200 People Watched A Canadian College Student Light Himself On Fire In An Apparent Suicide Attempt
In a live feed hosted on video chat website Chateen, the student reportedly consumed a combination of vodka and unidentified pills and used his toaster to start a small fire in the room. According to the Daily Dot, the student appears to catch on fire in the video before being rescued by a group of firemen.
According to CBC News, a 20-year-old University of Guelph student was seriously injured Saturday night after deliberately starting a fire in his dorm room. The school seemed to implicitly confirm the connection to 4chan with a statement on their website, which in part reads, "The University is aware that there is disturbing social media activity circulating about this incident and is urging people not to watch or distribute this hurtful material."
While the student's injuries are not life threatening, a university administrator told CBC that two school employees had to be hospitalized for smoke inhalation and 30 students who lived in the dorm were relocated.
For a more detailed look at the events of the live-stream, Ishmael Daro at Canada.com offers a breakdown of how the night likely played out:
Daro also notes that the emergency responders who eventually saved "Stephen" received a call at 7:40 p.m. - "roughly an hour and a half after the initial message on 4chan."