Sid Vicious vs. Arn Anderson: The Bloody Scissors Fight

On the night of October 27th, 1993, in a Blackburn, England hotel, WCW stars Sid Vicious and Arn Anderson were involved in a brutal altercation that left both men seriously injured. The infamous scissors fight is remembered not only for its violence but also for the strange and escalating tensions that led to the brawl and their subsequent deportation from the United Kingdom.

A Heated Clash: Sid Vicious and Arn Anderson’s Scissors Showdown​

When you combine long hours on the road with little sleep and plenty of alcohol, tempers are bound to flare.

A heated exchange broke out between Sid Vicious and Arn Anderson after Arn overheard Sid insulting his close friend, Ric Flair.

Initially, cooler heads seemed to prevail, and both men retreated to their hotel rooms. However, after some time to stew over the confrontation, Sid returned to Arn’s room, allegedly striking him with a chair leg when Arn opened the door.

The altercation quickly escalated, spilling into the hallway, where a brutal and bloody fight ensued involving a pair of scissors. The aftermath was anything but pretty.

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The Tension Builds: Sid and Arn Clash Over Ric Flair

THE NASTY BOYS:

"We flew, whatever it was, seven, eight, or nine hours across the country. We got on a bus, wrestled, drove nine more hours ’til 6 in the morning, got off the bus and went to bed because we partied on the bus all night.

Arn, Sid, and a couple of the other guys went to the bar after the bus, and that’s when it all happened. I wasn’t there, but it was a real unfortunate thing, man. What happened between Sid Vicious and Arn Anderson was bad."

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"We go over there and fly into [Blackburn, England]. We drove three hours, got to the show just off the airplane, and did the show. After the show, we had a three or four-hour drive, maybe even five, back to the hotel where we were staying out of [Blackburn]. Everyone was off the bus, taking a few pills, having a few drinks…"

BIG VAN VADER:

"If I were asked to get on the stand and testify, I would blame that one on the company because we flew over there, eight or nine-hour flight, got off the plane, traveled about two and a half, three hours, got off the bus, and wrestled.

After the matches, it was back on the bus, and we traveled another ten to twelve hours to get to where we were going. It was just ludicrous! I mean, they should have got us off the plane, wrestled, went to bed, and then skipped a day. Know what I’m saying? Skipped a day and stayed over there. We’re talking about there was beer, the food ran out, and everybody was drinking.

By the time we got off ten hours later, we’re talking after an eight-hour plane ride, a two-and-a-half-hour trip, fighting, and a ten-hour bus ride back. The guys were frazzled and worn."

SID VICIOUS:

"I’ll tell you exactly what happened. We were in a bar, and I was just waiting for food. We were all at a table drinking…"

VADER:

"I remember it was Sid Vicious and Arn Anderson, myself, and a couple of other guys sitting at this table. We were finishing up a beer while everyone else was checking in. I remember getting up and saying to the guys, ‘I’m going to bed.’ Apparently, Sid and Arn had squared off after I had left."

SID:

"Arn asked the question, ‘What’s wrong with our business? Why aren’t we drawing? The other company this and the other company that…’"

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"[It] started getting heated. Everybody was talking about, ‘This [guy] making money, that [guy] making money.’ Ric Flair and Arn Anderson started talking about, ‘Flair this, Flair that. He’s making this much money…’ and [it] started getting heated."

SID:

"So I said, ‘You want to know what’s wrong with our business? We have an old man in Ric Flair who needs to get out of the way!’"

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"The next thing you know, beer is flying across the table!"

SID:

"We then got into a verbal argument, and they were slinging beers in my face at the bar."

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"Sid then throws a beer. This sends the guys to their rooms. Everybody was like, ‘[Screw] it.’ Everybody goes to their rooms. I’m up there getting hashed out. I was smoking big hash!"

The Brutal Scissor Fight: How It All Unfolded

SID:

"As I was going to my room, [Arn Anderson] and a bunch of the other guys were in the hallway, and he broke a beer bottle and threatened to cut me.

