As people alive in this world, we don’t often think about what happens to a human body once a person passes away until we are faced with the reality of it. For those who do come across a body because a loved one passed away or they come across one while on a river or on a trail, they may experience sights previously unknown. One of these sights most apparent is called “skin slippage.” Skin slippage on a human body can look abnormal but on a cadaver in the decomposition process, skin slippage is perfectly normal.

The skin slippage process

Skin slippage is a part of the decomposition process when the top layers of skin become disconnected from layers below and can, therefore, “slip” off the body. Taking place relatively early in the process, it happens through a process when enzymes are released and cells holding layers of skin together start to rupture forming what looks like blisters, leaving a sticky surface behind. As the epidermis layer of skin separates from the dermis layer, these superficial layers can then start sloughing off or peeling away. Where this happens on the body can vary greatly but it is particularly common for the skin to first detach on the hands and feet where skin can be removed like a sock or glove cast off and no longer needed.

Many factors speed up or slow down the process

This part of the body decomposition process can vary greatly in speed and appearance depending on many factors around and inside the body. Once the skin has started slipping away, it can look like bubbles on the skin, a bad sunburn where you can peel the skin away, or like melted wax over the skeletal structure. Factors include:

• Surrounding temperature: The warmer and more humid an environment is around the body, the faster the skin will detach from the rest of the body. In high humidity, this can take place in 2-3 days. If it is cold, the whole decomposition process takes much longer, and skin will stay connected for a longer period of time. This is why cadavers are often refrigerated after death: it slows down the decomposition process while burial arrangements are made or cremation can take place.
• Size and weight of the body: The condition of the cells in the skin and how large or small a person is when they pass away can speed up or slow down the skin slippage process to a degree.
• Clothing worn at time of death: If a person has layers of clothing on at the time of death, there are fewer areas of skin exposed to the elements that would speed up the process. The more skin that is exposed to the soil beneath with all the bacteria in that soil, the faster skin slippage will occur.
• Weather and climate: Skin slippage will occur far faster and more evenly with more moisture in the air. If the surrounding weather is dry, the entire process, including skin slippage, will take far longer.

When a dead body is found in water

When a dead body is submerged in water while it decomposes, skin slippage takes place in around 24 hours. With water soaking through the top layers of skin, the cells holding the layers together separate far faster, letting in more bacteria into the rest of the body to aid in decomposition. This is one of the reasons a body found in a lake or river can be so unrecognizable so quickly—the water speeds the whole process along.

Unattended Death Cleanup

If you’re working on handling the cleanup after an unattended death where a body has decomposed on a property for a time, our team at Bio SoCal has the experienced and compassionate biohazard cleanup services you need. From large jobs to small, we understand what it takes to make sure all bodily fluids are fully removed and body tissues safely and legally disposed of. After removing all biohazards, we then carefully clean, sanitize, and disinfect all the surfaces, nooks, and crannies, so you can rest assured the property is safe and all lingering odor is permanently removed. As most property insurance policies cover our work, we’ll even document the damage and file the claim on your behalf. We are here to make a difficult time as easy as possible.

Around the world, archeologists discover burials where the body has deteriorated to varying degrees. Based on the remains of the body, usually just bones and teeth by the time the graves are discovered, archeologists can tell a lot about the person: age, gender, injuries, and sometimes even their social status depending on what is buried along with them. At other times, there is very little archeologists can discern due to the fact even the bones have dissolved due to acidic soil. Either way, most bodies leave clues of their existence even after long periods have passed.

In this day and age, especially here in Southern California, we deal with the bodies of most of our loved ones through cremation (burning the body) or burial in the ground. For those who are buried, if we, like the archeologists, were able to go back on the one-year anniversary of our loved one’s burial, to discover what remains still existed, what would we find? What could we tell about the person who passed away?

Body Decomposition

A body is designed to start decomposing directly after death occurs. Once the heart stops pumping blood and oxygen levels plummet, the bacteria inside a person’s digestive system starts feeding on body tissues. As cells break down, enzymes are released, quickening the process. Then, as the bacteria process these materials, they release gas, bloating the body, and creating new holes for other bacteria and insects to take hold and process more of the body’s tissues, muscles, tendons, and organs. Every piece of our body is broken down into new forms of energy and our bones are usually the longest lasting sign we once walked the earth.

