb is it that's so dumb what is this your eyes slowly widened i just cracked it. No, you didn't. I read the top of the Wikipedia page I'm on. I went straight to about.

I didn't read the header. So I might have used the words spontaneous and combustion in sentences. But yes, we're talking about spontaneous human combustion. Or S-H-B. Tell it was slow. It took me to work out the abbreviation for that. In India, one poor, poor three-month-old baby suffers from spontaneous combustion. That's right. He didn't die of spontaneous combustion.

He suffers from it. His parents say that he overheats and that he has burst into flames four times already. Right. That's mad. That's genuinely mad. What are they washing him with? Rum? It's like, this is...

Yeah, we call him Charlie the Chugger. He loves a hard one. I mean, he's bursting into flames though. I'm smiling because this is so ridiculous. Yeah. But this is so awful. I'm about to show you a video. What?

Of what? The baby's not on fire. Please don't. You're on my Wi-Fi, so I don't want to see that. I don't want that shit tracked to my IP address. Jesus Christ. So the baby is quite badly burned. He's very cute, though.

Bad parenting. Yeah, whatever you're doing, bad. Yeah. I don't understand. If this baby is bursting into flames, and they know he's going to burst into flames, this is a thing he does. Yeah.

I mean, can't you just look at his body, look what's inside him and try and figure out how this chemical reaction is happening the problem is we're researching the paranormal here and we don't know what the mechanics of the paranormal are no it's a problem with the paranormal there's not enough time there's not enough time the world's coming to an end aliens are at our doorstep and you want me to learn science, biology, physics. How rude. I flunked that shit on purpose.

Kim Jong-un. So I could get to the end quicker. What do you mean the end? The end of high school. Oh, I thought you meant of humanity or some shit. It was a major setback, though. I flunked all my classes. They put me back.

It turns out life is pretty long. Great school, three times. Not just repeating a year one to eight if you try and breeze through it the dirty secret is they make you redo it all over again yeah kind of like a shitty life hack we don't have time we just i don't yeah so they they check the baby's skin they check the baby's rough uh like anatomy to see is this baby leaking lighter fluid somewhere right like lighter match is he okay yeah 10 centimeters away yeah five centimeters exactly this exact type of thing up his ass and

they know no that burned him again back go two centimeters in from i think you do need to go back to school okay yeah maybe um they determined there was nothing weird about the baby's physiology right you know this worries people because they go you know i think the skeptics are going to say these parents are negligent they're i'm saying it at best at best they're leaving flammable substances around their baby at worst they are setting their baby on fire yeah the baby's dad said quote we're not drop it or i'll burn you too to a newspaper call give me off. Give me my baby. I'm out of here. As he left the room he was quoted singing the lyrics I'm a fire starter. Twisted fire starter.

Baby hater. Paranormal investigator. The doctor's like walking watching him walk down the street he's like we should stop him someone should do something but i think we're all afraid he'll burn us so we're just gonna let this one go uh he said we're not crazy enough to burn our own baby he told the new york times it sounds like he's burning someone else's baby the way he wordeded that. I'm not mad. I'm not going to burn my own baby. Some people don't believe us. And I am scared to return to my village and hoping for some government protection. There's also the fear that our child could burn once again.

So I know we always come back to this. What are the motives? Yeah. This family had to leave their village because they thought that there was something to do with their house or their living circumstances that were causing their baby to light on fire. So they actually moved village altogether. And he's saying, I want government protections. I want some sort of assurance this isn't going to happen again. Right.

So I don't know. That sounds pretty legit to me. Or did they get caught burning a baby and had to leave their village because of an angry mob? Maybe. But how bad at burning your baby do you have to be? So this is pretty dark, but if you're trying to burn your baby, do you have to do it four times and then get caught and talk to the New York Times and have to make up excuses? I guess, yeah.

And then why would you bring me to the hospital and stuff? I feel like it's a one-time thing, yeah. That's true. So anyway, we don't need to would you bring me to a hospital and stuff? I feel like it's a one-time thing, yeah. That's true. So anyway, we don't need to get too bogged down. That's just one crazy story. One other fascinating case comes from our motherland, Ireland, in County Galway. No way.

