The
Darwin Awards
The Darwin
Awards, for the uninitiated, are an unofficial hats off to
people who keep the gene pool clean by removing themselves from
it creatively, in the most extraordinarily stupid ways.
A past winner for example, was the fellow who was killed by a
Coke machine - it toppled over on top of him as he was
attempting to tip a free soda out of it.
GRAVITY KILLS
A 22-year-old Reston man was found dead yesterday after he tried
to use accessory straps (the stretchy little ropes with hooks on
each end) to bungee jump off a 70-foot railroad trestle, police
said. Fairfax County police said Eric A. Barcia, a fast-food
worker, taped a bunch of these straps together, wrapped an end
around one foot, anchored the other end to the trestle at Lake
Accotink Park, jumped ... and hit the pavement. Warren
Carmichael, a police spokesman, said investigators think Barcia
was alone because his car was found nearby. “The length of the
cord that he had assembled was greater than the distance between
the trestle and the ground.” Police say the apparent cause of
death was “major trauma”. An autopsy is scheduled for later
in the week.
LAUNCHED ON THE FOURTH OF JULY
Three young men in Oklahoma were enjoying the coming Fourth of
July holiday and wanted to test fire some fireworks. The only
real problem was, their launch pad and seating arrangements were
atop a several hundred thousand gallon fuel distillation storage
tank. Oddly enough, fumes were ignited, producing a fireball
seen for miles. They were launched several hundred feet into the
air and found dead some 250 yards from their respective seats.
DON’T ASK GOD TO PROVE HIMSELF, HE JUST MIGHT
A lawyer and two buddies were fishing on Caddo Lake in Texas
when a lightning storm hit. Most of the other boats immediately
headed for the shore, but not our friend the lawyer. Alone on
the rear of his aluminum bass boat with his buddies, this
individual stood up, spread his arms wide and shouted: “HERE I
AM LORD, LET ME HAVE IT!” Needless to say, God delivered. The
other two passengers on the boat survived the lightning strike
with minor burns.
THE BOYS OF SUMMER
A man in Alabama died from rattlesnake bites. Big deal you may
say, but there’s a twist here that makes him a candidate. It
seems he and a friend were playing catch with a rattlesnake. The
friend (a future Darwin Awards candidate himself) was
hospitalized.
THEY SAY THOSE THINGS WILL KILL YOU
Not much was given to me on this unlucky fellow, but he
qualifies nonetheless. You see, there was a gentleman from Korea
who was killed by his cell phone ... more or less. He was doing
the usual “walking and talking” when he walked into a tree
and managed to somehow break his neck. Keep that in mind the
next time you decide to drive and dial at the same time.
GOT A LIGHT?
In a west Texas town, employees in a medium-sized warehouse
noticed the smell of gas. Sensibly, management evacuated the
building, extinguishing all potential sources of
ignition-lights, power, etc. After the building had been
evacuated, two technicians from the gas company were dispatched.
Upon entering the building, they found they had difficulty
navigating in the dark. To their frustration, none of the lights
worked. Witnesses later described the scene of one of the
technicians reaching into his pocket and retrieving an object
that resembled a lighter. Upon operation of the lighter-like
object, the gas in the warehouse exploded, sending pieces of it
up to three miles away. Nothing was found of the technicians,
but the lighter was virtually untouched by the explosion. The
technician that was suspected of causing the explosion had never
been thought of as “bright” by his peers.
THIS YEAR's NOMINEE:
One day, the Arizona Highway Patrol came upon a pile of
smoldering metal embedded into the side of a cliff which rose
above the road at the apex of a curve. The wreckage resembled
the site of an airplane crash - but it was a car. The type of
car was unidentifiable at the scene. The lab finally figured out
what it was, and what had happened.
It seems that a guy had somehow gotten hold of a Jet Assisted
Take Off (JATO) unit. This is actually a solid fuel rocket used
to give heavy military transport planes an extra
"push" for taking off from short airfields. He had
driven his Chevy Impala out into the desert and found a long,
straight stretch of road. Then he attached the JATO unit to his
car, jumped in, got up some speed, and fired off the JATO.
The reconstructed facts are as follows:
The operator of the 1967 Impala hit the JATO ignition at a
distance of approximately 3.0 miles from the crash site. (This
was estimated by the deeply scorched and melted asphalt at that
location.) The JATO unit, if operating properly, would have
reached maximum thrust within 5 seconds, causing the Chevy to
reach speeds well in excess of 350 mph and continuing at full
power for an additional 20-25 seconds. The driver, soon to be
pilot, would have experienced G-forces usually reserved for
dog-fighting F14 jocks under full afterburners, basically
causing him to become insignificant for the remainder of the
event.
However, the automobile remained on the straight highway for
about 2.5 miles (15-20) seconds before the driver applied and
completely melted the brakes, blowing the tires, and leaving
thick rubber marks on the road surface. The car then became
airborne for an additional 1.4 miles and hit the cliff face at a
height of 125 feet, leaving a blackened crater 3 feet deep in
the rock.
Most of the driver's remains were not recoverable; however,
small fragments of bone, teeth, and hair, were removed from the
crater and fingernail and bone shards were removed from a piece
of the debris believed to be a portion of the steering wheel.
And a near winner but a future Darwin Awards candidate
is..............
A Vermont native, Ronald Demuth, found himself in a difficult
position yesterday. While touring the Eagle’s Rock African
Safari (Zoo) with a group of thespians from St. Petersburg,
Russia, Mr. Demuth went overboard to show them one of America’s
many marvels. He demonstrated the effectiveness of “Crazy Glue”
... the hard way.
Apparently, Mr. Demuth wanted to demonstrate just how good the
adhesive was, so he put about 3 ounces of the stuff in the palms
of his hands and jokingly placed them on the buttocks of a
passing rhino. The rhino, a resident of the zoo for the past
thirteen years, was not initially startled as it has been part
of the petting exhibit since its arrival as a baby. However,
once it became aware of its being involuntarily stuck to Mr.
Demuth, it began to panic and ran around the petting area wildly
making Mr. Demuth an unintended passenger.
“Sally [the rhino] hasn’t been feeling well lately. She had
been very constipated. We had just given her a laxative and some
depressants to relax her bowels shortly before Mr. Demuth played
his juvenile prank,” said James Douglass, caretaker. During
Sally’s tirade two fences were destroyed, a shed wall was
gored, and a number of small animals escaped. Also, during the
stampede, three pygmy goats and one duck were stomped to death.
As for Demuth, it took a team of medics and zoo caretakers over
four hours to remove his hands from the rhino’s buttocks.
First, the animal had to be captured and calmed down. And during
this process the laxatives began to take effect and Mr. Demuth
was repeatedly showered with over 30 gallons of rhino diarrhea.
“It was tricky. We had to calm her down, while at the same
time shield our faces from being pelted with rhino dung. I guess
you could say that Mr. Demuth was into it up to his neck. Once
she was under control, we had three people with shovels working
to keep an air passage open for Mr. Demuth. We were able to
tranquilize her and apply a solvent to remove his hands from her
rear,” said Douglass. “I don’t think he’ll be playing
with Crazy Glue for a while.”
Meanwhile, the Russians, while obviously amused, also were
impressed with the power of the adhesive. “I’m going to buy
some for my children, but of course they can’t take it to the
zoo,” commented Vladimir Zolnikov, leader of the troupe.
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Darwin Nominees
