- [Narrator] When coincidence strikes there will always be those who believe fate is
responsible and skeptics who try to use reason to
find a logical explanation. Life is packed full of
serendipitous happenings but coming up are some coincidences which are sure to leave
you lost for words. (bright music) - Amazing. - [Narrator] The book thief. Back in 1973, Hollywood
actor Anthony Hopkins, agreed to appear in a screen adaptation of George Feifer's novel
"The Girl from Petrovka." To prepare for the role, Hopkins realized that he should probably
read the book first, but he couldn't find a copy no
matter how hard he searched. That is until one day, when
a heavily annotated copy suddenly turned up on a bench
in a subway waiting room. When Hopkins eventually
met Feifer two years later, he retold the story of his unexpected find only to discover it was far luckier than he ever could have guessed. Feifer explained that he didn't own a copy of the book himself because
he'd lent his to his friend who lost it while riding the subway. Hopkins then produced the
book and to his surprise, Feifer identified it as his original copy by recognizing his own handwriting. There's no word about whether
Hopkins returned the book to its rightful owner though. A Titanic prediction. In 1898, U.S. writer, Morgan Robertson published a novella named "Futility", but it wasn't until over a decade later that it started gaining
some unexpected attention. The novel details a shipwreck which occurs after a ship of record size
collides with an iceberg in the North Atlantic,
and the name of that ship just so happens to be The
Titan, sound familiar? That's right, Robertson
pretty much predicted the most famous shipwreck in history 14 years before the Titanic
liner sank near Newfoundland, killing 1,550 people. The spookily similar name isn't the only coincidence
involved, either. In the novel, the Titan is
referred to as unsinkable, just like it's real-life counterpart, and despite carrying thousands
of passengers on board it had an insufficient
number of lifeboats, which is also true of the Titanic. Despite the unmistakable coincidence, Robertson denied his clairvoyant powers, and thankfully he didn't write any more monumental
disasters into reality. Death on the Hoover Dam. The construction of the iconic Hoover Dam was a monumental and treacherous project, which claimed a staggering 112 lives. The first tragedy on the dam occurred on December 20th, 1921, when a man named John Gregory Tierney, who was surveying the site was caught in a sudden flash flood and washed into the raging Colorado River. 14 years later, on December 20th, 1935, the dam took its final victim, when a young construction
worker fell to his death from one of the two intake towers on the Arizona side of the Black Canyon. That man was Patrick William Tierney. The only son of John Gregory Tierney, making this father and son duo the first and last people to die on the dam on the exact same day, 14 years apart. Nowadays, you'll find
a commemorative plaque honoring these brave and
coincidentally unfortunate men. Killer coincidence. On the night of 29 September, 1888, at around 8:30 pm, a woman
named Catherine Eddowes was found lying drunk on
Aldgate High Street in London. After being taken into custody to sober up and eventually released
at around 12:55 am, Eddowes decided to give
the fake name Mary Kelly, possibly to save herself from humiliation. In a cruel turn of events, Eddowes didn't make it home that evening as she walked unexpectedly
into the clutches of one of Britain's most
notorious serial killers known only as Jack the Ripper. 10 days after Eddowes'
body was discovered, Jack went on to claim his
next and final victim. Her name? Mary Jane Kelly. Either he was one seriously
perceptive killer, or this is just one deadly coincidence. Foul ball. Almost anything could go wrong
at a live sporting event, but no one could be quite as
unlucky as Miss Alice Roth. While attending a Phillies baseball game on August 17th, 1957
with her two grandsons, Miss Roth was suddenly
struck square in the face by a foul ball which
had entered the stands. The player responsible was Hall of Famer, Richie Ashburn, who had
amassed over 2,500 hits in his 14 years of play. Alice Roth's bad juju
doesn't end there though. As she was being taken out of the stadium on a stretcher with a broken nose, she was struck by another foul
ball which broke her knee. Once again, the ball had
been hit out of the stadium by Richie Ashburn. Fortunately, Miss Roth saw the humor in the unfortunate coincidence and she and Ashburn even
became close friends after he visited her in the hospital. Plum pudding. If you ever think your
life is serendipitous, just remember that there was once a man who encountered the same stranger every time he ate plum pudding. The story goes that the
19th century French poet, Emile Deschamps, was first introduced to the traditional British dessert by an Englishman named
Mr. de Fortgibu in 1805. About a decade after this encounter Deschamps ordered plum pudding
at a restaurant in Paris, only to be told by the waiter that the last one had been sold to the man seated at the back. Of course, this man was none other than Mr. de Fortgibu himself. And the incredible story
doesn't end there though, because in 1832 the
two were to meet again. While attending a dinner party
which served plum pudding, Deschamps joked that the party
must be for Mr. de Fortgibu. And sure enough, the
familiar stranger turned up not much later, having
arrived at the wrong address on his way to another party. Legend now has it that
if you say plum pudding three times in the mirror,
de Fortbigu's ghost is sure to turn up. Balloon BFF's. In 2001, a 10-year-old
girl named Laura Buxton was involved in a
remarkable chain of events after releasing a golden
balloon into the sky. Having attended her grandparents' 50th anniversary celebrations
in Staffordshire, UK, Buxton wrote her name and contact details on the balloon and set it free. The balloon traveled some 140
miles south to the Midlands and landed in the backyard
of another 10-year-old girl who also happened to
be named Laura Buxton. Astounded at the
one-in-a-million coincidence, the girls' parents arranged
for them to meet up and discovered even more similarities. Both Laura's were around
the same height and build, and both had a 3-year-old
chocolate Labrador, a gray rabbit and guinea pigs at home, the latter of which they both brought to the meet-up by chance. Over a decade later, the
