Face Split Diving Accident Video

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I am looking for translators to translate this post into Arabic, Hebrew, Maltese, Romanian, Macedonian, Bulgarian, Slovenian, Hungarian, Ukrainian, Lithuanian, Russian, Swedish, Malay, Indonesian, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese and Wolof. Email me if you are interested.

This post has been translated into:

French: Visage Fendu dans Accident de Plongeon (en Français).

Portuguese: Video Acidente de Mergulho Rostro Dividida Ao Meio (em Português).

Spanish: Video Accidente de Clavadista con Cara Partida (en Español).

Finnish: Sukellusonnettomuus (on Suomen).

Serbo-Croatian: Ronilačkih Nezgoda Sa Licem Podijeljen U Dva (u Srpsko-hrvatski).

Italian: Incidente Di Tuffo Che Divide Il Viso In Due (traduzione in Italiano).

Greek: as: Näo Lõhkenud Õnnetusjuhtumi Sukeldumise Video.

Bad reactions to the video including nausea, vomiting, dry heaves, paleness, shivering, shaking, spinal chills, headache, rapid heartbeat, nightmares, inability to stop thinking of the video and pain in the face, have been reported. Adverse reactions have lasted up to three days. Please exercise caution in viewing the video.

This is one of the latest viral videos going around. It actually appeared on the Net around the third week of July 2009, but it only started going viral in a huge way around the second week of September 2009. It first appeared on Arabic and Turkish sites, and finally found its way around the Net. In general, it never has a name.

It’s just referred to by some description of the event like, Horrible Diving Accident, Bridge Fail, Worst Diving Accident, Horrific Diving AccidentAwesome Diving Accident, Disgusting Diving Accident, Jump Accident, Cellphone Horrific Diving Accident , and Diving Accident. I named it Dive Fail since I could not think of anything better. Later I changed the name to Face Split Diving Accident.

There’s really no “violence” in this video. It’s just a video of a horrible accident.

A teenager, a 16 year old boy, dives off the seaside promenade in Beirut, Lebanon and slips before the dive. The slip causes him to miss the ocean and instead hit the concrete slab below where fishermen fish. He hits the concrete face first, then goes into the ocean. In a short while, the ocean for yards around has turned red with blood. There are people in the water and boats trying to help the guy, and girls are screaming all over the place.

The scene then shifts to a hospital where the poor guy is being overseen by a team of doctors and nurses. His face has been split clear in two down the middle vertically!

He is still alive, conscious, and, and his tongue is still moving around. He appears terrified. A couple of times, the doctor takes the sides of his face and pushes them together to make a whole face again. The doctor says, “Where do I begin?” a few times in Arabic. We know this is an operating room in Lebanon because the doctors and nurses are speaking Lebanese Arabic.

People are wondering how he could survive such an injury. The front part of his brain may have been injured, but others are saying that it appears to be intact. At any rate, basic things like breathing are done by the brain stem. The brain stem appears to be intact. People are also wondering about pain. The brain has no pain receptors. On the other hand, the damage to his face must be very painful.

There are a lot of rumors saying that this video is fake, but apparently it is a real video. We know this because people in Lebanon are reporting it. Some had friends who were at the Promenade that day, others said it was reported in the Lebanese press, and others say that they were aware of stories on the street about the video. There is an article in Arabic from the Lebanese press online proving that this event occurred, but it’s in the archives, and looking through the archives costs money.

This event occurred in Beirut in the second week of June 2009. The teenager and his brother were showing off their diving skills by diving off the Manara Promenade ( supposedly proves that this video is fake. In the other video, the hospital footage is said to be of a failed 9mm suicide. However, no way can a 9mm do that kind of damage to your face. Furthermore, in a longer video version of the ER scene, the two doctors are discussing in Lebanese Arabic how he landed “on a rock” when he jumped into the water. This dialogue would not exist in a gun suicide video.

In addition, some are saying that the victim in the failed gun suicide video had a similar injury that differed from this one in certain ways; in particular, this one has a dichotomy of the jaw at the chin, and the other did not.

There are claims that instead of a 9mm failed suicide, this is a shotgun failed suicide. However, there are many photos of shotgun suicides on the Web, for instance, at Rotten.com. In general, shotgun failed suicides do not neatly clove one’s face in two in the way that this injury did. If it’s really a failed gun suicide, why are they speaking Lebanese Arabic just like they are speaking during the dive accident?