My room was only a few doors down from his. I passed his room, took a left, and went into my room about four doors down. I got in there, and I wasn’t going to sleep real nice.

I wanted to go back to the bar, but I went into my room, ate part of my sandwich, and said to myself, ‘Man, this [guy]!’ I have a bad temper too. I thought, ‘This [guy] threw a beer in my face, and now he’s threatening me with a broken beer bottle?’ You know, you have to draw a line!

There was a chair sitting right there, so I broke a leg off it, and I was going to go whack him in the head a couple of times."

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"I hear somebody, and I’m like, ‘What the? Somebody’s fighting out there!’ I’m thinking it’s Vader. I’m like, ‘Vader starting something again, man!’"

VADER:

"Their hallway was down a different one, so I really didn’t hear it."

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"So I go over to Vader’s room, and I hear [snoring sounds]. I hear him snoring through the door!"

Sid and Arn’s Bloody Brawl: The Scissors Come Out

SID:

"When I got back down there, there was nobody in the doorway or the hallway, and [Anderson’s] door was shut. So I knocked on his door and said, ‘Come on out here! Bring your beer bottle!’

Some words were exchanged. I couldn’t totally hear him, but I heard him falling down and stumbling around, and I thought, ‘Ah, he’s [messed] up…’ I looked at my hand and thought to myself, ‘This is stupid.’ So I threw the thing.

You can look at the records the police had. The stick he said I hit him with never touched him. It was twenty feet in the opposite direction from where the fight had happened, and that stick had not one drop of blood, not one dent in it like it had been hit or anything.

So Arn comes out, and I had left, turned my back, saw his door open, turned around, and he’s standing there with a pair of scissors in his hands. I just went like this with him, and I said, ‘Hey man, this has gone too far.’ And he’s coming after me!

I don’t remember getting stabbed in the beginning. There were two doors in the corridor, and he backed me up there, and I had nowhere to run. When he came into me and got close, I think I hit him one time, and he fell down at my feet.

When he did, I looked at him, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw the scissors fall. They were falling out of my stomach. I have a scar right there. So when I saw the scissors falling out, I realized I had been stabbed. I didn’t feel it in my face or hands, but he launched back for them a second time, but my feet got them first. And then, I don’t know—it happened so fast…"

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"I go down the steps, and I see blood galore. Blood on the left, blood on the right, blood all down the hallway. I keep walking, and I’m in the hallway with a towel.

I get down there, and Sid Vicious and Arn Anderson are down there just brawling. They were covered in blood.

Sid Vicious got the scissors and grabbed Arn Anderson by the hair. He’s booting him in the face, stabbing him with the scissors every which way. Arn Anderson had blood spitting out of him like a horror movie, man. I see Sid kicking Arn Anderson’s nose, and it does a 180 turn straight up!"

SID:

"At this point, I think I heard him say, ‘Man, you’re killing me!’ or something like that, and I had the scissors in my hand. I looked down, I saw him, and I’m like, ‘He’s [messed] up…’"

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"I jump in—boom—push them apart, and Arn Anderson kind of falls against the wall, half drunk and half from the loss of blood. He just kind of stumbles against the wall.

Sid steps back, and he looks at me, and I step back in my stance, and I’m like, ‘I don’t want to have to take you down!’ You know what I’m saying? But that stopped. Sid just looked at me, freaked out."

SID:

"Blood came gushing out of my stomach, and I realized I’d been stabbed. I was scared to death. I had all white on. So I went down the hallway…"

VADER:

"Then I was in my room when I heard yelling and screaming in the lobby, so I literally came out in my underwear. Me, 420 pounds, in my underwear—it was quite a sight. I have these huge legs, you know?

So the next thing I know, I saw Sid kind of doing this monster walk towards me, and literally blood wasn’t dribbling down—it actually had some power to it. It was coming out about an inch from his belly, pouring out. I remember I just grabbed his back, stuck my thumb in the hole. I didn’t know what else to do. I just stuck it in there, and it stopped the bleeding or drastically slowed it down."