duo are still friends and meet up when their schedules allow it. Curse of the 21st. Its not unusual for
people to be superstitious about inexplicable things. For some it's magpies, black
cats or walking under ladders, but for the French King Louis
XVI that was the number 21, and it didn't work out so well for him. You see, before he took the throne, an astrologer warned Louis
to always be cautious of the 21st day of each month. During his rule, Louis made
sure never to do business on the 21st, but in the throes
of the French Revolution fate had other plans. On June 21st, 1791, Louis
and his wife Marie Antoinette were arrested while attempting
to flee the country. And on September 21st of
1791, their reign was toppled when France was officially
declared a republic. If that wasn't unlucky enough,
Louis was then executed by guillotine as a direct
result, on January 21st, 1793. Message in a bottle. Finding a mysterious message in a bottle is something most of us can only dream of. But one man named Mark Anderson,
truly lucked out in 2006 when he found the oldest
message in a bottle on record. Anderson was manning a
Scottish fishing boat named the Copious when he happened upon the 92-year-old bottle
which landed him a spot in the Guinness World Records. After bragging relentlessly to his fellow fisherman
friend, Andrew Leaper, about the find, Anderson was about to get a reality check in the form of one astounding coincidence. 6 years later, in 2012, Andrew Leaper was hauling in his nets on the very same boat when
he noticed a bottle neck sticking out of the water. The 98-year-old bottle,
which contained a note from 1914, outdated Anderson's by 6 years, making him the new world-record holder. 20-year-old bullet. Here's a riddle for you. How is it possible for a bullet to kill its intended victim
20 years after being fired? The answer is one of the most
mind-blowing coincidences you will ever come across. The tale begins in 1893,
in Honey Grove, Texas, when a timber businessman
named Henry Ziegland, abruptly broke off an
engagement with his lover. Unable to cope with the heartbreak, she took her own life, and
her brother then decided to defend her honor by killing Ziegland. After following Ziegland
and firing the gun, the young man fled the scene
believing him to be dead. Remarkably, the bullet had
only grazed Ziegland's cheek and became lodged in a nearby tree. Having long celebrated
his luck, Ziegland decided to remove the great oak
20 years later in 1913, and he opted for dynamite
to speed up the process. In the explosion, the
bullet became dislodged and fired off at Ziegland,
killing him at last. No one said karma is
always instant, right? Interrupted phone call. This next incredible coincidence was submitted by a "Be
Amazed" viewer named Dennis, and it's pretty unbelievable stuff. Dennis, who was formerly
enlisted in the U.S. Army, had never met his brother-in-law, but he knew he was a fighter
pilot in the Air Force. When the estranged pair eventually met, they discussed their former
postings and realized that they were both
stationed in South Korea in 1974 through 1975. That's just the start of
the revelations though, as Dennis also remarked that there was some well-known rivalry between different branches at the time and he distinctly remembers an occasion when an Air Force fighter pilot had ruined an important phone call back to the U.S. While contacting his mother
from outside the base, a fighter jet was doing
tree top level passes over the building he was calling from, making it impossible to
communicate on the phone. While retelling the story, his brother-in-law
couldn't help but laugh, he was the pilot flying overhead. If you have any
one-in-a-million coincidences you'd like to share,
go ahead and contact us at coincidences@beamazed.com,
I'd love to hear them. And who knows, you might just be featured in the next installment, like Dennis. Shark-ception. Sharks are some of the
most feared creatures in the animal kingdom, and
it's really no surprise when photos as truly
terrifying as this exist. Yes, that's a shark inside another shark. Researchers at the University of Delaware snapped a pic of this
incredible coincidence when they were hauling in
a large sand tiger shark only to discover that a
three-foot-long dogfish, a smaller type of shark,
was also hooked on the line and had been swallowed whole. The sand tiger shark was
released after being tagged, but there's no word about what
happened to the poor dogfish. Axe-ellent shot. Check out this incredible shot which somehow defies all logic. It's impossible to tell if this was someone's
first time ax throwing, or whether this is a feat
which could only be achieved by the most highly skilled thrower. Either way, some of us
can't even get a magnet to stick to a fridge successfully, so I'd say this is one
impressive coincidence. Impressionist apple. You might remember the pigeon that pooped a self-portrait
of itself on a leaf, but now I present you
something far more impressive. An apple artist. This charming portrait must
have been years in the making, and it's really something to behold. What's next, the banana-Lisa? Lost and found. There's nothing quite as heart-breaking as coming across a lost
dog poster on the street. But it's not so often you happen upon one which is accompanied
by the dog in question. That didn't stop this
guy from chilling out on the sidewalk under his
own photograph, though, totally oblivious to the fact his owner is probably freaking out somewhere. Maybe he ran away from home and now he's missing his home comforts and regretting the rash decision. Or maybe he even put the poster up himself just for the attention,
like some canine con-artist. Uncanny resemblance. Being a news reporter comes
with its own set of challenges, like following the autocue correctly, dealing with uncontrollable live guests, and all those times you get mistaken for wanted criminals, right? Unfortunately, for one BBC
"Crimewatch" presenter in 2016, that's exactly what happened
when the stars aligned and the thug in the wanted mugshot turned out to be an uncanny
doppelganger of Jason Mohammad, who was co-reporting on the story. Poor old Jason looked pretty uncomfortable as he noticed the spitting image, but thankfully he took
it all in his stride, tweeting that he'd seen
the comparisons online. He still didn't deny
that it was him, though. Do you think fate was at work in any of these unbelievable coincidences, and have you experienced
anything like this yourself? Let me know in the comments
below and thanks for watching. (bright music)
