The Heaven's Gate house in Rancho Santa Fe
On 26 March 1997 police found 39 members of Heaven's Gate dead in a house near San Diego, timed to a comet's approach.
Late in the day on Wednesday 26 March 1997, a caller who gave no name directed officers toward a big house outside San Diego, at Rancho Santa Fe. That afternoon sheriff's deputies discovered 39 dead members of a secretive group called Heaven's Gate, among them its leader Applewhite, inside the large home on Colina Norte. The group had died by suicide in coordinated rituals. There were twenty-one men and eighteen women, aged from 26 to 72, and the investigator Brunk described them lying peacefully in matching black Nike shoes and purple blankets, with no marks of trauma.
The deaths coincided with Comet Hale-Bopp passing nearest the Earth. Shortly beforehand the group's website had carried a message saying the comet brought closure to Heaven's Gate and that its 22 years of classroom on Earth were ending with a "graduation" from the human evolutionary level. That was the group's own account of the comet and its meaning.
If you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of suicide, a local crisis line can help.
"On March 26, 1997, deputies of the San Diego County Sheriff's Department discovered the bodies of the 39 active members of the group, including Applewhite, in a house in the San Diego County suburb of Rancho Santa Fe. They had participated in a coordinated series of ritual suicides, coinciding with the closest approach of Comet Hale–Bopp. Just before the mass suicide, the group's website was updated with the message: "Hale–Bopp brings closure to Heaven's Gate ... our 22 years of classroom here on planet Earth is finally coming to conclusion – 'graduation' from the Human Evolutionary Level."
- Heaven's Gate Investigator Saw Dozens Dead With Their Shoes On, ABC News
- 20th Anniversary of Heaven's Gate Mass Suicides in Rancho Santa Fe, Times of San Diego
- 29 years ago, Heaven's Gate couldn't wait, Escondido Grapevine