On the 22nd of December, 2010, Michael Faharty was found dead in his home. They found Mr. Faharty badly burned. They found that the fireplace in his living room was not the cause of the burning. The court was told that no trace of an accelerant had been found and there was nothing to suggest foul play. Coroner Dr. Kieran McLaughlin said it was the first time in his 25 years of investigating deaths that he had recorded a spontaneous human combustion. So he's gone on record for saying that.

He's gone on record, not just to say death by burning. He's not pussying out. He's saying there is no other explanation for this other than spontaneous human combustion. Well, look, we know firsthand. You know, we mentioned that all these people that have spontaneously combusted, they're drinkers. They like a bit of the booze we come from this place we know ireland it's a boozy land yeah i mean rubbing alcohol is probably making alcohol

you put in your breakfast yeah yeah cheerios and rubbing alcohol is like 7 a.m that's what you give toddlers then you move them on to the hard stuff yeah knives in the shreddies knives in the shreddies no milk you know is it looking good for this dude? I know it's spontaneous human combustion again, but I'm going to go ahead and assume that his blood alcohol was flammable. You're not wrong to suggest that. If that isn't enough for you, there have been two cases more recently right here in England. In September 2017 in London, Mr. John Nolan was simply walking down the street when he ignited into a fiery blade,

terrifying everyone around him. They were unable to help him and he was killed by the embers. Metropolitan police in London found no probable cause or accelerant on this person. If anyone's wondering what accelerant means, that just means he wasn't doused in lighter fluid. Right. Like, if he was doused in lighter fluid,

they would put this down to, you know, a suicide. Right. But they found no such evidence on this person that could explain the ignition. And literally one week ago, December 27th, the exact same thing happened to a man in Hull. The police have appealed for information regarding the incident, but they say they are not looking for any perpetrator. The man clearly burst into flames all on his own.

I don't understand how this is happening. This is happening. Literally right now, the Metropolitan Police have an open investigation saying we are appealing for evidence for why a man burst into flames on a high street in London. saying we are appealing for evidence for why a man burst into flames on a high street in london i so if this is some sort of like chemical imbalance i don't know how i haven't burst into flames yet because that's a good point i think out of a lot of people i know i would be the most likely person could you to make a bomb in my own stomach just like run run us through like day in the life day worries like absolutely dawn to dusk absolutely all right well and yeah the diet the diet and lifestyle right okay so uh first off wake up gotta be healthy go to the gym brilliant that's incredible so that's it so beforehand 6 30 uh two

scoops of pre-workout supplement called c4 explosive okay i'm all right now i can see why this is about this is looking bad. Yeah. It is genuinely called C4 explosive. And it's not legitimately C4? No. Is this a supplement? It is a supplement. It's a pre-workout supplement that you take to,

it kind of makes you feel like if you start moving, you'll die. Right. Like your heart is racing, your skin is itchy. Really? There's someone inside of you you're controlling your actions it's very powerful on the back of your palms you basically pass out for an hour which is you working out and then come to post-session wearing ripped purple jorts or blood on your hands then um you know after that just to keep the buzz going couple of coffees before breakfast so no food no no no not by then lunch is when i have my first food which is um uh sugar puffs mixed with cocoa pops and um just to like again keep the energy

flowing i just smash up a couple of batteries and just put the juices in there mix it all up with the milk battery acid right in your cereal which you eat at lunchtime which is your first meal yep and then take the edge off that with another scoop of pre-workout supplement because i'm gonna work out again or no just the the i start really really flagging post lunch granted probably the battery acids right yeah like it's kind of neurotoxic i get this like stabbing pain everywhere yeah passing any blood toes to eyes really bad really bad um you know if i if i could see the knives i would think it was stabbing but i can't so um if it's not wizardry i'm dying um dinner a couple more batteries uh just on the way home on the bus 9v double a double whatever you whatever you want man sometimes i'll go for the big ones the big old d's

just one d it's uh it's like a hot dog i put it in a hot dog bun mustard ketchup if i'm feeling fancy mustard ketchup pre-workout sometimes i'll just put it all on this hot, hot, hot dog. Mustard, ketchup, nothing can drown the taste of Patriacid. At dinner, a single lit match. Just to tempt fate and flip off God all at the same time. Yeah, just eat a single match while giving the finger to heaven and calling my mom leaving voicemail

saying I didn't ask to be born. And then precisely every night at 8.37, blackout. Not pass out? No, blackout. Blackout. Okay. It's immediate. It is sudden.

