When films become REAL horror movies: From helicopter crashes to the blank round that killed Brandon Lee, a look back at previous tragedies on Hollywood sets following Alec Baldwin shooting accident
- Behind the glamour, filming for Hollywood movies is notoriously dangerous
- This was again brought into sharp focus by tragic shooting of Halyna Hutchins
- The photography director, 42, was killed by prop gun fired by Alec Baldwin
- The tragedy has grim echoes of the dummy round that killed actor Brandon Lee
- Lee, rising star and son of Bruce Lee, was shot dead during filming for The Crow
- Often it is the stunt doubles who are most at risk, putting their lives on the line
- But film sets, involving explosives and destructive sets, are perilous for all
Behind the glamour, filming for Hollywood movies is notoriously dangerous, with plane crashes, explosions, falling structures and high speed chases all responsible for cutting short the lives of stunt doubles, actors and directors.
This was brought into sharp focus again on Thursday by the death of photography director Halyna Hutchins who was accidentally killed by Alec Baldwin with a prop gun on set in New Mexico.
The circumstances of how the weapon fired a lethal projectile remain unclear, but blank rounds are known for being sealed with paper wadding to build up pressure which can lead to fatal injury due to the hot gasses and unburned powder expelled.
Actor Jon-Erik Hexum died on the set of TV series Cover Up in 1984 when he accidentally shot himself while playing with a prop gun between takes, not realising it was still loaded with blanks. Wadding struck him in the temple, fracturing his skull and causing brain hemorrhaging which proved fatal.
The tragedy has grim echoes of the blank round that killed actor Brandon Lee on the set of the 1994 film The Crow, who was killed when a fragment of bullet lodged inside the gun was discharged when a blank was fired. It struck his abdomen with the same force as a live round.
Often stunt doubles are used for the most dangerous action, putting their lives on the line for the perfect shot, scaling heights, flying planes low to the ground and hanging out of moving vehicles.
But film sets, with explosives, falling buildings and vertigo-inducing staging locations, have also claimed the lives of actors, directors and crew members.
Here MailOnline recalls some of the worst tragedies to strike on set:
Cut short: Brandon Lee, the son of martial arts icon Bruce Lee, was a rising star before one of the most tragic deaths in Hollywood history cut his life short
The Crow, 1994 – Dummy round kills actor Brandon Lee
Brandon Lee, the son of martial arts icon Bruce Lee, was a rising star before one of the most tragic deaths in Hollywood history cut his life short.
In the scene, Lee’s character walks into his apartment and discovers his fiancée being beaten and raped, before a thug fires a Smith & Wesson Model 629 .44 Magnum revolver at Lee’s character.
In the shooting of an earlier scene, the prop gun – which was a real Smith & Wesson revolver – had been loaded with improperly crafted dummy rounds, cartridges which have the powder charges removed so that in close-ups the revolver appears loaded with normal ammunition.
The crew failed to remove the primer from the cartridges and at some point, prior to the fatal incident, one of the rounds was fired.
Although there was no powder cartridge, the energy from the ignited primer was able to separate the bullet from the casing and push it up into the gun barrel where it got lodged – known as a ‘squib load.’
In the fatal scene, the gun was to be fired from 12ft away, with dummy cartridges being replaced by blanks, containing powder and primer but no bullets.
But the gun was not properly checked and cleared before the blank was fired by the actor playing the thug and the .44 bullet lodged inside the weapon was discharged and struck Lee in the abdomen.
After six hours of unsuccessful emergency surgery, Lee succumbed to his injuries at New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, North Carolina at just 28.
Lee’s relatives took to Twitter Thursday to mourn the tragedy on the set of Baldwin’s movie.
‘Our hearts go out to the family of Halyna Hutchins and to Joel Souza and all involved in the incident on Rust,’ read a tweet from the account, which is run by Lee’s sister Sharon Lee. ‘No one should ever be killed by a gun on a film set. Period.’
Lee, the son of martial-arts icon Bruce Lee, died at the age of 28 on March 31, 1993 while filming The Crow in North Carolina. He was fatally hit with a .44-caliber slug after another actor fired a prop gun at him that was thought to have been loaded with blanks.