Sources in Lebanon who were there at the promenade and witnessed the dive accident claim that the word on the street in Lebanon is that the second half was shot in the hospital and is footage of aftermath of the diving accident. In addition, the young man in the hospital at the end is wearing swim trunks, just as the diver wore. What are the chances that a video of a failed shotgun suicide by a young man wearing a bathing suit occurred and was filmed in Lebanon around the same time of this accident?

Many people have questioned the nature of the wound. It does not seem to be possible to hit a concrete slab and split your face vertically like he did. However, if you look at the dive footage, there is steel casing around the concrete slab that he hits. The concrete slab has worn away and a lot of the steel casing is exposed. The steel casing runs parallel to the shoreline. Even then, hitting the steel casing would seem to be a horizontal hit.

However, look at the way that the boy is flailing wildly in the air. In his dive, he is twisting and turning like the wind. With such a flailing dive and while probably curving to try to avoid the concrete, it’s possible for him to him to turn the 90 degrees he needs to turn to hit the sharp edge of the steel casing vertically instead of horizontally, which would result in the injury we see later.

There is another theory suggesting that the hospital footage is not even real – it’s faked using special effects. I find this dubious. Looking at the cheap quality of the video especially and the fact that faking something like this is the terrain of motion picture studios with huge budgets, I think it is clear that the guy in the hospital suit is not “some rubber thing.” One problem is that the hospital guy is quite pale, while the jumper is a typical brown-skinned Arab. This is possible if the diver lost a lot of blood.

Another suggestion, perhaps not as odd as it sounds, is that he is already dead on the ER table. The body can make a few involuntary movements after death, there are such things as death rattles, and the breathing is said to have been artificially forced by the tube. But why tube a dead man? And if you look closely, you can see that his tongue is moving, and his chest is going up and down. He appears to be gasping for breath. A funeral director on the Web felt that he was still very much alive. She also said gun suicide injuries never cleave the head so perfectly. Only accidents can do that.

At the end of the day, it really doesn’t matter if the video is “fake” or not, because it isn’t. When we watch a scary Hollywood movie, do we all scream, “Fake!”? Of course not. What matters is if a movie is scary. And this video is downright terrifying.  It’s scary like Saw or Hostel is scary. At the end of the day, that’s all that matters.

There is something really creepy about this video that I can’t quite put a finger on.

From the very amateurish trilingual warning at the beginning (Arabic, French and English, suggesting once again it was made in Lebanon) to the horrible screams after he hits, to the blood-red ocean spreading in a large area around the 20-30 people gathered in the water to help him, to the absolutely terrifying scene in the hospital where the poor kid, incredibly, has a face split clear in two. The labored, terrified breathing of the victim combined with what appears to be a the look of horror on what’s left of his face is something that really stays with you.

Throughout the video, there is some weird, cheesy, hard to describe instrumental music going in the background that for some strange reason that really adds to the fear. This music is actually the soundtrack to a medical show on US TV that may or may not be on anymore. It’s either the soundtrack to ER or Chicago Hope. The amateurish cellphone footage that jumps around jerkily also in some way makes the video even scarier. I think maybe the frightening thing about all this amateurishness of the video is that it makes it seem so real (i.e. – it’s not just a Hollywood movie!)

I was traumatized for several days after watching this thing, and I’ve watched a lot of nasty stuff.

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231 thoughts on “Face Split Diving Accident Video”

  1. FUCK ALL OF YOU! I WANTED TO SEE THAT FUCKING DIVING ACCIDENT VIDEO, BUT NO! YOU CUNTS JUST HAD TO BE FUCKING DIFFICULT! FUCK FUCK FUCK! FUCK YOU!
    YOU’RE ALL CUNTS ‘N FUCKING BASTARDS! SUCK A DICK, YOU USELESS CUNTS! GET FUCKING FUCKED!
    YOU CAN ALL GET FUCKED FOR FUCK SAKE, YOU FUCKING USLESS FUCK-HEADED FUCK-WITTS! FUCK EV’RY ONE OF YOU! FUCKING HELL! YOU’RE ALL ASSHOLES ‘N CUNT-FACED WANKERS!

    1. You couldn’t follow a fucking link? You’re an idiot. If you jumped off a ledge and cracked your head open I doubt that we would see anything inside.