And then boom, like clockwork. i can't say it's without warning because it happens every night just make sure your home is all i'm saying because uh i've been on the tube when that shit's hit i'm very much the bell of some ball because the pumpkin hits the rocks at precisely 8 3737. I can tell it's getting close. I'm scoffing down that 1D hot dog. I'm just racing home. Thank Christ I don't have any glass slippers because, you know, I'd be eating them too. In the middle of the night, I get carted off to A&E. They give me a blood transfusion and I wake up back in my own bed at 6 o'clock, start it all over again.

Feeling great. The worrying part about that is the pre-workout is true i do um i take something called c4 pre-workout and energy drinks you like energy i love energy drinks i'm really bad for that cool we're good for it because it makes me feel great yeah i try to be healthy and i feel like shit so i don't know it's funny how like maybe this is why this dynamic of the podcast works i think i'm the most likely person i know that will explode at any given second yeah and you are the person that i know that at any given moment might just become a tree right like the opposite of exploding you might just yeah just Han Solo style when he gets frozen into the carbonite. Right, you're just tree bark.

Yeah. Like standing there, yeah. Exactly. Because you're super healthy. Like you eat soil and stuff and worms. Yeah, so mostly start the day with just like a soil shake. You literally just go outside, man. Just all natural.

Do you like shiv it or anything? Or just rocks and all? Honestly, just sometimes, like the rocks are good for digestion. Definitely not. Yeah. No? They hurt on the way out, granted. Yeah, on the way in probably too, I reckon. Yeah, that too.

They're actually only good when they're in. They're bad in and out. They're a bitch to keep down as well, so. Side note, a bird shit all over me a couple weeks ago yeah really bad wow and i didn't even realize until i was on the tube and i took my backpack off and it looked like a dragon had sharted all down my back it was big it was enormous i thought i brought a different backpack going to work yeah on the way to work down my hood i remember bringing this shit covered backpack to work i thought i left that at home

yeah it was bad wow yeah i'm just gonna have to bin it now they say it's lucky is it i've had nothing but bad luck post shite got fired got dumped got diagnosed with some awful disease from the bird shit because i quote unquote refuse to shower uh try and ring this one back all right so in terms of the possible causes of spontaneous human combustion skeptics pretty much maintain that in all of these cases, there is some overlooked ignition point. A cigarette, a fireplace, a lighter that kickstarts this process. And that like the FBI said, the wick effect takes hold and they burn up like a big old candle. Okay. And I get it. Spontaneous combustion is pretty crazy. But this theory of theirs doesn't perfectly stack up either for these people to burn up slowly like a candle each victim would have to have already died

or else they would try and put it out yeah that's a really good point actually and at that point why would the blaze not spread to other parts of the house and not be like literally the blaze is confined to knees upwards but then even if a body spontaneously combusted and burst into flames wouldn't that burn crap around the the nearby apartment like the chair and stuff yeah yeah it definitely could i think the argument against the wick effect in that respect is that spontaneous combustion the body could be burning in a way that's different from normal burning. Okay. That it's not a slow burn that would spread to other things.

That maybe it's just a big poof and a bang, and maybe that's why it doesn't spread to the other. Like when you light a Christmas cake and it's like whoosh, and then it's kind of out. Yes. You know? And it goes out right away. Yeah. Additionally, some studies have tested how human flesh actually burns without an accelerant and turns out it doesn't necessarily burn all that well if you imagine if you just took

as you say a candle to your skin right now you wouldn't just like burn up no it's humans we're filled with water yeah you know we are more water than literally anything else. If you would like, I can show you some photographic evidence of spontaneous combustion cases. It's a little gruesome, but I think you want to see it. Are you sure? Yeah. Okay, I'll go for it. I don't feel like I could come to a conclusion without seeing the evidence. So there's one, if you could see.