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"Vader just tackles him, pulls him down. Sid is spitting blood from his stomach and everything."

VADER:

"I yelled at someone to get a chair and told a lady to get me some towels. I held a towel on him until the ambulance came, and I walked him over to the ambulance. The guy said, ‘Okay, I gotta help him.’ I was completely covered in blood. You know, I never really saw Arn because he was in a different part of the hotel."

2 COLD SCORPIO:

"They [Sid Vicious and Arn Anderson] were fighting on the first floor, right down by Ric Flair and Ricky Steamboat’s room. And these guys were supposed to be their buddies, but not one of those chickens got out of their rooms! I’m up on the second floor, and I gotta come down and break that up? That’s BS.

Then, I’m not even office, but the ambulance and police came and broke it up. It was like a murder case, you know what I’m saying?

Next thing you know, these guys are going to the hospital, and me and one of the office guys are going with them.

They ended up staying there, filling out papers for Arn and filling out papers for Sid—real name, address, the whole nine yards. And I’m over there doing the same, filling out papers for Sid. You know what I’m saying?

So Sid had to have exploratory surgery, and Arn had to get patched up from head to toe with all his cuts."

SID:

"When I was in the hospital, the police, or whatever you call them—the law enforcement over there—came into my room trying to get me to press charges against him.

I said, ‘No, man, I’m not going to press charges against him. We both made mistakes. I don’t know how bad he’s really hurt.’ I didn’t know. And they’re like, ‘You know your friend, he’s got not one scratch on him.’

Here I am having exploratory surgery already, and I’ve got stabs on my face, and I said, ‘He’s not got a scratch on him?’ I thought, ‘This [guy]…’ As I said, it happened so fast. I really don’t remember it happening.

So I was going to press charges on him.

Later that night, the nurse came over to my room and said, ‘Your friend is really messed up.’ So I dropped the charges."

VADER:

"I think everyone was kind of in shock. We were extremely tired, and we had a meeting at the next venue, which was the next night, and Turner was thinking about shutting down the tour and bringing us all home. He was going to make a decision about what to do. I don’t know how much of that was a shoot or work to scare us. Dusty asked me to speak to everyone, so I did."

SID:

"Of all the people in the world, Arn was the last person I would—well, I wouldn’t want to hurt anybody—but he would be the last person in the world I would want to hurt. He had been good to me as a person. I don’t know what he might have said behind my back, but face-to-face, he was always a gentleman. I can only assume he was like that at all times.

So I later asked, ‘What does Arn say?’ They said Arn was so [messed] up he couldn’t remember anything!"

From the Perspective of the WCW Official on Tour

Richard Steinberg, the WCW Official who was directly involved in the Sid Vicious and Arn Anderson incident in Blackburn, England, reached out to us to share his experience from that fateful evening:

"I was directly involved in the incident,” Steinberg began. “At the time, I was the Director of Marketing Services for WCW and was on the entire tour.

“I received a phone call in my room about 2:30 a.m. saying there was a major incident, and I was needed in the lobby ASAP. I told them to call the Tour Director or the Head of Security (Doug Dellinger), but I was told he could not be found!

“I got dressed and grabbed the elevator down to the first floor.

“Blood was everywhere—all over the hotel walls, leading down the corridor to the lobby. I passed Sid and Arn’s rooms, which were across the hall from each other. Both doors were open—lots of blood and smashed furniture everywhere.

“I got to the lobby, and the entire front glass window of the lobby was smashed out, with plate glass broken everywhere.

“At this point, I knew nothing except what I saw!

“Sid was lying on the floor, bleeding from several wounds. I immediately covered two of Sid’s wounds with my hands to try and stop the bleeding. I asked for an ambulance and was told it was on its way! At this point, I knew nothing about Arn.

“I got in the ambulance with Sid. He was crying all the way to the hospital, saying he didn’t want to die! Alternatively, he was telling me that he had ‘[messed] up’ his big chance to be WCW World Champion but was mostly moaning that he didn’t want to die! Here was this huge guy crying like a baby!