Motherless Brooklyn, 2018 – Set fire kills FDNY firefighter
Tragedy struck the set of Edward Norton’s directorial debut Motherless Brooklyn in March 2018, when fire broke out on the set.
The FDNY was called in to contain the blaze, with decorated fireman Michael Davidson, 37, who had been on the FDNY for 15 years, dying on the set.
He had been cited for bravery four times during his tenure, leaving behind a wife and four daughters.
The fire broke out in the basement of 773 St. Nicholas Ave., while the film crew was inside the building on the ground floor, with actors dressed up in period costumes for a scene in the movie, set in the 1950s.
Edward Norton at the scene as the massive fire tore through the New York City movie set
FDNY member Michael Davidson, 37, died while battling the fire, which Norton was first to spot when he spotted smoke coming from the basement of a Harlem building used in the movie
Firefighters tackle the blaze Fire on ‘Motherless Brooklyn’ film set, New York, on March 23, 2018
Tragedy struck the set of Edward Norton’s directorial debut Motherless Brooklyn in March 2018, when fire broke out on the set, killing an FDNY firefighter
Davidson’s widow Eileen (pictured) arrives for her husband’s funeral at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan in New York City, U.S, March 27, 201
The five-story building is home to the former St. Nick’s Jazz Pub, which closed in 2011.
‘We were inside when the fire started and everybody came out panicking’, actress and model Angelica Guillen tweeted after the incident, adding that they ‘were all there and we are safe’ while offering her condolences to Davidson’s family.
Davidson was reportedly the first fireman into the building and suffered serious injuries after becoming separated from his crew.
New York Fire Department Commissioner Daniel Nigro at the time said the blaze had erupted in the basement about 11pm and that crews went down the stairs to fight the fire with Davidson as nozzelman’.
‘They encountered heavy fire and they did the best they could. The fire continued to advance. Units were forced to back out of the building. Somehow while backing out of that building, firefighter Davidson was separated from the rest of the unit.
‘The search ensued. Members tried desperately to find firefighter Davidson and when they did he was unconscious.
‘Despite the best efforts of the members of our fire fighting forces, EMS and here at the hospital, they were unable to revive Michael and he perished.
‘Our entire city mourns his loss.’
It took more than 175 firefighters, and dozens of vehicles to get the fire extinguished by 2.30am the next morning.
The Expendables 2, 2012 – Explosion kills stuntman on rubber boat
The Expendables 2 starred Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jet Li and had an explosion scene filmed on the water in Bulgaria.
Stuntman Ken Lui was killed in October 2011 while performing in a rubber boat on Ognyanovo dam, just outside the capital, Sofia.
The 26-year-old Beijing native did not survive after suffering wounds from a nearby explosion in the Stallone vehicle.
Bulgarian press at the time reported that Stallone’s stuntman was seriously injured during the explosion that killed Kun Liu.
Emergency crews arrive at the scene of the explosion scene that killed stuntman Kun Liu during filming of The Expendables 2
First responders at the scene that killed stuntman Kun Liu during filming of The Expendables 2
Stuntman Kun Liu was killed by an explosion that went off during filming for a scene in The Expendables 2
Millennium films denied reports that the doubles for Stallone and Li had been involved in the accident.
Liu’s parents, Liu Zong Yu Liu and Bai Yan Mei, filed a wrongful death lawsuit in 2012 against Millennium Films and the movie’s stunt coordinator, following their son’s death.
They were eventually awarded HK$195,000 (£19,400) after a protracted court battle lasting four years.
The Twilight Zone: The Movie, 1982 – Vic Morrow and a child actor decapitated by a helicopter’s rotor blades, a second child crushed by the aircraft
The tragic accident that killed actor Vic Morrow and children Myca Dinh Le, 7, and Renee Shin-Yi Chen, 6, resulted in major filming code changes.
The scene was supposed to feature Morrow’s character being transported back to Vietnam, where he was supposed to protect two Vietnamese children.
A helicopter flying above Morrow and the two children was sent crashing to the ground by an ill-timed explosion during filming of a chase scene.