The surrounding conditions

This process of decomposition to the point of only bones remaining can take place in as little as a couple of weeks to thousands of years depending on the surrounding conditions around the body while it decomposes. If a body is left out in the open air in easy access to scavengers and temperate weather, then a body is going to decompose in a matter of weeks. If the temperatures are hot, then a person’s skin may dry out before fully decomposing. If the temperature is extremely cold, then the decomposition process slows significantly. This is why morgues refrigerate bodies before burial or during a crime investigation.

However, most bodies are not left in the elements to decompose. Most people are placed in the ground after death to decompose back into the soil. How quickly this takes place depends on what the body is placed in when buried. A body simply wrapped in a linen cloth or shroud when buried, as is still done in many places around the world, will decompose faster than a body placed in an airtight casket surrounded by a cement barrier. The more barriers between the body and the soil around it, the decomposition process slows down significantly though it still occurs in much the same order. To help speed along the decomposition process in a casket, sometimes holes are drilled into the lid or spaces are left open so outside forces can get inside to break down the body.

Embalming

Embalming a body involves removing many of the organs and draining the blood before filling the cavities with chemical preservatives. This procedure does slow down the decomposition process enough to allow for an open casket funeral but does not stop the process. While the body may take longer to decompose it will, eventually, still become a pile of bones.

Seeing a body after one year

If you were able to view a body after one year of burial, you may see as little as the skeleton laid to rest in the soil or as much as the body still recognizable with all the clothes intact. Depending on what was done to the body before burial and in what condition it was buried in, the state of a decomposed body can vary greatly. In a cemetery, for instance, where bodies are buried in different ways and in different times, you could have two bodies in the same stage of decomposition buried ten years apart. For the most part, however, if a non-embalmed body was viewed one year after burial, it would already be significantly decomposed, the soft tissues gone, and only the bones and some other body parts remaining. If the body was embalmed before burial, there would still be moist material around the body from the decomposition of soft tissues and the body fat will be transforming into soap-like material as the moisture evaporates. In either case, the decomposition process is well on its way.

If an archeologist were to take a look after this one year mark, they could nearly always tell the age and gender of an individual, some injuries and medical conditions, and, sometimes, even quite a bit about them depending on the condition of any clothing, jewelry, or other personal objects the person was buried with.

Returning Energy

Imagining our own bodies decomposing one day can seem horrific but this is simply nature’s way of transforming all creatures who once lived back into the energy needed by new life. The bodies we live and breathe in today, however beautiful, are borrowed material from the earth to be returned when we no longer need them. It is actually quite an efficient process as life and death follow one after the other.

Let the professionals handle death cleanup

As natural as the decomposition process may be, for most people, our instinct is to stay away from a decomposing body. This is for good reason. The diseases that may have lain dormant or hidden away in our bodies in life are now free to spread unmitigated to those still living. The insects and other creatures that help the decomposition process can also spread disease and the odor of a decomposing body can be extremely foul. For all these reasons, it is important to only let those who are trained in cleaning up after a decomposing body do the work. No matter what stage the body was found in, rely on professional biohazard cleaners to clean all affected areas and remove any lingering odor.

When a body is discovered more than 72 hours after death, details normally examined to establish time of death such as body temperature, skin color, and degree of muscle rigidity, have all plateaued. Blowflies, however, lay eggs within minutes of someone dying and so investigators can use the growth timeline of blowfly maggots to find out exactly when a person died.

In some deaths, establishing the time a person died is extremely important. Even the difference of a few hours can make a huge difference in convicting someone of a crime. It’s at these times a forensic entomologist (someone who studies bugs found on dead bodies) is called in to take maggot samples from the body, establish which type of blowfly it is and which stage the blowfly maggot is at in order to determine the time of death.

Life Cycle of the Blowfly

Though we use the term “blowfly” there are many different species with different growth charts and development timelines. Though adults are easy to tell apart, the maggots can look quite similar. Part of a forensic entomologist’s job is identifying which species the maggot belongs to and knowing how temperature and environment affects that growth. On average, though, the lifecycle of a blowfly goes through six stages. They are:

