Hussiens half-brother hanged....

I would bet that the decapitation is a much more rapid and much less painful process than the normal process of being hanged. Link

There is nothing kind or gentle about a hanging. It is a process scientifically designed to break the neck and choke a person to death as efficiently as possible.

 

In judicial hangings from a gallows, such as those in Iraq, the victims are typically dropped a distance greater than their height through a trapdoor. At this point, the rope becomes rigid, and the force of the noose should break the victim's neck, causing immediate paralysis and unconsciousness.

 

The procedure causes a classic "hangman's fracture" — a break between the head and the neck, effectively snapping the upper cervical spine. In most cases, the victim dies of asphyxiation.

 

Though nobody really knows how long it takes a person to die from hanging, experts say it is probably anywhere from a few seconds to a couple of minutes.

 

In judicial hangings, as opposed to suicides, there is significant damage to the spinal cord. If the victims fall more than the prescribed distance, they may even pick up enough speed that the noose itself decapitates them, as happened Monday to the former Iraqi dictator's half brother, Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti. In rare cases, intense fear can cause the victim to die of cardiac arrest.

 

"Hanging is a very cruel way of killing people," said Harold Hillman, an expert in executions who teaches at the University of Surrey. "The fracture obstructs their breathing, and they are left gasping for breath."

 

Even when the neck is broken, Hillman says, there is still blood containing oxygen in the brain. The brain can still function at some level until that oxygen is used up.

 

In practice, this means that facial movements can still occur even after the head has been severed from the body.

 

The head of the Marie Antoinette, the guillotined French queen, famously smiled after being chopped off for precisely this reason, Hillman says. "Until there is no oxygen left, you can have involuntary movements in the head."