The helicopter fell to the ground, its main rotor blades decapitating Morrow and the child actor Le, while one of the aircraft’s landing skid crushed the second child Chen.
Tragic: The tragic accident that killed actor Vic Morrow and children Myca Dinh Le, 7, and Renee Shin-Yi Chen, 6, resulted in major filming code changes
The filming location was the ranch Indian Dunes in Santa Clarita, California, that was used throughout the 1980s for such movies and shows as The Color Purple, Escape From New York, MacGyver, and China Beach.
Its wide-open area set on 600 acres enabled larger pyrotechnic displays and the shooting of night scenes without the interruption of city lights.
The scene was filmed at night with Morrow’s character to carry the two children out of a deserted village and across a shallow river while being hunted down by American soldiers in a low-flying helicopter.
Morrow was standing in the river when a Bell UH-1 Iroquois helicopter that was being flown by Vietnam war veteran Dorcey Wingo hovered 25ft off the ground.
Wingo was turning the chopper through 180 degrees when a mortar effect was detonated while the tail-rotor was above the explosion.
The tail-rotor was blown off the back of the helicopter causing the low-flying chopper to spin wildly out of control.
The helicopter fell on top of Morrow and the children, decapitating the actor and Le, while Chen was crushed to death by the aircraft’s right landing skid. All three died instantly.
Director John Landis, Associate producer George Folsey Jr., pilot Wingo, production manager Dan Allingham, and explosives specialist Paul Stewart were tried and acquitted on charges of manslaughter in a nine-month trial in 1986 and 1987.
The families of the children later collected millions of dollars from several law suits.
In October 1984, the National Transportation Safety Board found that the explosion had been too near to the helicopter and this had been caused by a failure of coordination between the pilot and Landis.
The incident led to legal action that lasted for over a decade, and lead to stringent changes in safety regulations that had not previously been in place.
Cover Up, 1984 – Blank bullet cartridge kills actor Jon-Erik Hexum
Cast and crew were filming the seventh episode of the 1984 TV series Cover Up, when tragedy struck on October 12, 1984.
Actor Jon-Erik Hexum, 26, was playing an undercover CIA agent who was posing as a male model.
He was given a .44 magnum loaded with blanks and the day was beset with delays as the director sought out the perfect take.
Hexum grew frustrated by the protracted filming and between scenes he began playing around with the gun, simulating Russian roulette.
Jon-Erik: Actor Jon-Erik Hexum (left) was filming a scene where he was meant to simulate Russian Roulette, when a cartridge in the gun was fired and fatally struck him in the head.
He had unloaded all but one of the blank rounds and was spinning the cylinder around before re-engaging it and, apparently unaware of the danger, put the gun up to his head.
Blanks use paper or wadding to seal gunpowder inside a cartridge, which means that huge pressure is built up which can send lethal fragments of whatever is inside the barrel out, including unexploded powder, as well as searing hot gasses.
Paper wadding shot out of the barrel and shattered Hexum’s skull, causing massive hemorrhaging in the brain.
The actor was rushed to Beverly Hills Medical Center where he underwent emergency operations, but he passed away just five days later.
The death was ruled as accidental. His mother later reached an out of court settlement with 20th Century Fox Television and Glen A. Larson Productions.
Deadpool 2, 2017 – Stuntwoman Joi ‘SJ’ Harris dies in motorcycle crash
The production of the highly-anticipated Deadpool sequel was tarnished when stunt motorcycle rider lost control of her bike and fatally crashed.
Joi ‘SJ’ Harris was filming a stunt sequence at Shaw Tower in Vancouver, when she lost control and crashed into a plate glass window.
It was Harris’ first gig as a stunt rider, though she was an experienced rider, and was the first African-American female professional road racer.
Harris was not wearing a helmet at the time of the accident, because her character, Domino, played by Zazie Beetz, didn’t wear one in the scene.
Tragic: The 40-year-old was killed when she lost control of her motorcycle while practicing a stunt on the Vancouver set in August 2017
A police officer photographing the motorcycle after the incident occured during filming in Vancouver, British Columbia
Details of an investigation report by WorkSafeBC found that the Harris was killed in a freak, low-speed accident.