That's insane. It's just knees and gone. That's so weird. It looks like an art exhibition or something. Yeah, because there's the outline of the skeleton. Yeah. This one's weird. Yeah, there's tons of these.

That's crazy. I don't know. Yeah, they're not as gruesome as people probably think they are who are listening to this podcast. Yeah, I mean... It's almost cartoonish. Like, it's so unbelievable. The last one I showed you there,

it's literally a pair of legs that are just human legs and then right at the thigh it just becomes complete ash yeah just ash just just like it looks like mannequin legs poking out of an ash pile yeah additionally the wick effect cannot account for the cases that we've seen in the last couple months walking down the street in london and hull where they were still alive when they burst into flames yeah i mean in the more couple months. Walking down the street. In London and Hull, where they were still alive when they burst into flames. Yeah. I mean, in the more outlandish end of things,

one researcher suggested a ball of lightning. Okay. Doesn't really work if they're... Out of the blue? Doesn't really work if they're in their own home, I would say. Yeah, that's true. Most paranormal of all, some have suggested divine intervention as a potential cause.

Could God be so pissed at someone that he cast them into flames? Were these men and women sinners? I've done a lot of bad shit recently. Right. And I'm just a little worried I'm going to pop now. Do you want to let us know any, so we know the scale of how bad it is?

Honestly, no. Okay. I would... There would be people knocking on that door if i uttered a word about the murders shit i said the m word oh balls they work fucking fast man i just pop it was gross but i somehow think he deserved that. Regarding the divine intervention, I'm glad someone actually brought it up. In the case in Galway in Ireland, the coroner stated that if divine intervention

were the cause of spontaneous combustion, there would be a lot more cases out there. Right. Is that just banter though? Or is he saying that his whole town are filled with like shit lords and criminals? He's a coroner. He probably does think that.

Larry E. Arnold, in his 1995 book, Ablaze, claimed that it could be caused by extreme stress. No. I mean, that doesn't make any sense. Sometimes it is worrying when you read these things that you're like, wait, so you're a professional and that's what you think? Yeah. Maybe my favorite, people might remember that South Park covered spontaneous combustion in an episode.

Right. And Trey Parker, one of the creators, revealed that the topic of that episode actually stemmed from his own serious belief that holding in farts could indeed cause humans to spontaneously combust. belief that holding in farts could indeed cause humans to spontaneously combust. He said, quote, I honestly think it could be what spontaneous combustion is because I've seen some dudes light their farts and the fireballs were big and that was just one fart. I'm serious. I think it's totally possible. Is that true? Can you light a fart? I thought that was a myth. Oh, that's true. That's true. Do you want to like see a video maybe i just turn around spread my ass cheeks jesus christ you made a poorly constructed fake youtube window out of out of cardboard spreading your ass this is so grim it's just 15 minutes of you struggling to fart. I think you might combust because you're pushing so hard.

I think this is the saddest thing I've ever YouTubed. Light fart on fire. All I'll say is this is going to be in the show notes. Needless to say. So I think this is a compilation mixtape of people lighting farts on fire. Because I just assumed they'd like... I know this sounds even more insane. I assumed that these people had blown gas up their assholes

and then farted it out with a lighter. I didn't want this to be how I spent my evening. I'm sorry. You see that? I did see that. I kind of wish I... I mean, he's doing it himself through his jeans. This is so sad. Did You see that? I did see that. I kind of wish I... I mean, he's doing it himself through his jeans. This is so sad.

Did you see that? That burnt his asshole. He's rising in pain. I didn't know this was a thing. See, that's insane because I didn't know that... I didn't know... So is it generally creating a flame or is it like the air blowing? Genuinely creating a flame because they're expelling methane.

Jesus Christ. Yeah. So we've seen a couple like legit. F***ing hell. He blew a fireball out of his anus. He's a dragon, I think. So I. The shittest dragon of all time.

