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Lesser-Known Near-Deaths and Near-Misses

C

Callan

It’s me. I’m the old lady with the tarot cards.
Published by SLP
Location
Toronto, ON, CA
It's a common trope in alternate history that a point of divergence or a plot point will be an OTL figure or ATL leader meeting a premature, unnatural end. However, unless this early death is based on something that really happened OTL, it comes across as random or arbitrary. You could have Barack Obama die in a plane crash before the 2008 primaries, but unless it's is linked to or based on a real-life incident or near miss involving Obama and/or aviation, you might as well kill him off by having a grand piano fall on top of him. So what are some OTL near-misses that could make for interesting PoDs?

I have one example to start us off: this infamous photograph of the 2000 crash of the Concorde was taken from a Boeing 747 waiting on the tarmac that had then-French President Jacques Chirac as a passenger, returning from a G8 summit in Japan. The burning Concorde, struggling to take off, only narrowly avoided colliding with the plane. And Chirac dying in 2000 has profound consequences for French and European politics (for one thing at this point Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin was still at the height of his popularity and likely would've won the resultant early election). The imagery of a French president being killed by an icon of French engineering might seem absurd, even farcical; but it could very well have happened.
 
The shootdown of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 by the Soviets in 1983 claimed the life of Representative Larry McDonald, but more members of Congress could have died in it too. McDonald was part of a Congressional delegation travelling to South Korea to attend a conference commemorating the 30th anniversary of the U.S.-South Korea Mutual Defense Treaty, one that had included Jesse Helms, Steve Symms, and Carroll Hubbard. McDonald actually hadn't been scheduled to be on the downed flight, having been rebooked due to missing his connecting itinerary in New York due to bad weather, but Symms and Hubbard did originally make reservations for that flight before changing plans to fly with Helms from Los Angeles on another KAL flight just minutes behind 007. On top of this, Orrin Hatch and Edward Zorinski were also set to attend the same event but had left the U.S. earlier and were in Tokyo at the time of the disaster, and several other members like Malcolm Wallop and Bob Kasten had considered but ultimately decided against going. That's at least eight members of Congress who, with changes in travel plans, could have been killed at the hands of the Soviets.
 
Not political, but one from the world of entertainment and continuing the air crash theme: in Feb/Mar 1966 a group scouting locations for You Only Live Twice in Japan (producers Cubby Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, director Lewis Gilbert, cinematographer Freddie Young, and production designer Ken Adam) changed their flight out of Japan at the last minute because they unexpectedly had an opportunity to view a ninja demonstration. Their flight was BOAC Flight 911 which crashed 25 minutes after take-off with the loss of all passengers and crew.

Naturally, the ninjas made it into the film.
 
Callan said:
You could have Barack Obama die in a plane crash before the 2008 primaries, but unless it's is linked to or based on a real-life incident or near miss involving Obama and/or aviation, you might as well kill him off by having a grand piano fall on top of him. So what are some OTL near-misses that could make for interesting PoDs?
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There's the time part of Mrs Truman's piano crashed through the floor into the White House dining room below in June 1948.
 
Very likely that Lech Wałęsa would have been assassinated while visiting Rome in January 1981 if his wife hadn't been too tired to go for a walk on the evening in question. As it was, the unidentified gunmen almost opened fire on a few random members of the Solidarity delegation but were called off at the last minute.
 
Tony Benn in the Early Summer of 1981 Labour Deputy Leadership campaign caught Guillain–Barré syndrome, a fairly rare syndrome in which your immune system attacks your nervous system (which my partners father had occur to him about year and a bit ago).

It has the potential to be life threatening or cause long lasting difficulties breathing or physical disabilities, so it’s incredibly bizarre that it’s often consigned to being an afterthought when discussing Benn in 81’.

There’s a fairly possible chance that Benn could have died if his system decided to react a bit differently.
 
Jawaharlal Nehru was nearly killed a number of times. Some of these reports of assassination attempts are more credible than others.

  • In 1947, when visiting the North-West Frontier Province to see Partition firsthand, Nehru’s car was fired upon a number of times. The bullets missed Nehru, although one of them nearly hit one of his aides.
  • In 1948, three gang members were arrested in Bihar on charges for procuring bombs to kill Nehru. An informant reported this to a town council.
  • In 1950, Vallabhbhai Patel disclosed to Parliament a Hindu nationalist plot to kill Nehru, claiming a Hindu nationalist leader admitted to this.
  • In 1953, on the train Nehru was to travel on in ten minutes, numerous bombs were discovered. It was later discovered that these bombs lacked the firepower to destroy or derail the train.
  • In 1955, a rickshaw-puller attempted to kill Nehru with a knife, as he wished to remove Congress rule by killing its leader. Nehru claimed it was not a big deal and said the knife was too small to harm him, but others had a different opinion.
  • In 1956, when Nehru was encountered by a stone-throwing mob, the police got a report some wished to throw a bomb, after which they kept “doubtfuls” far from the platform to ensure they’d be unable to throw bombs at him.
  • In 1960, Nehru visited UN troops stationed at Gaza, and on his way from there to Beirut aboard a UN plane, Israeli planes performed aggressive military maneuvers against it. The pilot nevertheless got Nehru to Beirut.
  • In 1961, just after Nehru was on his way home from a quarter of Old Delhi, that quarter was bombed, although police were unwilling to say whether this was an assassination attempt or not.