‘A temporary worksite had been setup to record a film scene for a movie production. The site had been cordoned off from general public and traffic by the Vancouver Police Department,’ the report said.
‘The worker had been rehearsing a stunt scene that involved driving a motorcycle, Dictate 939 Hyperstrada, out of the open doors of a building, across a concrete pad and down a ramp that had been built over three stairs and coming to a stop on the stair landing.’
It went on to say that during the initial shooting of the scene Harris continued driving beyond the planned stopping spot on the stairway landing and continued to drive down a second ramp which was built over the bottom stairs and across the road.
It concluded: ‘The motorcycle struck the concrete sidewalk curb, the worker was thrown off the motorcycle and propelled through a plate glass window of a building.’
Josh Brolin said afterwards: ‘We had somebody pass away on Deadpool 2 and it was an absolute freak accident.
‘The woman was such a wonderful woman … it wasn’t even a stunt, it was a freak accident.
‘It was a terrible thing that happened. Was it a nano-decision that she made in order to save the bike and this, you know what I mean?’ he continued.
‘You could look into it all [these ways], but sometimes things just happen that are tragic.’
Catch-22, 1970 – Aerial photographer falls out of jet while filming over Gulf of Mexico
Aerial photographer John Jordan was killed while capturing footage from a C32 Lockheed Freighter over the Gulf of Mexico.
Jordan was an experienced cameraman and renowned for his fearless ability to achieve aerial shots that nobody else could, leaning out of helicopters with a harness securing him.
He even lost a foot while filming for James Bond film You Only Live Twice when he got too close to a Bell 47 helicopter.
It was this gung-ho attitude which would be his downfall on the filming of Mike Nichols’ Catch-22 starring Orson Welles.
Jordan was shooting from the open door of a C32 Lockheed Freighter and refused to wear a harness as they flew over the Gulf of Mexico.
A sudden gust of wind caused the plane to tilt sideways and Jordan was sucked out of the door, plunging 4,000ft to his death into the sea.
Director Mike Nichols and actor Orson Welles on the set of Catch-22
Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, 2017 – Crew member killed when unsecured car slid off rotating platform
Crew member Ricardo Cornelius was killed when an unsecured car slid off a rotating platform and crashed into him.
The South African, from Mitchells Plain, a township outside the city, had only been working on the Cape Town set for five weeks when the fatal accident took place in December 2014.
The 34-year-old was assisting with a US army issue Hummer, which was parked on a rotating platform, when it tilted and fell, pinning Cornelius to a wall.
Ricardo Cornelius, 34, (pictured with his wife Shafiefa, 26) died after being crushed by a Hummer on the Cape Town set of Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, the sixth film in the series starring Milla Jovovich (pictured)
Cornelius, who married wife Shafiefa, 26, earlier that year, was taken to hospital and put on life support, but passed away a few hours later.
‘At the hospital, doctors said they had to take him into theatre as soon as he arrived,’ Mrs Cornelius told South African news website IOL at the time.
‘His heart stopped and they were fighting for his life but managed to revive him again. The doctors said his lungs were completely flat and he was bleeding a lot.
‘We were with him for about an hour, then he died.’
A poster for the movie Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, 2017. Crew member Ricardo Cornelius was killed when an unsecured car slid off a rotating platform and crashed into him
Gone in 60 Seconds 2, 1989 – Director H.B. Halicki killed by falling telephone pole
Director H.B. Halicki was killed while filming the sequel to his 1974 hit Gone in 60 Seconds, the subject of a loose remake starring Nicolas Cage and Angelina Jolie in 2000.
On August 20, 1989, in upstate New York, Halicki was preparing for a dramatic stunt sequence in which a 160ft water tower was supposed to tumble to the ground.
He was allowed to go ahead with the stunt after wrangling with local officials over the disused water tower, which he agreed to insure for $8 million.
The water tower was being supported by a cable which suddenly snapped and sheared a telephone pole which fell on Halicki.
