Victor M. Sweeney, a licensed funeral director and mortician, gives a tour of a funeral home in Minnesota. From the intricate processes and tools used to embalm a body to the "selection room" filled with caskets and urns, this unique tour gives unprecedented access to a mortuary and funeral chapel.Check out Victor's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/victor.m.sweeney/Director: Katherine WzorekDirector of Photography: David DiebelEditor: Matthew ColbyTalent: Victor SweeneyGuest: Shawn NygaardLine Producer: Joseph BuscemiAssociate Producer: Paul GulyasProduction Manager: D. Eric MartinezProduction Coordinator: Fernando DavilaCasting Producer: Nicole FordCamera Operator: Haylie FlesnessGaffer: Jason BedardAudio: Phil KerrProduction Assistant: Riley ThelenPost Production Supervisor: Alexa DeutschPost Production Coordinator: Ian BryantSupervising Editor: Doug LarsenAssistant Editor: Andy MorellGraphics Supervisor: Ross RackinDesigner: Lea Kichler
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00:00 Hi, I'm Victor M. Sweeney, licensed mortician.
00:04 We're here at Corzimo Funeral Service.
00:06 Come on in.
00:07 [classical music]
00:10 We've been given unprecedented access
00:20 to the whole funeral home.
00:22 We're gonna go into the prep room
00:24 where we embalm and prepare bodies.
00:25 Normally, if a person from the outside, like yourself,
00:29 wanted to go into the prep room,
00:31 they wouldn't be allowed.
00:32 We've been given special access today
00:33 from the Department of Health.
00:35 And we're going to look at caskets, urns,
00:37 that kind of stuff.
00:38 We're gonna get to see the funeral chapel,
00:40 and then we'll also get to take a tour of the hearse,
00:42 see how that works.
00:43 With us today is Sean.
00:45 Victor, thanks for having me here.
00:47 I really appreciate it.
00:48 Death can be kind of scary.
00:49 There's a lot of things about our field that are unknown.
00:52 I'm excited for you to bring those answers
00:54 to everyone today.
00:55 First, we're gonna go inside the prep room.
00:57 (door creaking)
00:59 Why don't you come with me and I'll show you what we do.
01:02 (classical music)
01:06 So here we are in the prep room,
01:13 the room where we do all the embalming.
01:15 Embalming is meant to sanitize and preserve bodies,
01:18 as well as provide some level of restoration.
01:21 So for instance, if someone is grievously injured,
01:24 we can kind of work to reconstruct them.
01:26 In addition to making sure that their body holds up
01:29 for maybe the week that we have
01:30 in between the time when they die
01:32 and the time when we have the funeral.
01:33 In this funeral home, the prep room is off of the garage.
01:36 I don't want to be bringing cots with bodies on them
01:40 up or down stairs or through the whole funeral home
01:42 to get them here, 'cause then we can go right from the van
01:45 to the room where the magic happens.
01:47 We've taken our dummy mic from the back of the van,
01:56 and now we are ready for the embalming.
01:59 Every time you prepare a body, you kind of start from zero.
02:03 So you're going to do inventory,
02:04 you're gonna look them over,
02:06 you're gonna make sure that you know everything
02:07 about their condition,
02:08 and then adjust your embalming processes accordingly.
02:12 In a normal situation, I'm covered from head to toe
02:16 with personal protective equipment,
02:17 and that's mainly to keep me safe
02:19 when I'm dealing with blood and pathogens.
02:21 I'm also dealing with embalming fluids.
02:24 So these are things that keep bodies preserved
02:27 and sanitized, and a lot of these contain aldehydes.
02:30 These are actually toxic chemicals.
02:32 Every prep room is going to have ventilation,
02:35 it's going to have formaldehyde-level monitoring.
02:38 All these things are in place to keep me safe
02:40 and to make sure that we don't infect our public spaces
02:44 with what we have to do here in private.
02:53 One of the first steps of embalming
02:55 is setting the features.
02:56 So making the face into a natural expression.
03:00 These are called eye caps.
03:01 Sometimes when people die, their eyes are open
03:03 and we can position the eyelids and have them stay that way.
03:07 We use this device called the needle injector
03:09 that actually punches these sharp brads
03:12 into the upper and lower jaw,
03:14 kind of keep it in place, they'll stay that way.
03:17 The next part of embalming after we set those features
03:22 is we're going to do what's called arterial embalming.
03:24 So we're going to gain access to the arteries,
03:27 and then that's how we're going to use
03:28 our embalming machine to pump fluids in.
03:30 So there are three different kinds of fluids
03:37 that embalmers use when preparing a body.
03:39 The first, arterial solutions are going to be fixatives.
03:42 So they're going to sanitize the body,
03:44 they're going to preserve it,
03:45 and they're going to fix it into place.
03:47 Other fluids are what we call co-injection
03:49 or accessory fluids.