    2. “YOU’RE ALL ASSHOLES ‘N CUNT-FACED WANKERS!”
      Odd. From what I understand, ‘asshole’ is an american word and ‘wanker’ is a british/austrailian word, but they’re used together in the same sentence.
      Is the word ‘asshole’ becoming more prevalent in these other countries? It’s the reverse of San Franciso: Now asshole is penetrating something else.

  2. The first time I saw this video was in an EMT class. I’ve watched it again a few times afterwords. The intubation seems correct, and would have been performed prehospital. I have seen severe trauma cause “case splitting” of the skull like this before in car crashes. Also the construction of the pier would most certainly be steel framed concrete, which in turn would give a perfect mechanism to cause such an injury. In the ER the skin would be much more pale. The combined effects of homorhaggic shock, and likely neurological shock would turn a person of any color pale. Suicide by gun leaves distinctive entrance and exit wounds. The angle and quality of the shot in the ER is poor, but in my opinion the wound observed in the ER is from blunt force trauma, not a GSW. A GSW to the head leaves a ballooning pattern with small caliber ammunition such as 9mm, .40, .45, .38. A GSW to the head with a shotgun or rifle round would have physically removed parts of the head, and as you can see from the video there are no missing parts. A suicide by gun would also leave powder burns on the face which would be easily visible, even with this poorly shot film. As a rule of thumb anything over 20 feet is considered severe trauma and usually involves a helicopter. This jump was clearly close to 40 feet if not more. The damage done to any skeletal structure impacted would be severe. The fact that a grown person hit an angular piece of steel from 40 feet should let you know the victim died.
    This video appears real. And I hope this young man serves as a warning to others. Don’t be an idiot. If it looks dangerous, it is dangerous. Doctors and paramedics can fix a lot of things, but we can’t put your brain back into your skull and call you alive.

  3. Another observation. If the trauma was severe enough to cause massive skull fracturing like this, then there would certainly be internal injuries as well. You’re looking at a speed of about 55kph (35mph for all us Americans =] ) Try to think about it like this…The boy appeared stocky…lets say 160lbs, he would have impacted that tiny surface area with over 8500 joules of energy which is roughly 75000 lbs per square inch. That would be the same as planting 12 tractor trailers on the boys midline. I’ve done my math in explaining trauma for the day =)

  4. I watched the video twice. I’ve seen things like this before, in person. Death, especially when unnecessary is a tragic thing, but it happens everyday. Perhaps I’m desensitized, but it didn’t bother me one bit.

  5. Wow i am 14 but i think i am even more traumatiside then other people i was really sorry that i watched this movie. Damn for the brother and sister and parents for him amen for him i would kill myself if that was my brother could’ve you imagine about that Damn for the kid i wich it was never happend

  6. The second part is most likely a failed gunshot suicide attempt. It was posted in late May 2009 at this address:
    http://theync.com/media.php?name=9999-mans-face-completely-split-open
    It’s removed now though, so here’s an archived version from June 5th 2009 (still well before the diving accident):
    http://web.archive.org/web/20090605152705/http://www.theync.com/media.php?name=9999-mans-face-completely-split-open
    The video itself is not archived but I saw it myself back then, before someone spliced it together with the diving video which was pulled from a Lebanese (I think) Facebook group. By the way, the wound does look exactly like a gunshot wound to the face. It happens all the time, and there are plenty of very similar videos on the internet. I could link to some of them but you should probably just take my word for it.

  7. I watched this in class. And normally nothing makes me sick just watching it. But I wanted to puke. This is something crazy that happened, and its a shame it happened to him to die like that. May he rest in peace

  8. Thanks for posting the full story, too often these dramatic videos hit the net, but no story is attached.
    I watched only the bit where he actually hit and stopped there. I don’t need to go further, I got to understand the situation well enough.
    This video directly reminds me of a suicide in town that took place on this last Friday night/Saturday morning where someone jumped off a 7-story parking garage. It happened at 3am, after bars closed, and apparently, he had been sitting there for hours. Worse, some say people shouting ‘jump’ and he did.
    Now, suicide is nothing like an accidental death, but the impact shown in this video is similar. People were witness to the event and they provided more information than the news paper did. The mother even added a comment about her son to the article which never named him. It seems that the situation is the same here, no news articles available, but plenty public commentary.
    Thanks for filling in that role.