I completely agree. This is not how I wanted this podcast to go. But you could say that this is the most concrete evidence we've had. I... Because the whole premise... So bad. The whole premise of spontaneous combustion is that an internal chemical cocktail causes an explosion. cocktail causes an explosion.

Are you happy that you might have just won an argument by showing me a compilation of grown men farting through their jeans onto a naked flame? I'm actually pretty f***ing sad, man. I think I need a career counselor or something. That's not how anyone

should win any argument. And I'm so disappointed in myself. What you said, that's pretty concrete evidence, isn't it? If that gas is inside a human's body. And this is flammable. And back in 1823, that's what they documented. That was the gassiest years of all. They said, dirty secret of all these spontaneous combustion things is,

you know, they said there's no smoke without fire. There's no spontaneous combustion without some sort of source nearby. Now, whether that's a fireplace in the corner of the room, whether that's a box of matches somewhere, spontaneous combustion without some sort of source nearby. Right. Now, whether that's a fireplace in the corner of the room, whether that's a box of matches somewhere, there's always a source of fire somewhere. That's true. So, and every crime scene stank of shit as well. And every crime scene had YouTube open and compilations of lit farts.

Kitchens littered with baked beans, all empty. They wanted to set a record. There was a running camera in the corner. It was being periscoped. Before uploading the video, they had input the title into it. World's Biggest Fart Blast. They had already recorded the intro. Guys, if this doesn't kill me it'll make me famous

remember to hit subscribe twisted twisted fire farter is uh my youtube channel oh no so every week i think is a low point for this podcast and then if the next one feels like it's getting lower damn i swear i've brought you some evidence some some photographic evidence some quotes some new york times articles with babies that have gone on fire four times yeah cases as recently as just last week here in england what do you think of this whole spontaneous combustion business i god i hate to say it so much i was so not on board until the fart video uh terrible sentence terrible sentence um i i honestly did not know like i knew that um you know there was like uh methane gas inside the human body i didn't realize that it was so combustible

like the amount i was so combustible that even a fart like, man. If you are subscribed to the Patreon, please check out these research notes. Because I assume Kit is going to put maybe like some of the biggest ones he can find. It's pretty. It's genuinely pretty impressive. I did not know that actually happened. Because this whole time I'm looking for a scientific explanation as to what chemical combination could react in a certain way to make a body just combust. And, you know, we got these cases where there's a fireplace nearby.

We got somewhere and someone's smoking or drinking alcohol. But then just the walking down the street ones. That's kind of weird. Yeah. And just boom, burst into flames. I don't know. As we always do kit you were the investigator what are your thoughts on the case you spent a lot of time

with it pretty fascinating i mean very recently i talked to um a close friend of mine and weirdly before i ever thought of researching this they brought up spontaneous combustion they spread their freaking ass i was just gonna say i'm just having a word with a friend of mine. Actually, I think he's here tonight. Kit, put your ass out. I've drawn a face on my ass. Yeah, and my friend was like, oh, it's completely disproven. You know, it's potato combustion. And a lot of people do think that. Skeptics will say that there's no scientific evidence.

But there's also no scientific evidence for why these cases have happened. And the police have admitted that. We've had a lot of these recently. A lot of just can't disprove it, can't prove it. Yeah. You just got to use a gut feeling. And then bring the hammer of justice down as hard as you can. And it doesn't matter who goes to the goddamn slammer,

as long as it's the gut feelings behind it. Exactly. I guess the question as always is is it paranormal or not personally if i'm to start drawing conclusions i think whilst the mechanics are not entirely known i think they lie in the realm of scientific possibility i don't think this is paranormal that's a good way of looking at it because even if it is spontaneous human combustion if it does if it does actually happen to people the way it's happening is a chemical build-up of a very natural explainable um the body fluids essentially um which isn't paranormal that's very scientific it's strange definitely strange yeah but it's

equally as strange as you know um uh people walking down the street and they have like a brain aneurysm and they just drop and like that's could be dressed up as oh the have you heard of insta death you know when people just die it's like well yeah but that's just a medical condition that it happens to people it's kind of along those lines yeah people just explode sometimes so i think we're chalking this up to a double no it's a double no god damn it i know i hate to side with the skeptics bunch of ass hats i want to prove them wrong exactly i don't want to be part of the herd i want to be the shepherd beating the sheep mercilessly with my cane.