03:50 Co-injections might add fluid to tissue,
03:54 they might draw fluid out, they'll add color,
03:57 sometimes maybe a rosiness is helpful.
03:59 And then we have other fluids that are really good
04:01 at preventing certain types of decomposition.
04:04 Probably the most common place for a fenal injector
04:09 to gain access to an artery is right up here in the neck,
04:13 and that is called the carotid artery.
04:15 Let's say you choose not to raise the carotid artery,
04:19 you can actually embalm a whole body
04:21 right here from the leg.
04:22 So the femoral artery is one of the largest arteries
04:25 that we have access to.
04:26 If you push fluid up, you can open the corresponding vein,
04:29 and then the blood will drain out.
04:31 And arteries are interesting because they're very rubbery,
04:33 think like a tube rubber band.
04:36 And so when we put high pressure into them
04:38 with the embalming machine, they're able to withstand that.
04:41 The fluid just goes right into the body.
04:47 So this tank here is the embalming machine,
04:50 and this tube goes right down the artery
04:52 and then is gonna shoot fluid in at a high pressure
04:55 in order to circulate that fluid through
04:57 while pushing out the blood
04:59 that's been pooling in the venous system.
05:01 So this will actually simulate something of a heartbeat.
05:06 So if you have large clots that are stuck in a venous system
05:10 you can pulse the fluid through at a high pressure
05:13 and push those clots out of the body,
05:15 and that'll create better distribution for our fluid
05:17 and better preservation in the final procedure.
05:20 This one is called a tissue spreader.
05:30 So let's say you have someone with a little extra weight
05:32 and you need to get into, let's say,
05:34 the meat of their leg to gain access to their artery.
05:37 This guy you can put in like this,
05:39 and it spreads out all that fat.
05:42 Any number of handy scissors, a curve is nice sometimes,
05:45 especially as you're cutting through arteries
05:47 or maybe other tissue.
05:49 This is called an aneurysm hook
05:51 'cause it's used for separating tissue
05:53 and hooking the arteries and pulling them out
05:56 where you have access to them.
05:57 This is called a groove director.
05:59 I can hold this, put it into the artery,
06:02 and then this hard surface in the bottom
06:04 is gonna open up the artery
06:05 so I can slide my other tools right in.
06:07 An angular forceps,
06:09 this you can actually use to pull out clots.
06:12 This guy is called a drain tube.
06:14 Typically, this end here is going to be hooked up
06:18 to another tube that we run down the table,
06:20 and then this end is going to go inside the artery.
06:23 One thing that's great about a drain tube
06:25 is that we can actually control
06:27 how much blood leaves the body.
06:29 If we're having drainage issues, you can stop it.
06:32 Pressure is building in the body,
06:34 and then all of a sudden, you'll pull the end,
06:35 and whoop, it'll come pouring out the bottom.
06:38 So you wanna create that pressure
06:40 'cause sometimes you need a little extra
06:41 to get into the extremities,
06:43 like into the toes or the fingers, something like that.
06:45 Cavity embalming is the second part of preparing a body
06:51 in which we want to puncture all the hollow organs
06:54 and then drain out all the goo and nastiness
06:56 that wants to live in there.
06:57 So the tool we're going to use to do that
06:59 is called the chokar.
07:00 The chokar is a great big steel spear.
07:05 This tip is going to puncture the organ,
07:08 and then this part is actually hooked up to a vacuum,
07:11 so it's going to suck all that goo right down the drain.
07:14 And then the holes that we make
07:16 will actually provide access points
07:18 for introducing what we call cavity fluid,
07:21 so embalming fluid that's made to kill all the bacteria
07:24 and solidify those hollow organs
07:26 so we don't have any issues down the road.
07:28 This is a chokar as well.
07:29 It's slightly different in that it doesn't suck fluid out,
07:33 but puts fluid back in.
07:36 So in this case, we'd take a bottle of cavity fluid.
07:39 We would actually twist it in and attach it
07:41 to the top of the chokar,
07:43 and then right through that same hole we made before,
07:45 we'd go back in, all the while gravity
07:48 is actually drawing the fluid down
07:50 and inserting that from the end of the tip
07:52 back into all the holes we made,
07:54 into the heart, into the lungs,
07:55 and then it'll go around back down into the abdomen.
07:59 This is really the lower part
08:01 is where all the bacteria like to hang out.
08:03 And that, my friends, is how you embalm a body.
08:07 When I embalm my first body, it is kind of scary,
08:09 kind of unnerving, because it's one of those things
08:11 you have to do right the first time,
08:14 and you only get one chance.
08:16 So if you screw up and maybe pressure is too high
08:19 and the face starts to swell and you don't see that,
08:21 you've caused a problem with grandma or grandpa
08:24 that you can't really fix.
08:27 So attention to detail is everything.
08:29 Welcome to the selection room.
08:36 If you have a loved one that passes away,
08:38 odds are good you'll end up in a room just like this
08:41 to select your funeral merchandise.
