TikTok loves a good true crime mystery. It’s not uncommon for folks to go viral over somewhat creepy stories where viewers can try to guess what happened.
The latest viral series involves a buried rug, cadaver dogs, and lots of theories from TikTok. In short, folks online were enthralled by the story of a woman who found a rug buried in her backyard. They wondered if she perhaps had found a body or if there was some much more innocent explanation.
Friday afternoon, we finally got an answer: there was no body. But there remains a lot to explain about how this situation went so viral.
We’ve got the full breakdown.
What happened with the buried rug?
It all started with then-relatively obscure TikTokker Katie Santry, a woman in Columbus, Ohio, posting a TikTok four days ago. In the video, Santry wondered if her house was haunted, citing her laptop getting shattered and her workspace disturbed overnight, seemingly without explanation.
Toward the end of the video, Santry mentioned that she and her boyfriend also recently discovered a rug buried in their backyard while digging to install a fence. That TikTok got more than 4 million views, which led to a series of followups. The next video, for instance, racked up 10 million views as it showed the actual rug in the ground.
As these things are wont to do, each forthcoming installment added bits of info and racked up tons of views. For instance, a Bloodgood tree was planted over where they found the rug, which, of course, people found creepy. After the comment section insisted, Santry tried to dig some more, but the rug was too big and too long for her to dig out. She was going to leave it as it was, but after a while the comment section then convinced her to call the police.
What happened with the cops and cadaver dogs?
The police came out and apparently told Santry it did seem weird, but there wasn’t much to do. Santry kept digging, both literally and figuratively. She enlisted friends to help dig in the backyard and got in touch with family members of the previous owners of the home.
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But eventually the professionals got involved again. Santry said that the local homicide department got in touch and sent more officers to the property, including cadaver dogs. Santry said both dogs sat by the hole in the ground, indicating they had found something.
That would seemingly indicated something strange was going on in the backyard, which, of course, all of TikTok found disconcerting. Meanwhile, Santry’s account ballooned to 1.6 million followers as tons of people anxiously followed along.
What has Santry said about it all?
The newly famous Ohio woman did an interview with People about the situation that published on Thursday.
“The Internet is about 50/50 on whether it’s a dead body or an animal, and maybe 10% think this was just a junkyard,” she said. “However, we’ve dug a lot of posts and fenced in most of our yard at this point, and I can say we haven’t come across any other rugs. So, the Internet thinks it’s either a junkyard, a dead body, or a dead dog.”
Though Santry said she didn’t think it was a body.
“I truly don’t think there’s a dead body down there,” Santry told People. “The curiosity about why that rug is there definitely haunts me. But my biggest concern is my computer because, at the end of the day, it shattered for no apparent reason. That leaves me with the most question marks. I actually have a psychic who reached out to me and wants to do a reading.”
So, what’s in the rug?
Developments in the strange situation continued to roll in through Santry’s TikTok account. Friday morning she posted videos saying that a bunch of officers had come over to her house and were prepared to dig.
Around 11 a.m. ET she posted a video saying the digging had begun. Clearly a bit shaken, Santry seemed to be ready for the whole ordeal to conclude.
“We don’t know anything yet,” she said. “My goal is that we can all laugh about it tomorrow. We’re all going to say, ‘Huh, this was a funny, silly-goose waste of time.”
And by about 2 p.m. ET, Santry revealed on TikTok that the cops had found only the rug, some rubber, and nothing else of consequence. It’s not clear why the dogs got a hit in the yard, but it doesn’t seem to be for any nefarious reason. She still wondered what happened to her laptop, but there was definitely a sense of relief.
“There’s no body. There’s no body,” she said. “Honestly, let’s praise the lord there’s no body. I can stay in my house.”