The day that Prince Charles married lady Diana
They had a large street party with various entertainers doing their bit and one of the climax acts was an escapologist.

His finale was to escape from a straight-jacket whilst hanging upside down from a burning rope 30 feet above The Guildhall Square Portsmouth.

Trevor Revell was his name, and he was the father of a girl I went to school with.

He was only 35.

This being 1981 crowd control consisted of a length of rope being handed to the people at the front (which included me and my best friend) and the police telling everyone to stand behind the rope, which they did.

He was strapped into a straight-jacket then hoisted 30 ft in the air on a burning rope before a crowd of 3,000 people celebrating the wedding. But the trick failed and the rope burnt through too quickly and he plunged head-first onto a concrete paving slab.

I was at the front.
I saw him hit the ground head first.
I heard his skull shatter; I heard his skull crack like a boiled egg being hit with a spoon.

I saw the puddle of blood and brain he left behind after they loaded his still twitching body onto a stretcher and into the ambulance which rushed him to QA hospital where he later died.

I thought at the time that this was the most horrific thing I’d ever seen until, as the crowd dispersed a group of rowdy skinheads who had been standing behind us pushed their way forwards and began jumping and dancing in the pool and blood and brain.

That was, and still is the most horrific thing I’ve ever seen.
( Darryn.R, Mon 25 Jun 2007, 15:37, Reply)