22 Spine-Tingling Facts That’ll Creep You Out – Part 2

One reason that crows and ravens are associated with death is because they would often follow armies as they marched to battle. Being both carrion birds and extremely intelligent, they realized that a large group of armed men marching in one direction meant that there would be a tasty meal of corpses to eat soon afterward.

2. Blobfish in its natural habitat looks like normal fish. It lives so deep underwater that it doesn't use a normal gas bladder to keep itself balanced. Instead, it has a spongy skin that is slightly less dense than water, which becomes damaged and bloated when fishermen bring it up too quickly. It's not really the ugliest fish. It has just experienced something worse than one of us being thrown into outer space. Between sea level and space, there's one atmospheric pressure of difference. Between sea level and 2000 feet underwater, their upper limit, there are 60 atmospheres of difference.

3. According to the FBI, if you are murdered in the USA there is only about a 40% chance that your murderer will ever be found and punished.

4. Locusts aren’t a type of animal. They are a condition some grasshoppers experience. Many species of grasshoppers become locusts when they are too crowded (literally their legs rubbing together triggers the change). Once grasshoppers start to swarm they will join up with others, physically grow larger, change color, and eat basically anything they find. Most of a swarm will be born as part of the swarm (increased mating is part of swarm behavior). This is why it often seems like locust swarms come out of nowhere. Add in the amount of calories they need to stay airborne, and in addition to devouring acres upon acres of crops, they also cannibalize each other in the air.

5. Once you begin to display symptoms of rabies you will go crazy and die. There is no cure. Your brain will slowly melt until you are dead. Therefore the second you get bitten by anything that has the potential to carry rabies you should get yourself to the hospital.

Serial Killer Richard Chase took any unlocked door as an invitation to come inside. He only entered homes with an unlocked door, killed and cannibalized his victims. He considered that locked doors meant he was not welcome.

7. Crocodiles can gallop like a horse. Fortunately, alligators cannot.

8. Men who are hanged get a death erection, known as Rigor Erectus.

9. A black mamba is the fastest snake which can slither at a speed of 12.5 miles an hour (20km/hr). They have neurotoxins that are fast-acting. The venom shuts down the nervous system and paralyzes the victim. Its venom can kill 10 people and it repeatedly bites. To add to this, it has an almost 100% kill rate and can kill a person in 20 minutes.

10. It wasn't until 1987 that the American Academy of Pediatrics declared it unethical to operate on newborns without anesthesia. Until surprisingly recently, the medical community felt it would be dangerous to give infants anesthesia and/or believed that they didn't feel pain.

When creating the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland, they couldn’t create skeletons that looked “realistic” enough, so they used real human skeletons from UCLA medical center. They’ve since removed all of them except one.

12. Ducks will sometimes become cannibalistic due to boredom, lack of ventilation, or faulty nutrition. They can only be stopped by cutting off their “mouths.”

13. It was once discovered that something really strange was growing inside a human body. Artyom Sidorkin went to the doctors suspecting something wrong with his lungs. The doctors thought they were dealing with a tumor but turns out he had inhaled a fir tree seed which had sprouted and had begun growing in his lungs.

14. If you live to the age of 70 you will have shed around 105 pounds of skin over your lifetime.

15. It’s quite common for dead bodies to burp a lot as there is a lot of gas buildup after death. The dead body of a pregnant woman can “give birth” to the fetus inside as a result of the increasing pressure of intra-abdominal gases. This is called coffin birth.

Mount Everest is covered in frozen corpses because removing them is very unsafe and time-consuming. Even scarier is the fact that bodies don’t decompose up there. They either look like mummies or someone sleeping. They are easily viewed from the climbing routes and some are even used as trail markers. One section of the Mount Everest climbing trail is even named “Rainbow Valley”, due to the bright clothing and climbing gear on many of the bodies. It’s located near the summit.

17. Imagine being totally aware of someone performing CPR but you physically can’t move or respond. Well, that’s what happens when you get bitten by a blue-ringed octopus. You have approximately 6 minutes between being bitten and someone starting CPR to keep your heart and lungs functioning to ensure you survive, all whilst being totally aware of what is happening to you. The venom of the blue-ringed octopus is 1000 times more powerful than cyanide and has enough venom that could kill about 26 humans in a minute. One guy who got stung, got CPR performed on him and survived but went blind because he was lying on his back, eyes open, unable to blink because of the paralysis, starring into the sun. Imagine lying there, unable to move, unable to communicate, the sun slowly burning out your eyes and you can't shut them.

18. A “sense of impending doom” is a medically recognized symptom and can indicate certain conditions especially in case of a heart attack. It can present itself before any physical symptoms are detectable.

19. Stonefish is an incredibly venomous fish living in tropical waters mostly off the coast of Australia and parts of the US. It can cause pain that only escalates with time. Eventually, the pain will subside but even after the barb is removed, patients have reported increasing pain more than 12 hours later. Without antivenom or denaturing the venom with excessive heat, the pain builds and builds until the patients request euthanasia. Its spines hold the venom, hidden in its dorsal fins. Aboriginals living around the Great Barrier reef have “corroborees,” large gatherings, and will during these gatherings hold reenactments of people being stung by this monster (either for amusement, learning, or both).

20. The venom from the Brazilian Wandering Spider contains a protein (PnTx2-6) that has been found to induce erections. Erections resulting from the bite are painful, can last for many hours, and can lead to impotence. Some cases of even death have been reported. These spiders are large and highly aggressive, often entering human dwellings and hide in clothing or shoes. When disturbed they bite furiously several times.

In Stalin’s Russia, 6700 people were sent to live in a work camp on the Nazino Island which was in a remote part of Russia. They had no supplies, shelter, or tools and if they tried to leave the island they were shot and killed by Russian soldiers. It took less than 2 months before the people on the island, in their desperation, gave in to a cannibalistic holocaust. Over 4000 people were killed or went “missing” at that time. In the end, only 2200 people made it off the island in one piece. It wasn't until the late 80's that a world tribunal even found out the gruesome details of what went on there.

22. The men of the ship Essex (the true event that inspires the story “Moby Dick”) avoided islands after being shipwrecked for fear of cannibals. The islands were settled and landing there would have brought salvation to the survivors. Ironically because of this bypass, the men ran out of food and were forced to eat each other for survival. Do you know what's even creepier? Two of the sailors were later rescued by an American ship. When they saw their rescuers, they immediately stashed the bones of their crewmates they had cannibalized in their pockets. They didn't seem to care that they were rescued. They were obsessed with the bones of their fallen crewmates, so that they could suck on the bone marrows. Even after they were on board the ship, they refused to depart from the bones and would even attack anyone who would come close.