You like it, no? You don't know what a shepherd does. Keeps control of the flock. Yeah, so hopefully we'll see some more convincing paranormal cases coming up next week and beyond. If you guys have any of your own experiences with

spontaneous combustion, if you have survived a spontaneous combustion uh anything like less interesting than that don't even talk to us absolutely not um stop listening as well actually yeah like who do you think you are you know what i'm gonna go on record in saying that next week it's gonna be my turn to investigate a new paranormal case. And whatever I bring to the table, I 100% with all of my being believe it is true. I'm saying that now. Cool. So that's going to be next week's episode. That's big words.

Yeah, big words for big case kit. Hard cut. And this is you just twisting my arm as hard as you can. Ah, crap. So it's real. All right. If you have your own experiences, do send them in to thisparanormallifepodcast at gmail.com

You can get us on the socials at Twitter at thisparalife on facebook.com forward slash thisparanormallife where you can also find The Secret Society Shhh Very exclusive

Lots of incredible research going on in there. And for that reason, we've got to keep up on the f***ing download. Exclusive but elusive. If you join, you will be kicked. If you comment, you will be booted, blocked, harassed. But please join and tell all your friends. But shut up.

As always, the show notes for this episode and our previous episodes, As always, the show notes for this episode and our previous episodes, as well as incredible physical rewards, are located at patreon.com forward slash this paranormal life. You can support the podcast if you want to and get some cool stuff in return. There's a great community going on over there. So get involved. I'm going to be real with you guys for a second. Go on. We were going to stop. We were were gonna stop because it was too hard it was this job my it's like my job was hovering

over the delete key the red button which is what you call a kitchen knife and it was hovering over my heart what i call the red button and rory grabbed the knife and he said what if there's an other way exactly um so miraculously with all of your support um we've managed to make this thing work and worth the amount of time we're putting into it and for that we are immensely grateful so thank you very much to everyone uh that contributes and i've actually got some specific names to shout out for you right now oh wow and you can get your own name shouted out by supporting us at patreon.com i'm excited so thank you so much to will richardson will richardson he is rich and he is my son joe stackhouse joe is stacked and he's in the house he is stacked he's jacked he's got a hog he's a pig with a hog wow thank you and i am a duck with a chick

joe stackhouse had a couple of quail eggs i think he could um open on a like a really badass pancake house who's this guy joe stackhouse. Oh yeah, Joe's house is a stack of pancakes. Yeah. You get that one for free. This one's pretty cool. You gotta cut me in for 3% though. This one's pretty cool. Butane Murphy. Butane Murphy?

Murphy, you are a butay in my eyes. I'm gonna try and nail this pronunciation. Bored Hogland. I'm going to try and nail this pronunciation. Bort Hogland. I'm not bored of you, Hogland. I think you're pretty great. Actually.

Despite what those f***ers say about you, Bort, or whatever your name is. Smitty Johnson. Oh, Smitty Johnson. He was my butler when I returned from the war. Oh, Smitty, I used to beat you, master. We'd play whip the butler, strangle the butler. He was always the butler. I always had the whip.

He loved it. Went weirdly cockney there. Like, that's the evil side coming out. He loved it, the little shit. You were a good butler. I'm sorry I killed you. Frozen metalhead. My man, the little shit. You were a good butler. I'm sorry I killed you. Frozen Metalhead. My man, Frozen Metalhead.

Surprisingly, a really nice guy. Gentleman. Stand-up guy. Yokel Bear. Yokel, you are the local in my heart. You're close to me is what I'm trying to say. You're regular on these parts of my heart. Rayan Abdul.

Rayan Abdul. I'd like a jewel from you, of which I assume you have plenty, Abdul. Ruby or emerald or diamond. John Paul Terry. Sorry, just the monetary value of either or any of those stones. John Paul Terry. John Paul, you make me stones. John Paul Terry. John. Paul.

You make me merry. I love you. Peter's in there somewhere as well. He was a disciple. Sometimes they say people, wow, two first names. He's got three first names in his name. Yeah. That's pretty cool.