The 48-year-old, who had married Denice Shakarian earlier that year, was killed instantly.
In an interview just hours before his death, Halicki denied his stunts were unsafe and said he thought town officials were out to ‘make my life as miserable as they could.’
Tonawanda Town Supervisor Ronald Moline, who had earlier accused Halicki of ‘flying by the seat of his pants, told reporters afterwards: ‘I’m not one of those types of people to take any satisfaction out of what happened, like, ‘I told you so.”
However, he added, ‘one of the ironies of this situation is that perhaps the Halicki family will benefit from some of these insurance coverages he took.’
Director H.B. Halicki was killed when a water tower, which was supposed to dramatically tumble to the ground for a scene, fell unexepectedly when a support cable snapped.
Comes A Horseman, 1978 – Stunt double killed while being dragged by horse, striking his head on fence post
Jim Sheppard was doubling for actor Jason Robards in the 1978 Western, Comes a Horseman, starring James Caan and Jane Fonda.
The 40-year-old was filming a scene in which he was to be dragged by a horse through a wooden gate to simulate the death and disappearance of Robards’ character.
Sheppard’s head struck a fence post and he was airlifted to St. Thomas More Hospital in Canon City, Colorado, where he later died.
The scene in which the stuntman appeared was still used in the final edit of the movie, although it cuts away right before Sheppard hits his head.
Comes a Horseman starred James Caan and Jane Fonda. Stunt double Jim Sheppard was taking part in the final scene where the lead character is supposed to be killed being dragged by a horse. Sheppard’s head smashed into a fence post during the scene and he was killed. The scene was still used in the final cut of the movie, although it cuts right before Sheppard hits his head.
xXx, 2002 – Parasailing stuntman dies after striking his head on bridge
Harry L. O’Connor, Vin Diesel’s stunt double for the 2002 action hit xXx, was killed in a parasailing accident filmed over the Palacky Bridge in Prague.
The stuntman was to rappel down a parasailing line and land on a submarine.
But he failed to rappel fast enough and hit his head off the bridge at high speed, killing him instantly.
Director Rob Cohen decided to include footage of the scene – with his final moments edited out – as a gesture of respect for O’Connor’s final act.
Vin Diesel filming the 2002 hit XxX. His stunt double Harry O’Connor was killed when he struck his head on a bridge while parasailing over the Palacky Bridge in Prague
The Dark Knight, 2008 – Stuntman killed while hanging out of 4×4 during crash
Stuntman Conway Wickliffe was rehearsing a scene and was leaning out of the window when the car’s driver smashed into a tree at 20 miles per hour in Chertsey, Surrey in 2007.
The driver escaped without injury, but Wickliffe suffered a severe head injury and died at the scene.
The father-of-two was hanging out of a window when the driver failed to negotiate a bend and struck the tree.
An inquest hearing in Woking, in November 2008, ruled his death was an accident.
Heath Ledger, who played the Joker in The Dark Night, died of an accidental drugs overdose in January of that year.
The film’s closing credits carried a dedication ‘in memory of our friends Heath Ledger and Conway Wickliffe.’
Stuntman Conway Wickliffe was rehearsing a scene in the Batmobile and was leaning out of the window when the car’s driver smashed into a tree at 20 miles per hour. The driver escaped without injury, but Wickliffe suffered a severe head injury and died at the scene.
Top Gun, 1986 – Pilot dies while performing a spin over the sea
Famed stunt pilot Art Scholl died while filming a spin maneuver in a Pitts S-2 camera plane which failed to maintain altitude and crashed into the sea.
Sadly, neither Scholl’s plane nor his body were ever recovered, leaving his wife Judy, his two sons, friends and co-workers with many unanswered questions about the renowned pilot’s death.
The Wisconsin-born pilot, a talented and experienced aerobatics pilot and instructor, who had worked on hundreds of hit TV shows and movies including Indiana Jones, had just started working on Top Gun when he died, aged 53.
Scholl had been asked to film some background shots – known as ‘plate shots’ in the business – which are used as a backdrop behind the actors on a green screen during filming.
