[NSFW] People who knew someone who died at work, what happened?

I was locking up at the end of the day and saw brake lights flashing on the car of our welder while I was pulling out. I pulled back in to see if everything was ok. He was in the midst of heart attack. Ambulance was there in three minutes, but I watched him fade away in my arms before they arrived. He was a good man and is sorely missed.

He came in to work, sat down at a table in the cafeteria, said he was tired, put his head down on his arms, and died. It was completely unexpected and it shocked everyone.

A student. He was chewing on a cap to something while walking in the hallway. Ended up choking and died.

Dude was hanging out in the break room cracking jokes. Laughed, fell over and was dead. Brain aneurysm. It’s terrifying how fragile our lives are and how quickly it can end without warning. Might be a blessing as well though

Construction site. A 30ft concrete wall toppled over like a domino and smashed three people to death. It was my first job and fucked me up really bad. The lawyers of other subcontractors subpoenaed me and I had to go to court several times even after I didn’t work there anymore to prove I wasn’t at fault. I wasn’t.

He was an older guy and wasn’t feeling well and went to use the portapotty. Ended up having a heart attack and passing while on the can. He was treasured in the workplace, and it was a big loss.

Guy had the crown of his head sliced clean off when a hydraulic press suddenly decided to drop because they forgot to bleed the pressure before starting to do maintenance on the machine.

Buddy of mine worked for a sewage company – he went down a narrow shaft to do maintenance and the fumes overwhelmed him and he passed out and fell down the shaft and died from the trauma. He had a wife and young daughter. He was legit a top 1% human and it hurts still 15 years later.

My first hire as a manager, and it was his first job out of college. I was away on a business trip, he was heading into work one morning and had an asthma attack and died on the platform. I had only known him a few weeks. I went to the funeral, met his family and actually am still in touch w one of his uncles. Sad for me, but of course nothing like what his family went through.

We had a mainframe operator who worked weekends exclusively. One weekend payroll had not received their reports. The payroll manager called into the operations room and got no answer.

She called the lead operator. He tried to check the cameras in the room but they were all turned in non normal positions and locked from turning via the remote software. He couldn’t see anything.

He drove in to the office. When he got there he found the small windows on the big steel doors papered over. He opened the door and found the operator. He was hung from a attic truss. He was completely naked. His clothes were folded neatly on the floor next to him. There was a laptop on wheeled cart in front of his dead body.

He was getting himself off and I guessed just misjudged his tolerance, passed out and then never woke up.

There’s been some shocking stuff that’s happened on our campus (affairs, verbal and pretty near physical altercations etc) but nothing has tried this in the 22 years I’ve been there

I worked at a supermarket in the mid 2000’s. We were doing inventory prep one night and the store manager said he was feeling kind of weird. He went to sit down in the office and suffered a fatal heart attack. He was fairly young (late 30’s) and in relatively good shape and was a really nice guy, so it hit a lot of us hard. The guy selected to be our new manager was very popular in the company and came in the next day to introduce himself. Seemed like a really cool guy. On the morning with what would have been his first shift at our store, he was killed in a motorcycle accident on his way in. Definitely the craziest work week of my life.

A buddy of mine worked at a FedEx warehouse and ran over a coworker with a forklift and killed him. It was ruled no-fault and he (the driver) kept working there afterwards

My employee. They were my go to person, a friend, and we chatted constantly even after we transitioned to work from home. Working late one night we were chatting on slack while working and he disappeared. Two hours later his phone text me and stated “this is xxxx’s fiance, I found him on the keyboard and he’s dead. He won’t be into work tomorrow. Please call me at xxxxxxxxx”.

I’m privileged not to deal with people in shock in my profession. That was heart breaking and sobering. Ill miss him.

I used to work for a supermarket chain that would get fresh bread delivered every morning by a separate company.

Everyday, no matter what, Eric would show up. 7 days a week, he never took a day off. He was the happiest, hardest working guy you could ever meet. The type of person you simply can’t be upset around. He worked so hard for all of his kids’ future.

I used to tell him he’s more than earned some time off, even just for a few days to spend time with his kids. He would politely smile and say, “everything is an investment, I’m doing this now so I don’t have to in the future” give me a smile and head off to his next delivery.

One morning he didn’t show up. We were all so confused, he had never missed a day in years. We found out he passed away at 32 of a heart attack, almost certainly from how hard he worked.

I’ve taken numerous lessons away from him, to never take life for granted, the importance of work life balance etc. The whole situation broke my heart, he never got to see his kids enjoy the money he had worked so hard for.

Rest in Peace Eric

Dude drove the forklift like an asshole. No seatbelt. Took a turn too fast, and rolled it onto its side. He fell out as it rolled, and the super strong roll cage came down on him—the bar crushed his head against the solid concrete floor.

It popped his head like a grape, pretty much right at eye level. Pretty much emptied his skull, eyes out, whole deal. The floor was a total mess.

Coroner people collected what they could, but we had to spray the rest out of the building with a hose after they left and released the scene. Sprayed the forklift down too. Threw down a fresh coat of concrete paint the next day.

That forklift was still there when I left that job…..

One time I was eating a wiener schnitzel in the food court of a skyscraper when a guy came crashing through the glass ceiling having jumped a window high above. But I was on break, so it probably doesnt count.

It wasn’t AT work, but I worked for CNET when James Kim died while on holiday. He was returning home with his family from Thanksgiving and got caught in a snowstorm. The map he was using led him down a very remote road where his car was stranded. After a few days of holding out, James went out on his own in search for help. He died, but his family was eventually rescued.

The annual holiday party was appropriately cancelled, and the mood int he office was pretty somber in the weeks to follow.

Got 2 of them.
One was a coworker. Shot by some punk who thought we weren’t serious about our job. Private security contracting. Neither of them made it.

The other was a random homeless woman. I was working on a city security contract. Cheap, observe, and report, mall cop type stuff. Shift was ending, and I was headed back to the city office when I noticed something rather strange. A sleeping bag in the middle of the alleyway. Didn’t think anything of it, so I went inside. Garbage truck came through while I was. Didn’t put 2 and 2 together till I walked outside and smelled it. Garbage truck ran the sleeping bag over with a drug addict inside. Former teacher from what I read later.

Suicidal friend of my SO slit their wrists with a box cutter in the freezer. No one noticed they were gone for hours.

Everyone has a gruesome story. Mine is simple. Went to Safeway deli with a co worker. He was early 30s I was Early 20s. He dropped while walking. like a light switch went off. Right in the door. Brain aneurysm.

I only knew him about 9 months but it was shocking. Most store patrons got to him before me. People calling 911. We all knew he was dead and the EMT confirmed it.

We weren’t best friends but he seemed like a good dude. Definitely didn’t deserve that. That was ten years ago so I’m about his age. But after learning about aneurysms it is quite rare.