08:43 When a family chooses cremation,
08:48 family might want to select an urn.
08:50 And these range all over the place.
08:52 There are simple urns that maybe start at $100 or less.
08:56 There are really fancy, maybe cast bronze ones
08:59 that are hundreds and hundreds of dollars.
09:00 Or some families just opt to use the container
09:03 that comes from the crematory,
09:05 just a simple plastic urn.
09:06 Any one of those is perfectly suitable
09:08 for what a family wants to do.
09:10 So one thing that can kind of be confusing
09:15 and is often used interchangeably
09:18 is the difference between a casket and a coffin.
09:20 In other parts of the world, like in the UK for instance,
09:23 they have what are called coffins.
09:25 So these are what we might call anthropoid shapes.
09:28 So they're narrow at the top where the head is,
09:30 they widen out at the shoulders,
09:32 then they come back in again towards the feet.
09:34 Whereas caskets are uniformly rectangular.
09:37 In the United States, we used almost exclusively caskets.
09:41 Caskets vary as widely as you can possibly imagine.
09:45 We have very simple cardboard cloth covered caskets
09:49 that might be more suitable for a simple burial
09:51 or maybe cremation.
09:52 And then we have high-end caskets made from hardwoods
09:55 like mahogany or cherry or even bronze caskets.
09:59 Variety is really the spice of death here.
10:02 (somber music)
10:04 Here we are in the funeral chapel.
10:14 We've taken our dummy Mike
10:17 and now we're ready for his family to come
10:19 and say their final goodbyes.
10:21 This opening here is called a cap
10:23 and this is an example of what we call a half couch casket.
10:27 So you're only going to see from about the midsection up.
10:31 You should note every person in the casket is wearing pants
10:35 but not always shoes.
10:37 When we go to close a casket,
10:40 oftentimes I have the deceased family around me.
10:43 There's a locking mechanism under here
10:45 and we're just going to simply pull that up.
10:48 We'll open the latches here at the bottom.
10:50 And then with the family, we all grab hold.
10:54 We slowly lower the lid and then we say goodbye.
11:00 As a last step, I'll have you come with me
11:04 as we load the casket into the hearse
11:06 and we'll make our way to the cemetery.
11:09 Come on.
11:10 (somber music)
11:13 Oh, this is such a cool one.
11:21 Oh, look at the lights on the inside.
11:22 They're awesome.
11:24 You have a great hearse, Sean.
11:25 - Thanks.
11:26 (somber music)
11:29 (upbeat music)
11:31 - So the vehicle behind me, some call it a hearse,
11:34 some call it a coach, but in any case,
11:36 it gets the deceased from point A to point B.
11:39 There's some special things about a hearse.
11:41 The first thing you should know is that every single one
11:43 is custom built.
11:44 So there's not a single company
11:45 that makes hearses right off the line.
11:47 Every one is made with a normal car,
11:49 cut in half, extended, and totally rebuilt.
11:52 You do not need a special license or anything
11:53 to drive a hearse.
11:54 Being built on Lincolns and Cadillacs,
11:57 usually they have nice big engines
11:58 and they go well over 100 miles an hour if needed.
12:01 On the back end, they normally have a vinyl top,
12:04 at least in the States.
12:05 That swooshy design on the back is called a Landau bar.
12:08 It's kind of the quintessential mark of a hearse.
12:11 It's a remnant from when they used to be coaches,
12:14 so horse-drawn carriages, and the top would pull back.
12:17 Today, we don't have convertible hearses,
12:19 but it's a nice mark when you see one,
12:21 you know exactly what it is.
12:23 So one thing you'll notice about a hearse
12:24 is that the door opens really wide.
12:26 So when you have six casket pairs,
12:28 you can get nice and close
12:29 before you put the casket on the rollers.
12:32 And the rollers go all the way inside,
12:35 so it's a nice, smooth roll into the hearse.
12:38 When you get the casket in place,
12:40 you're gonna take this stopper,
12:42 put it just like this,
12:46 and keep the casket so it doesn't go flying out of the back.
12:49 When I load a hearse, I always go head first.
12:54 The reason being, when you tilt the casket a little bit
12:57 to get it in, then their feet are down,
12:59 and if they slide, they slide towards their feet,
13:01 whereas if you flipped it around the other way,
13:03 they'd be going head first, and it's awfully heavy.
13:06 So always the heavy head end first,
13:08 and the feet will follow.
13:10 Well, why don't we try loading it up with our friend Mike?
13:12 We've taken him from point A, now let's go to point Z,
13:16 and Sean is gonna help me here.
13:18 (gentle music)
13:20 I so appreciate you coming with me on this trip today
13:45 through the funeral home.
13:46 I hope you've learned some things,
13:47 and that maybe you feel a little bit more comfortable
13:50 as you come with me on my life with the dead.
13:53 (gentle music)
13:55 [BLANK_AUDIO]