Sean Wills. Sean Wills. Wills, he contribute to this Power of Life Patreon. He wills. Ekelmon. Ekelmon? It's like my favorite Pokemon. What was he, Fairy type or something?

If I had an Evolve Stone, I would shove it down your throat so fast, you would become the most beautiful Pokemon, and you would be trapped in my ball forever. That was supposed to be endearing. That came out really threatening. I apologize for that. I apologize for that. I apologize for that. And I can't believe this is happening, guys.

Alex Jones. My God. The Alex Jones. Lord Alex Jones. Oh my goodness. I guess we are humbled in your presence. You are the competition. You are also king.

We are the jesters in your courtyard. But one day we will come for you in the night. Hattie busy. Hattie busy. You keep this hat busy. Hat being my brain and busy being doing shit. It's four in the morning. We're just burning the midnight oil.

They're getting progressively worse. Since we decided we we were gonna do this if they're getting worse. They were clever at one point I think Jessica lead Jessica leak there's no leak in this boat because you know what it's called the goddamn SS Friendship here's a short one for you Jess Jess I should like just she sold me my seventh car um when i was in the market for it uh for a steal as in she stole the money and the car you don't own a car no she stole the car too i was gonna say why do you think she didn't put her last name in there she knows i'll track her she's taunting me at this point uh danny white sixth car from danny that was

why are they when i was young dumb and full of money money i didn't realize people could steal from me but danny was the first followed by jess joe hutchinson joe hutchinson uh He's just a good guy I actually know him pretty well They call him Average Joe But I think he's above Average Joe That's beautiful Thank you

The Drawlers I mean he's boring as f*** But I mean he's a good guy He's got a heart of gold Okay Yeah sorry Fine Mean

But sure Also fine Just end it The Drawlers The Drawlers Is it like a group? Mine. Mean, but sure. Also fine. Just end it. The Drawlers. The Drawlers? Is it like a group? Maybe they're a band or something.

That's kind of cool. I'm just going to go right ahead and shout them out because hovering over their icon here on Patreon, I can see that their Facebook page is facebook.com forward slash the drawlers. I don't know what or who you are. I hope you're not some sort of race hate group because we just gave you a shout out. But hope you're not some sort of race hate group. Because we just gave you a shout out. But whatever you're doing, thank you for the contribution.

It turns out it was very race hate. I thought those were ghosts. Very racy. Very hatey. Sexy racists. A lot of them. Luke, I don't believe in Sasquatch. Baldock. Luke, you're treading on thin ice there, buddy.

Much like Sasquatch himself during the icy, icy winters. He's a heavyset man. And you know what? I'm a heavyset man. And if you don't watch yourself, me or Sasquatch are going to come and teach you that we do exist. But also, thank you so much for the contribution for the podcast. I very much appreciate it. Actually, you're a gentleman in that regard.

Yeah, really are. And I think we said that Bigfoot wasn't real. Also, just for the record. Just for the record. So, thank you so much to all of you for contributing on Patreon. It's a cliche, but we really couldn't do it without you. It makes the entire podcast possible.

It makes living possible. It makes my life that little bit less miserable that little flicker and candle in the wind just got a little bit brighter yeah so every time you know someone leaves Patreon you know a little bit darker

I'd be lying if I said it didn't just make me a little bit closer to the edge yeah anytime those monthly downloads take a little dip you know I know it's all fun and games listen that's a rainstorm to me it's a torrent of shit that is the wax from the life candle dripping down my arm searing the hairs i can smell them i have a wax hand at this point people a. A wax fist. I am angry and cold. Sorry.

Excuse me. Sorry. The worst combo. Okay. Thank you for tuning in. Check out the show notes. Absolutely. Check us out on socials.

And we will see you next week. Bye-bye. You're listening to this paranormal life this paranormal life bringing to your leader this paranormal life it's like the surround sounds of the thing

this paranormal life on this podcast you can hear a pin drop and the roar of a UFO jet engine I miss her out. On this podcast, you can hear a pin drop. Bing! And the roar of a UFO jet engine.