1. Eggs Laid: Eggs are laid by a mature female blowfly in carcass holes or open wounds such as ears, nose, eyes, mouth, and anus within minutes of hours of death.
2. Eggs Hatch (Larvae): Eggs are 1-2 mm in length and hatch after 24-45 hours then quickly grow to become first stage larvae, otherwise known as maggots.
3. 1st Stage Maggots (Larvae): Maggots produce an enzyme that breaks down protein so they feed on semi-liquid bodily fluids as the body decomposes. At this stage they grow and after several days, shed their exoskeleton.
4. 2nd Stage Maggots (Larvae): In the second maggot stage, they grow in size and continue to feed off the decomposing body. This stage ends when they molt for a second time and become third stage maggots.
5. 3rd Stage Maggots (Pupae): In the third stage of maggots, now pupae, they fall to ground and no longer feed or move. Their exoskeleton hardens and turns from a light brown to a black color.
6. Adult Blowfly: The adult blow fly emerges from the exoskeleton and can fly after only a few hours. A male blowfly is able to mate right away while a female must feed on protein such as a carcass or feces before being able to lay her own eggs and thus the cycle continues.

Blowflies Aid in the Decomposition Process

Blowflies often take a part in breaking down decomposing bodies and returning the nutrients back to the earth. It’s through their efforts that bodies decompose faster than they would otherwise.  Because of the specific life cycle of the blowflies, the time of death can be determined with fair level of certainty.   This is an important piece of information when investigating a death whether it’s an unattended death from natural causes, or when foul play is suspected.

Open most any news site and you can read of a body being found. How long that person has been dead and how they died is determined under careful scrutiny by a forensic team trained in the various stages of human decomposition. By looking for certain signs and taking external factors into account, they can find a great deal of information about how and when death occurred.

Though it’s not something we like to think about, human decomposition, or the decomposition of any animal, is the way nature recycles materials and keeps systems in balance. As tragic and heartbreaking as death is for us, there is a beauty and efficiency about how creatures and the environment assist the body in the decomposition process and return the materials back to the local environment.

However a person died, there are five stages of decomposition that human and animal remains go through as the materials they are made of return to the earth.

Stage 1 – Initial Breakdown

As soon as death occurs, the body temperature starts cooling to match the surrounding temperature around it. Without blood and oxygen flow, muscular tissues become rigid and the blood pools into the lower extremities. Then, as the bacteria in the intestines devour the intestinal walls, cells lose their structural integrity and cellular enzymes are released to begin breaking down the cells themselves and surrounding tissues. Microbes also start breaking down carbohydrates, proteins, and lipids. Most of this breakdown occurs inside the body and is not visible from the outside. At the end of this stage, blowflies and flesh flies arrive to lay eggs.

Stage 2 – Bloating

As bacteria multiply and process bodily materials, they produce gasses such as methane, carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and hydrogen sulfide which bloat the body. These gasses build up pressure in the body and push fluids out through natural openings including the mouth, nose, and anus. If insects are present, maggots begin to hatch and feed on body tissues causing the skin to slip, the hair to detach, and the surface to rupture. These additional openings provide even more surface area for insects and bacteria, thereby quickening the decaying process. This emitting of gasses and fluids is what causes the greatest amount of odor during the decaying process.

Stage 3 – Active Decay

It’s during the active decaying process the most body mass is lost due to bacteria and insects processing the body material along with liquids being released into the surrounding environment. During this stage, the area of decomposition expands into the surroundings and the most insects are present while they feed on bodily fluids. This stage ends when the maggots leave the body.

Stage 4 – Advanced Decay

By this stage, most soft tissues have already decomposed and only bones, hair, cartilage, ligaments, and sticky byproducts of decomposition are left. Insects with chewing mouthparts such as beetles and certain types of flies are attracted at this stage and arrive to chew on and process this tougher material.

Stage 5 – Dry Remains

The last stage is when all byproducts of decomposition have dried up and only the skeleton and perhaps some hair are left. Beetles and flies eat anything softer that remains, and mites and moth larvae digest the hair. Exposed to the elements, the bones lighten in color and are eventually reclaimed by the earth.

Speed of Decomposition

How quickly a body decomposes depends on several factors: surrounding temperature, whether the body is buried or exposed to air or water, and the number of bacteria present. A body that is exposed to the elements such as air and water will decompose faster and have more insect activity than a body buried or confined in a sealed space. In similar fashion, a body decomposing in warm temperatures will break down faster than if it is left in a cold environment. The exception to this is if the temperature is so hot that moisture, a needed component in decay, isn’t present. In that case, the body mummifies and dries out.

However fast or slow a body decomposes and goes through these five stages, it is nature’s way of releasing the materials back into the earth so new life can be born again.