Casualty: Art Scholl died when his plane plunged into the Pacific when an inverted flat spin went wrong as he filmed backdrop scenes for Top Gun,which was released the following year
Art Scholl in his Super Chipmunk N13Y at a 1984 California airshow
It was September 16, 1985, and the day started out like any other for Scholl and his wife Judy, who worked alongside each other for their whole married life – on movies and an aviation business.
Scholl needed to do some ‘plate shots’ for an inverted flat spin, a fairly low risk move for an experienced pilot, and the couple set off from their home in San Bernadino, California, to Edwards Air Force base, north of Los Angeles.
Speaking to DailyMail.com in 2015, Judy said: ‘First of all he was doing some filming over land then he came back, we had lunch together and he swapped airplanes and he flew down to Palomar airport in Carlsbad – and met the camera crew down there to put the camera in the airplane.
‘It was shooting outwards – sort of the pilot’s point of view shot.
‘The script called for a flat spin – where the airplane is spinning but its not able to gain any lift – over water.
‘He went out and was doing several sequences of these flat spins but in the first sequence he caught the observer airplane, which was flying behind him, in the shot so he told them to back off a couple of miles because it would spoil the shot.
‘They backed off, lost sight off him and then he radioed to tell them he was starting an inverted flat spin.
‘Part way down he radioed again saying, “I have a problem” and then about three seconds later he said, “I have a real problem.”
‘So the guys in the observer airplane went into the area where he was operating and by the time they got there he was gone.’
The support craft searched the area and soon spotted debris and oil floating on the water.
‘Neither he or his airplane were ever recovered,’ said Judy.
Scholl (pictured) flew in many movies, including The Right Stuff, Blue Thunder, and The Great Waldo Pepper
‘He went down in the ocean about five miles off the coast – near Carlsbad – in deep water.
‘I talked to the coast guard and they said it was too deep to try and look for anything. It was 200 knots – about 1200 feet deep – and with such a small target they said it would be too difficult to find.
‘Art didn’t say what the problem was. This is the one thing I’m not happy about with him.
‘So I don’t know if he had a control failure, where maybe the camera jammed into the flight controls. Or whether he had an issue with the flight controls where he wasn’t able to get the airplane out of the flat spin or whether he was disorientated. He didn’t say.
‘It’s a puzzle. Most people think it was spacial disorientation but without the airplane we’ll never know.’
Vampire In Brooklyn, 1995 – Angela Basset’s stunt double falls 42ft to her death
Angela Basset’s stunt double Sonja Davis fell 42ft to her death while filming a stunt for the horror-comedy starring Eddie Murphy.
Davis, an experienced worker who counted Strange Days and Timecop among her previous credits, was filming for a stunt involving a backwards fall.
She was supposed to fall onto a massive airbag that was in an alley in the space between two buildings, around 12ft across.
Angela Basset in the horror-comedy Vampire In Brooklyn, 1995, which starred Eddie Murphy. Her double Sonja Davis fell 42ft to her death while filming a stunt for the picture
‘There was no way she could miss it unless she did the stunt wrong,’ said cinematographer Mark Irwin.
‘Before she fell, the stunt coordinator said, “Don’t push off, just relax and fall back naturally.” Well, she didn’t relax. She pushed so hard her head hit the opposing brick wall and when she fell only the tips of her toes touched the airbag. The rest of her body hit the pavement. She landed at my feet.’
The stuntwoman was rushed to hospital where she remained for two weeks in a coma before eventually succumbing to her injuries.
Heartbreakingly, Davis’s mother and brother were on set during the shooting and witnessed her fatal fall.
Her mother Wanda Sapp and Davis’ siblings then filed a $10 million wrongful death lawsuit against Paramount Pictures, Eddie Murphy’s production company, director Wes Craven, and stunt coordinator Alan Oliney.
Sapp claimed that her daughter had been pressured into an unsafe stunt.
It’s unclear what the outcome of the proceedings were.
Irwin told Hopes and Fears magazine: ‘Not to be blunt, but it was [Sonja’s] fault. She pushed back. But she was a pro stuntwoman and her death was such a tragedy. And the lawsuit was totally understandable.’
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