 
Threads about obscure assassination attempts on Dianne Feinstein and John W. Bricker (am I morbid?)

More significantly, though: During Deng Xiaoping's 1979 visit to the United States, KKK leader Louis Beam apparently rushed him in a hotel lobby and got into a fistfight with his security detail. The incident's been mythologized by both the Chinese government and white supremacists so it's not clear exactly what happened. Some sources claim it was an assassination attempt, some that Beam was just trying to punch him / pour paint on him / make some kind of gesture of protest. But if Beam did get that close to Deng it's not out of the question that he could have shot him, had he been so inclined.

Deng being taken out of the picture at the very start of his reign obviously has huge implications for the history of the 20th and 21st centuries, possibly more so than any other figure of the era; this would be a huge POD. And even in an unsuccessful assassination attempt, Beam being arrested or killed would drastically change the trajectory of the American far right - he was the progenitor of the "leaderless resistance" strategy of white supremacist terrorism that gathered steam in the mid-80s and continued through Oklahoma City to today.
 
After the 1907 Tiflis bank robbery Lenin had to flee Russia to avoid arrest. He escaped through Finland, but couldn't board the steamer from Abo to Stockholm because it was being monitored by the cops, and so instead he decided to take a steamer from a nearby island that wasn't being watched. The problem was that the only way to get to the island without attracting the authorities' attention was a three-mile trek across the frozen water. Midway through his journey the ice gave way, and Lenin barely escaped drowning in the freezing water. Lenin would later say that his first thought when the ice broke was "Ah, what a stupid way to die." This is definitely something which if you included it in a story everyone would be like "Why not just drop a piano on him you hack?"
 
theev said:
Teddy Roosevelt narrowly avoided being assassinated in May, 1916 by a man with a throwing knife.
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It takes more than that to kill a bull moose.

Obvious recent political cases, semi-related to @AH Layard 's last point, Boris Johnson and Donald Trump were both hospitalised with Covid at one point.

In entertainment ones, Sophia Aldred was almost killed during filming of an episode of Dr Who. Madonna was lucky not to die or be paralysed after falling off a horse. Both Alice Cooper and Danii Minogue have had close calls involving being strangled by snakes.

Sports wise, Christian Eriksen and Fabrice Muamba are obvious ones.
 
*Cracks knuckles*

-on December 2, 1880, when Ion C Brătianu was just leaving the building of the Chamber of Deputies,Ivan Petraru, an official in the Ministry of Finance jumped on him with a knife with a blade 20 cm long, to attack him. Brătianu had the inspiration to hit him over the arm, turning the blow that targeted the neck area towards the thick coat that he used to wear in winter.

Him dying then would have left the Liberal Party in a different direction,probably with C.A Rosetti being PM,and agricultural and voting reforms happening earlier.

-during 1897 Ferdinand suffered of typhoid fever,with many believing that he’d die and that the Crown would need another appointee successor to the throne.

The person in question to take Nando’s place? Why,no other than Prince Luigi Amedeo, Duke of the Abruzzi,cousin to Victor Emmanuel III,Infante of Spain and best known for his Arctic and mountain expedition and the colonizing of Somaliland.

I’m not quite sure what he would do differently as King of Romania compared to Nando given that I don’t know much about his political views but it would be interesting to see him deal with the upheavals of the nation,especially during WW1.

-Ionel Brătianu was nearly shot dead in 1909 by a disgruntled railway employee,which would have not only changed the life of Romanian politics significantly (given how much of a schemer Bratianu was,the poor man’s Bismarck) but also could have caused massive riots against Bulgarians and other minorities due to the attacker being half Bulgarian,as well as how OTL a large influx of bigotry was caused by the event and a nationalist and anti socialist fever set the country aflame and in blind support of the Liberals,with many starting to think the assassination was just a ploy to weaken the newly formed trade unions. (Though there isn’t any real evidence to that,it just seemed plausible since Bratianu did shit like that all the time)

I got more but there’s a lot on the top of my head that I can think of so it’s gonna be two parter post.
 
JFK's boat was sunk during World War II, it wouldn't take much change for him to have drowned in the sinking, in the many swimming voyages to shore/for food, or if rescue was delayed. That means he's not available to replace his older brother as the family's standard bearer. Maybe Bobby gets tapped to do it instead but he's younger, everything will take longer and he's not going to be able to run for president in 1960.
 
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