“I entered the emergency room with Sid while the doctor treated him. He kept crying and moaning, ‘I don’t want to die!’ The doctor took a look at his wounds and told me to leave while he treated him.

“I walked outside the treatment room and encountered Too Cold Scorpio. He told me the full story of what happened and that he had stayed with Arn during his ambulance ride to the emergency room.

“I made the decision to contact WCW back in Atlanta immediately. I grabbed a payphone, but, of course, it was the middle of the night back in Atlanta, and nobody answered the phone. I left a message for Bischoff and returned to Scorpio.

“Scorpio and I remained in charge of the two guys. Scorpio eventually left, and I stayed at the hospital for several more hours. After returning to the hotel, I met with the police and Doug Dellinger, the WCW Security guy, and grabbed a couple of hours of sleep.

“The next morning, I received a call from Atlanta, telling me to remain in Blackburn with Sid and Arn while the tour continued to the next cities. So I stayed behind to deal with potential police charges and the extensive damage to the hotel.

“I had the hotel calculate the total damages and faxed the information back to Atlanta. WCW then increased the limit on my company Visa card, and I paid the bill at the hotel.

“It should be noted that after my return to Atlanta, it was discovered that a hotel employee had stolen my credit card number and made additional unauthorized charges on my account. So much fun!

“A day or two later, when Sid and Arn were stable enough to travel, WCW told me to take them to different airports on different days to get them back to the United States. I ultimately put Sid in a taxi and sent him on his way to the airport.

“The next day, I did the same with Arn, sending him to a different airport.

“On the third day, I grabbed two trains and caught up with the tour in Birmingham, England. I walked into the hotel lobby and promptly sat down to breakfast with Rick Rude!

“My truly lasting memory of the event is being in the ambulance, trying to stop Sid from bleeding. Here I was with this massive man, and all he was doing was crying like a baby! Weird, isn’t it?"

Richard has shared multiple wild stories from his time on the road with us on Pro Wrestling Stories, which you can explore here.

The Aftermath: Stitches, Suspensions, and Sid’s Apology

Arn Anderson sustained twenty stab wounds to the chest and stomach, while Sid Vicious endured four stab wounds in their brutal scissors fight.

Both men spent the night in the hospital and were deported back to the U.S. the following day. Despite the incident’s severity, no police charges were filed.

In the aftermath, WCW President Eric Bischoff fired Sid after multiple wrestlers threatened to walk out if he remained with the company. Arn Anderson, meanwhile, received only a suspension.

In time, Sid apologized to Anderson, and the two were reportedly on good terms before Sid’s passing on August 26, 2024, at the age of 63.

Arn Anderson’s Heartfelt Reflection on Sid Vicious’s Legacy​

In a heartfelt statement on his ARN podcast following Sid Eudy’s death, Arn Anderson reflected on Sid’s impact on the wrestling world:

"Well, it was a shock, as it always is. Obviously, the wrestling world lost a giant. He was definitely a monster. He left a mark on this business that people will remember for decades to come. He had the best look. I would go as far as to say he probably had the best look of anybody in the history of the business. Just seeing him walk into a room, he was a monster."

Anderson continued, "Our thoughts and prayers for his family certainly go out, and it’s very, very sad to hear of such a huge loss. It’s never a shock, but it is a shock. In our business, we beat our bodies up, and in dog years, our bodies are aged a lot faster."

"I had no previous knowledge of any illness with Sid, so it was a shock. Like I said, our thoughts and prayers go out to his family and to his fans equally. Let’s give them the thoughts and prayers they’ll need going forward."

While time healed their personal rift, the events of that night remain a lasting reminder of the very real tensions that simmered beneath the surface on the road, where even seasoned wrestlers could find themselves in violent and unforgettable confrontations.​

These stories may also interest you:

• Sid Vicious and the Infamous Squeegee Incident
• Sid Eudy (aka Sid Vicious & Sycho Sid): His Secret Story
• The Messy Fight Between Paul Orndorff and Vader in WCW

Sources used in this article: highspots.tv and RF Video.

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