Phantom Stack Sinks Vickie Seley
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We heard the floor being called over to a nearby table and walked over to see what the commotion was all about. According to some players at the table, a highly unusual situation occurred which required floor staff to sort things out.
Apparently, an unknown player failed to retake his seat after the recent twenty-minute break and his short stack began to dwindle. Eventually, this player's stack was forced all-in by the big blind and Vickie Seley seized the opportunity to earn some free chips by reraising to isolate the pot. The action folded around and Seley expected to take the pot without a showdown.
Unfortunately for her, the dealer ruled that the hand must be played to completion irregardless of the fact that the big blind player was absent from the table. Seley tabled her 
and watched as the board rolled out with two pairs of over cards to counterfeit her small pair.
The missing big blind's hand was turned up and his 
was good enough to win the pot with seven-high. The pot was awarded to the empty seat and Seley was crippled by the unbelievable loss. The drama did not end there though, and Seley found herself all-in on the next hand, losing her remaining chips in the process.
Rather than bow out of the tournament, Seley stuck around long enough to hear a floorman make a ruling that left her confounded and confused. It turned out that in the previous hand, the empty seat should not have been awarded the pot after all, and the chips should have been shipped to Seley after she made her isolation reraise.
This turn of events would have likely prevented Seley from going all-in on her eventual last hand, and she was understandably a bit upset. She sat patiently in her chair with no chips in front of her, and the empty seat's chips stacked neatly nearby, as play resumed without her. Eventually the floor staff decided that the empty seat's stack was dead and the chips were removed from the tournament.
Seley was also ruled out of competition and despite making the right play at the right time, she hits the rail with the unlikeliest of bad beat stories to share with her friends: the hand when she lost it all against a player who wasn't even there.