  9. As other posters have said above, it seems the man on the operating table is not the one shown diving. For quite a while I doubted those that said the two videos where unrelated, but having recently done research on the incident, I can attest to the fact that the footage in the hospital was posted on several forums (nyc, liveleak, ogrish, and possibly others) in late may and early june which contradicts the story included in the article.
    Furthermore, a picture allegedly of the man on the operating table taken after he had recovered was posted on a forum. I can’t say for certain whether it is him, but there is certainly a likeness and the fact he has a scar running down the front of his face lends more credibility to the claim.

  10. Hey, i live in Beirut and go to school right next to the railing were that kid died….In regards to “remember its a Lebanese hospital” the boy was taken to AUB, one of the Middle East’s leading hospital. I highly doubt the doctors did not know what they were doin…Most likely that video was a fraud

  11. Ehh… I thought he lived :/ but he didn’t how SAD. R.I.P , I bet he felt alot of PAIN that you can’t discribe, He would of died from that hit just in a flash but took it and suffered for 2 days 🙁 They should of FLOW him out to professional doctors,nurses, But he would rather die instead live in such PAIN

  12. am i the only one who noticed that you first said he died 2 days later, but further along you stated that he was in icu for two hours and then died??? please could you clarify this? 🙂 thnxx may the boy r.i.p amen

  13. I’ve seen videos like “3 men 1 hammer”, “1 lunatic, 1 icepick” all kinds of sick shit, you name it, I’ve seen 3 Pedophilic necrophilliac cannibals eat a dead kid together, 100% legit too, and I’m not lying here, but this video seems to affect me the most, my dad told me to never watch this, but after seeing all those sick videos, I thought Fuck it, and man do I regret it.. Haha R.I.P.

  14. I watched this vid years ago & it traumatized me so much! Don’t know why I came to look for it again maybe because of the shear OMFG of it! I’ve never seen another vid that shook me like this 1 did & probably never will! Unlike ‘time’ we can rewind the video & see what went wrong which is simply he decided to run & dive, where as the boy before sprang into his dive & cleared the concrete easily. Shame we can not rewind his life to the point that he never made that silly misjudged mistake. Life is precious don’t lose your head R.I.P dude..

    1. Three guys one hammer is worse…this guy starts beating other guys with a hammer..and one lunatic one ice pick…fucking gross.

  15. My brother sent this to me unannounced well over a year ago. I watched it once but it still haunts me from time. Talk about a horriffic, traumatic injury!

  16. Thank you for the thorough follow up on a video that totally traumatized me…a seasoned ER nurse. I have wondered about the outcome to the point of not being able to sleep, and your article at least puts the questions to rest! Thank you!!

  17. oh fuck i must be stupid to be watching this its horryble i don’t want to see anything like this again its too horryble jessus christ its like the video with the asia girl who’s runed down by a car and then another car drives all over her leaving her in the street with broken boones in a pool of blood that immage gave me nightmares for three months and i still remember it why do people show this god trust me you don’t want to see it its too awful ….i hope he is alive and that stupid jump should be a freaking lesson too everyone who’s trying to dive like that! God. i’m in nurse school and if i go to the hspital and ever have to face that live i think i’ll quit my job in the nex second !

  18. We’ll if you didn’t have unqualified people in a hospital he could of lived due to the fact that he died from internal bleeding means they probably just stitched his face up without connecting all or if any of the miniature blood vessels which is why it probably took two days for him to die and the fact that the doctor was trying to push it together does no good for it is just like playing with it because pushing it together several time is not going to magically make it be put back together

  19. Victoria ball you can see it on Facebook in the craziest injuries account thing and that’s where I saw it with my mom

  20. I watched this video over and over again back in 2009 just so I could desensitize myself because it was just so horrible. I can still see the images all this time later. I agree with the writer, there is something really scary about this video.

  21. His girlfriend said he was a two-faced jerk. Well that hit him right between the eyes. He felt like he should split but he took a leap of faith.
    He was in two minds whether to jump. He made a bloody mess of things but wanted to show off his inner self.
    At the hospital it was an open and shut case. At first it seemed like a mystery but the doctor read him like a book. This hospital brings people together all the time.
    He diagnosed a splitting headache and decided on a two-part treatment.

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