10 More Astonishing Coincidences

Our debut piece on coincidences has consistently ranked among the top 10 most popular articles, making it only natural to create a sequel. Dive into another collection of 10 incredible coincidences!

10. Emergency Landing

In 1979, Das Besteran, a German magazine, organized a writing contest where readers submitted extraordinary tales based on real-life events. Walter Kellner from Munich emerged victorious with his account of piloting a Cessna 41 between Sardinia and Sicily. His story detailed engine failure, an emergency water landing, and subsequent rescue. Intriguingly, an Austrian man, also named Walter Kellner, contacted the magazine, accusing the winner of plagiarism, claiming an almost identical incident had happened to him. Upon investigation, the magazine confirmed both stories were true, despite their striking similarities.

During the 1930s in New York, a commuter train plunged off an open drawbridge into Newark Bay, resulting in the tragic death of 30 passengers. Newspapers featured images of the accident, with the number ‘932’ prominently displayed on one of the train cars. This number was subsequently chosen by numerous participants in the Manhattan numbers game, and remarkably, it turned out to be the winning number, leading to thousands of winners.

In 1899, a man in Taranto, Italy, was struck and killed by lightning while standing in his backyard. Three decades later, his son met the same fate in the exact location, struck by another lightning bolt. On October 8, 1949, Rolla Primarda, the grandson of the first victim and son of the second, was also killed by lightning in the same spot.

Jean Marie Dubarry, a Frenchman, was executed on February 13, 1746, for killing his father. Exactly 100 years later, another Frenchman named Jean Marie Dubarry was executed on the same date for the same crime—patricide.

On November 26, 1911, three men—Robert Green, Henry Berry, and Lawrence Hill—were executed at Greenberry Hill in London for the murder of Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey. Their names coincidentally matched the location of their hanging: Green, Berry, and Hill.

Emile Deschamps, a 19th-century poet, recounted an incident from his school days when he dined at a restaurant with M. de Fortgibu, who had just returned from England. Fortgibu, having developed a fondness for plum puddings—a delicacy unavailable in France at the time—insisted that Deschamps try one.

A decade later, Deschamps noticed a restaurant serving plum pudding and decided to order a slice. However, he was informed it was reserved for another patron. Upon approaching the customer to request a share, he discovered it was none other than M. de Fortgibu. Both men were astounded to reunite over the same dish after so many years.

Years later, Deschamps attended a dinner party where plum pudding was served. As he recounted his remarkable encounters with Fortgibu to his hosts, they jokingly speculated about the old man’s possible appearance. To everyone’s amazement, Fortgibu, who had also been invited, arrived at the party.

Deschamps remarked, “In my life, I have eaten plum pudding three times, and on each occasion, I encountered M. Fortgibu. It sent chills down my spine!”

Between 1861 and 1878, Henri Trange engaged in five duels in Marseilles, France. Remarkably, his first four opponents died before any shots were exchanged. In the fifth duel, just as the duel was about to commence, Trange himself collapsed and died.

Barbara Forrest (born in 1954) and Mary Ashford (born in 1797) were both murdered 157 years apart, yet their cases share astonishing parallels. Both were killed on May 27th in the same town, and in both 1817 and 1974, May 26th was Whit Monday. Each victim was raped before being murdered, their bodies discovered within 400 yards of each other, and both crimes occurred around the same time of day. Efforts were made to conceal both bodies, and both women had visited a friend on Whit Monday evening, changed into new dresses, and attended a dance.

The accused in both murders shared the name Thornton, and both were acquitted. The two victims bore strikingly similar facial features. Ten days before her death, on May 17, 1974, Barbara Forrest told a friend, “This is going to be my unlucky month. I just know it. Don’t ask me why.”

The Columbian newspaper in Oregon accidentally published the winning Pick 4 lottery numbers for June 28, 2000, ahead of time. Instead of printing the previous winning numbers, they mistakenly listed the numbers from Virginia’s lottery: 6-8-5-5. Surprisingly, these exact numbers were drawn in the subsequent Oregon lottery.

In 1899, Canadian actor Charles Francis Coghlan fell ill and passed away in Galveston, Texas, USA. Due to the considerable distance of 3,500 miles to his home on Prince Edward Island, he was interred in a lead coffin placed within a granite vault.

A year later, in September 1900, a devastating hurricane struck Galveston, flooding the cemetery, destroying Coghlan’s granite vault, and sweeping his lead coffin into the Gulf of Mexico.

Eight years after the hurricane, in October 1908, fishermen near Prince Edward Island discovered a worn-out box floating close to the shore. It was Charles Coghlan’s coffin, which had miraculously drifted back to his homeland. He was laid to rest in the local church where he had been baptized as an infant.