This isn't really a typical post. It's just something that I
figured was worth looking into and sharing. I hope you enjoy it.
On the subject of the
reanimated recently-deceased digging their way to the surface:
For those of you who have ever wondered or worried about the
possibility of a reanimated body of someone’s deceased loved one (zombie or ghoul,
for those of you who are insensitive monsters who are cruel enough to use the
Z- or G-word to describe someone’s recently reanimated, but still deeply loved,
Granny) finding a way to make it out of their grave to either feast on the
living or to watch the season premier of Game of Thrones, I have some either
good or disappointing news for you: They’d probably be trapped in their
caskets.
For mostly esthetic reasons, most modern cemeteries in the US
use burial vaults or liners for all burials. Liners are basically cement boxes
that the casket goes into and is solid to prevent collapse and flat enough to
prevent mounds, holes or valleys in the top soil once everything settles after
the burial. Burial Vaults are just higher quality liners that either seal better,
have an esthetically pleasing painted metal exterior, or both. Caskets usually
fit pretty snuggly into Liners. So snuggly in fact, that caskets are lowered
into liners using thin fabric straps that are made of the same material as
seatbelts. This is done because those thin strips are pretty much all you could
fit between the casket and the inside of the liner.
Now that I’ve defined terms and discussed materials it’s time to
start talking dimensions and weight. Before I start however, I want to make it
clear that I’m using bare minimum numbers to minimize margin of error.
Though it is still true that graves are dug six feet deep, six
feet is merely the floor of the grave. The top of the liner to the top of the
grave is usually only about three to four feet. Multiply 3 ft. (minimums
remember) by the length (6 ½ft) and the width (2 ½ft) of the liner and you come
up with 48.75 ft. cubed. Multiply that by a minimum of 70lbs. per cubic ft. of
soil and you get 3,412 &½ lbs. of soil between the top of the liner and
ground level.
Add to that the weight of the lid of the liner. I’m not sure
where you might find a liner this thin, but for the sake of this equation let’s
say that the lid of the liner is 1 inch thickness, multiply that by our
previously discussed liner dimensions of 6 ½ft by 2 ½ft and you get 2,340 in
cubed. Multiply that by 0.077lbs. Per cubed inches of concrete and you get
roughly 180lbs.
Leaving out the marginal weights of the casket lid and the
ground level layer of grass, when you add it all together you get 3,592 ½lbs.
that needs to be essentially bench-pressed by a reanimated decedent in order to
even start the process of crawling out of their final resting place.
The current world record bench press was set at the Cajun
hardcore powerlifting meet in Buna, TX in 2013. The record was set by Paul
"Tiny" Meeker when he, while wearing a “bench shirt,” bench pressed
1102lbs. Which is less than 1/3 the weight of just the liner lid and the soil
above it. And that’s not taking into account that a decedent who was strong
enough to pull this off during his or her lifetime would most likely require a
wider casket, which means a wider liner with a bigger and heavier lid with more
cubic feet of dirt above it.
Add to all this
that most caskets sold today can be locked and that it’s usually cemetery and
funeral home policy to do so before burial; there is typically less than 3
inches of clearance between the lid of the casket (which swings out) and the
bottom of the liner lid (which lifts up and out); and the fact that once the
casket lid hits the liner lid, the metal or wood of the casket must continue to
open out while pushing up on the liner lid, the whole process being further
hindered by the friction of the two parts sliding passed each other.
After all of
this, most casket lids have two pieces, a longer one at the head and a shorter
one at the foot end. The reanimated would most likely only have the room to
lift the head end. At some point, he or she (even if they are dead and possibly
flesh-hungry, we still owe them the respect to not refer to them as ‘it’) would
have to be using one arm to continue to push the casket lid out while using the
other to push up on the lid of the liner and all of the dirt above it, dividing
his or her strength among the two. Not an easy task for anyone.
If all of this
took any more than eight hours it extremely likely that someone would notice
the ground bulging up above the grave. In order for it to go unnoticed, it
would have to happen somewhere with little or no foot or vehicle traffic and/or
in the middle of the night at a cemetery without a caretaker (sexton). If the
caretaker was either a drunk or extremely negligent, or the reanimated made
very slow progress, they might end up having to do battle mole traps once they
got close to the surface.
So, in
conclusion, even if a reanimated decedent were to be stronger than the average
living person, it would still be extremely hard if not nearly impossible for
them in death, reanimated or otherwise, to dig themselves out of their grave.
No matter how much motivation the hunger for human flesh, or wanting to watch
the consequences of the Red Wedding unfold, gives them.
Again, I hope you enjoyed that.
For those who are unaware, I am working on moving away from this
format and starting to post vlogs on YouTube. I want to reach a wider audience,
and Blogspot just isn't cutting it.
Like last time and all the times before, if you have any
questions, concerns, suggestions, spelling or grammatical corrections (how will
I ever learn if no one ever says anything), words of support or encouragement,
confessions of love, hate-filled rantings of utter distain, or anything else
for me, do not hesitate to email me at funhomeambo@gmail.com.
Hope you enjoyed it and I thank you for reading all of this or
skipping to the end, whichever is the case.
Johnathan Hove
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