Yes friends, the 1996 Darwin Award nominees are currently being
compiled. Please submit your nominees, we know there are some FAA
people that belong in this group.
Darwin Awards are (by definition) granted posthumously. This citation
is bestowed upon (the remains of) that individual, who through
single-minded self-sacrifice, has done the most to remove undesirable
elements from the human gene pool.
You may recall last year's Darwin Award winner: The man who found out
moments before making a 300 MPH dent in an Arizona cliff that the JATO
(jet assist take off) unit he'd strapped to his car could not be
turned off once it was turned on.
The 1996 nominees are:
[San Jose Mercury News] An unidentified man, using a shotgun like a
club to break a former girlfriend's windshield, accidentally shot
himself to death when the gun discharged, blowing a hole in his gut.
[Hickory Daily Record 12/21/92] Ken Charles Barger, 47, accidentally
shot himself to death in December in Newton, N.C., when, awakening to
the sound of a ringing telephone beside his bed, he reached for the
phone but grabbed instead a Smith & Wesson .38 Special, which
discharged when he drew it to his ear.
[Unknown, 25 March] A terrible diet and room with no ventilation are
being blamed for the death of a man who was killed by his own gas.
There was no mark on his body but autopsy showed large amounts of
methane gas in his system. His diet had consisted primarily of beans
and cabbage (and a couple of other things). It was just the right
combination of foods. It appears that the man died in his sleep
from breathing from the poisonous cloud that was hanging over his
bed. Had he been outside or had his windows been opened, it
wouldn't have been fatal. But the man was shut up in his near
airtight bedroom. He was "... a big man with a huge capacity for
creating [this deadly gas]." Three of the rescuers got sick and
one was hospitalized.
[Reuters, Mississauga, Ontario] Man slips, falls 23 stories to his
death. A man cleaning a bird feeder on his balcony of his
condominium apartment in this Toronto suburb slipped and fell 23
stories to his death, police said Monday. Stefan Macko, 55, was
standing on a wheeled chair Sunday when the accident occurred,
said Inspector D'Arcy Honer of the Peel regional police. "It
appears the chair moved and he went over the balcony, Honer said.
"It's one of those freak accidents. No foul play is suspected."
[UPI, Toronto] Police said a lawyer demonstrating the safety of
windows in a downtown Toronto skyscraper crashed through a pane
with his shoulder and plunged 24 floors to his death. A police
spokesman said Garry Hoy, 39, fell into the courtyard of the
Toronto Dominion Bank Tower early Friday evening as he was
explaining the strength of the building's windows to visiting
law students. Hoy previously had conducted demonstrations of
window strength according to police reports. Peter Lauwers,
managing partner of the firm Holden Day Wilson, told the
Toronto Sun newspaper that Hoy was "one of the best and
brightest" members of the 200-man association.
AP, Cairo, Egypt, 31 Aug 1995 CAIRO, Egypt (AP)] Six people
drowned Monday while trying to rescue a chicken that had fallen
into a well in southern Egypt. An 18-year-old farmer was the
first to descend into the 60-foot well. He drowned, apparently
after an undercurrent in the water pulled him down, police said.
His sister and two brothers, none of whom could swim well, went
in one by one to help him, but also drowned. Two elderly farmers
then came to help, but they apparently were pulled by the same
undercurrent.The bodies of the six were later pulled out of the
well in the village of Nazlat Imara, 240 miles south of Cairo.
The chicken was also pulled out. It survived.
[Times of London] A thief who sneaked into a hospital was scarred
for life when he tried to get a suntan. After evading security
staff at Odstock Hospital in Salisbury, Wiltshire, and helping
himself to doctor's paging devices, the thief spotted a vertical
sunbed. He walked into the unit and removed his clothes for a
45-minute tan. However, the high-voltage UV machine at the
hospital, which is renowned for its treatment of burns victims,
has a maximum dosage of 10seconds. After lying on the bed for
almost 300 times the recommended maximum time, the man was
covered in blisters. Hours later, when the pain of the burns
became unbearable, he went to Southampton General Hospital, 20
miles away, in Hampshire. Staff became suspicious because he was
wearing a doctor's coat. After tending his wounds they called
the police. Southampton police said: "This man broke into Odstock
and decided he fancied a quick suntan. Doctors say he is going
to be scarred for life.
"More intelligence-challenged people"
45 year-old Amy Brasher was arrested in San Antonio, Texas, after
a mechanic reported to police that 18 packages of marijuana were
packed in the engine compartment of the car which she had brought
to the mechanic for an oil change. According to police, Brasher
later said that she didn't realize that the mechanic would have
to raise the hood to change the oil.
Portsmouth, R.I.Police charged Gregory Rosa, 25, with a string of
vending machine robberies in January when he: 1. fled from police
inexplicably when they spotted him loitering around a vending
machine and 2. later tried to post his $400 bail in coins.
Karen Lee Joachimi, 20, was arrested in Lake City, Florida, for
robbery of a Howard Johnson's motel. She was armed with only an
electric chainsaw, which was not plugged in.
The Ann Arbor News crime column reported that a man walked into
Burger King in Ypsilanti, Michigan at 7:50 am, flashed a gun and
demanded cash. The clerk turned him down because he said he
couldn't open the cash register without a food order. When the
man ordered onion rings, the clerk said they weren't available
for breakfast. The man, frustrated, walked away.
In case you've forgotten about the 1995 awardees, some of them
are listed below:
* James Burns, 34, of Alamo, Mich., was killed in March as he was
trying to repair what police described as a "farm-type truck."
Burns got a friend to drive the truck on a highway while Burns
hung underneath so that he could ascertain the source of a
troubling noise. Burns' clothes caught on something, however, and
the other man found Burns "wrapped in the drive shaft."
[Kalamazoo Gazette, 4-1-95]
* Same thing up here in MI. Seems some poor fella thought it
would be a good idea to "move" a downed wire from his car.
Newspaper reports it took a FULL MINUTE of neighbors whacking
away at him with a 2x4 to free their freshly fried former
friend from the fatal flashing.
* Bowling Green, Ohio, student Robert Ricketts, 19, had his head
bloodied when he was struck by a Conrail train. He told police
he was trying to see how close to the moving train he could place
his head without getting hit.
* In Wesley Chapel, Florida, Joseph Aaron, 20, was hit in the leg
with pieces of the bullet he fired at the exhaust pipe of his car.
When repairing the car, he needed to bore a hole in the pipe. When
he couldn't find a drill, he tried to shoot a hole in it.
(
geocities.com/siliconvalley/peaks) (
geocities.com/siliconvalley)