[paazin]

I wonder if there is a site about exhumations. I am interested how long a body decays, though there are many factors. Still when I shuffle of this mortal coil. It will be cremation and ashes scattered,

[bakuto50]

I really enjoyed the pic's and info. Thanks for sharing. Very cool. It looks like more than a ,one man job, is it just you out there?

[sylvz88]

Originally Posted by bakuto50 ↗

I really enjoyed the pic's and info. Thanks for sharing. Very cool. It looks like more than a ,one man job, is it just you out there?

I had a friend helping me that day...

[mart_knip]

Man i think you will bring alot to the site :o) , thanx alot for those!
Cheers

[Billthegravedigger]

Sylvz88, out of curiosity, do you ever bury the steel type of vaullts ? And do you ever exhume them if you do bury that type ?
The one good thing about them is that they keep the groundwater from saturatting the corpse to a stew, though the corpse can and does still seep out at times.

I try to explain to people that a person that suffers trauma from whatever killed them, start to decompose at that paticular spot or spots faster than other parts that were not damaged. Most seem to understand, some don't. We took this one up after being in the ground around thirty years, and the casket and body were in pretty good shape.

[sylvz88]

I've never seen a vault like this in my country, this one is all metal isn't it?

We use only concrete vaults which can welcome 4 to 6 caskets (sometimes twice more for the doubles but it's rare) or we dig a hole and we put the casket directly in the grave. Sometimes two (one on the other).

The caskets are in wood with brass handles.

It's true what you said about the decomposition of the damaged parts of the body. they decay first.

Also all the orifices are appreciated by the flies which make maggot eggs in the nose or the mouth or the eyes or any wound... they love them !!!

When you say the body was in pretty good shape, how did it look like?

Because after 30 years most of the bodies I've seen were very fragile skeletons and ready to become powder.

When you're about to about a vault like this one, you must be curious of what you'll find inside no?
I would.... it's my favorite part of the job.

[Eisenberg]

This is why i like DR, high quality first hand pictures. I hope you do not get in trouble with your employer for publishing these pictures :P

[sylvz88]

thanks man I also like DR for the same reasons that's why I uploaded these pictures here and nowhere else.

I appreciate your concern about these photos being a potential risk for my professional activity.

I made the choice to share these photos with advised people, on a private website documenting the different faces of death, and they definitively belong here. It could be good also if they stayed here.

To be honest, I would't appreciate so much if these pictures could be found anywhere on the web since I've searched such a place for a long time ...and eventually causing me problems... but compared to what some people we see here can be into, it's no big deal is it?

But it's true if i could re-edit my post I would ask DR members to tell me first if they use those where I appear... the others I don't mind and neither are they, they're all dead !!!)

And as I said before I'll keep posting the good stuffs so let's keep it private so I can go on....

[Billthegravedigger]

Originally Posted by sylvz88 ↗

I've never seen a vault like this in my country, this one is all metal isn't it?

We use only concrete vaults which can welcome 4 to 6 caskets (sometimes twice more for the doubles but it's rare) or we dig a hole and we put the casket directly in the grave. Sometimes two (one on the other).

The caskets are in wood with brass handles.

It's true what you said about the decomposition of the damaged parts of the body. they decay first.

Also all the orifices are appreciated by the flies which make maggot eggs in the nose or the mouth or the eyes or any wound... they love them !!!

When you say the body was in pretty good shape, how did it look like?

Because after 30 years most of the bodies I've seen were very fragile skeletons and ready to become powder.

When you're about to about a vault like this one, you must be curious of what you'll find inside no?
I would.... it's my favorite part of the job.

It's a 12 gauge vault, the kind we bury the most. They are welded to be one solid piece for the dome. They tack-weld the bolts to the outside of the vault for the handles, that way there is no holes for water to seep in. They also water test them as well. They have a giant "dunk tank" they put them in, and a hydraulic piston forces them to the bottom. When the vault comes back up, if it has a water line higher than four to five inches, they reject it. The pan sits up in the dome about 4.5 to 5 inches, so any water higher than that, and the vault is recycled. I will put a couple of pics up for you, I don't usually do the best job explaining things, and stuff comes out wrong.

[Billthegravedigger]

The body we exhumed had been buried right at 30 years, and the casket looked like it had just been buried, except for some minor condensation stains.

The body looked pretty good for being dead that long. It had discoloration as you can imagine, and very mild mold growth.
Even his eyes were still intact, but had went through the shrinking process every so slightly. Other than that, they were intact, and void of color. You could see no visable colors for them, not even a pupil. They were completely white.

I will have to find it, but I took a picture of him. One thing about this place man, people do seem to honestly wonder and enjoy these types of posts, but if you can, just mark out any names on gravestones and stuff. That will just help you in the long run. It is not very likely anyone you have worked for will ever come on here and see a deceased loved one you exhumed, but it is possible.

You seem like a really good person, and hiding names would just be an insurance policy for you. I blur names on gravestones, funeralhome equipment, and faces of people around me just in case. I did not in the one above of the guy inthe white hat, but he is a friend and doesn't care if he is seen or not.

Of course it just what you are most cofortrable with, blurring them out or not. Here is a couple of pictures showing how the vault looks and works. It will probably be more help to you than me trying to explain it, I do not have a very good way with words.