More Americans than ever before are opting to have their remains cremated instead of having a traditional burial. There are a number of reasons for this, mainly stemming from economic factors. After all, it’s much cheaper to be cremated than going six feet under.
While many people are interested in cremation, the process of turning bodies to ash is not something that many of us have seen up close. A little while back, we did a piece on the process of cremation, but that wasn’t as close as it could have been.
Thanks to Redditor iCremate, we can now see what happens to a body inside the cremation furnace, and it’s hauntingly beautiful.
The straight cut on the skull is a leftover from the autopsy.
The dark mass directly behind the skull used to be the person’s lungs.
Here you can see the remaining tissue turning to ash in the flames.
This was taken around five minutes into the cremation process. You can see there isn’t much organic matter left.
(source Reddit)
Cremation typically takes about 2 to 2.5 hours to complete for a body of average weight. It takes years and years to make a life, and in 2 hours, all that time can be reduced down to a single box of ash.