Subject: THE DARWIN AWARDS
>> _THE DARWIN AWARDS are given every year to bestow
>> upon [the remains of] those individuals, who through
>> single-minded self-sacrifice, have done the
>> most to remove undesirable elements from the human
>> gene pool.
>>
>> DARWIN NOMINEES:
>>
>> #1 - LOS ANGELES, CA. Ani Saduki, 33, and his
>> brother decided to remove a bee's nest
>> from a shed on their property with the aid of a
>> pineapple. A pineapple is an illegal firecracker
>> which is the explosive equivalent of one-half
>> stick of dynamite. They ignited the fuse and
>> retreated to watch from inside their home, behind
>> a window some 10 feet away from the
>> hive/shed. The concussion of the explosion
>> shattered the window inwards, seriously lacerating
>> Ani. Deciding Mr. Saduki needed stitches, the
>> brothers headed out to go to a nearby hospital.
>> While walking towards their car, Ani was stung
>> three times by the surviving bees.
>> Unbeknownst to either brother, Ani was allergic to
>> bee venom, and died of suffocation enroute
>> to the hospital.
>>
>> #2 - Derrick L. Richards, 28, was charged in
>> April in Minneapolis with third-degree murder in
>> the death of his beloved cousin, Kenneth E.
>> Richards. According to police, Derrick suggested
>> a game of Russian roulette and put a semiautomatic
>> pistol (instead of the more traditional
>> revolver) to Ken's head and fired.
>>
>> #3 - PHILLIPSBURG, NJ. An unidentified 29 year
>> old male choked to death on a sequined
>> pastie he had orally removed from an exotic
>> dancer at a local establishment. "I didn't think
>> he was going to eat it," the dancer identified only
>> as "Ginger" said, adding, "He was really drunk."
>>
>> #4 - In February, according to police in WINDSOR,
>> ONT., Daniel Kolta, 27, and Randy
>> Taylor, 33, died in a head-on collision, thus
>> earning a tie in the game of chicken they were
>> playing with their snowmobiles.
>>
>> #5 - MOSCOW, Russia-A drunk security man asked a
>> colleague at the Moscow bank they
>> were guarding to stab his bulletproof vest to see
>> if it would protect him against a knife attack. It
>> didn't, and the 25-year-old guard died of a heart
>> wound. (It's good to see the Russians getting
>> into the spirit of the Darwin Awards.)
>>
>> #6 - In FRANCE, Jacques LeFevrier left nothing to
>> chance when he decided to commit suicide. He stood at the top
>> of
>> a tall cliff and tied a noose around his neck. He tied the
>> other end
>> of
>> the rope to a large rock. He drank some poison and set fire to
>> his
>> clothes. He even tried to shoot himself at the last moment.
>> He jumped and fired the pistol. The bullet missed him
>> completely and
>> cut through the rope above him. Free of the threat of hanging,
>> he
>> plunged
>> into the sea. The sudden dunking extinguished the flames and
>> made
>> him vomit the poison. He was dragged out of the water by a kind
>> fisherman and was taken to a hospital, where he died of
>> hypothermia.
>>
>> #7 - RENTON, WASHINGTON, USA. On February 3,
>> 1990, a Renton, Washington man tried to commit a robbery.
>> This was probably his first attempt, as suggested by the fact
>> that he had no previous record of violent crime, and by his
>> terminally
>> stupid choices as listed below:
>>
>> 1. The target was H&J Leather & Firearms, a gun shop.
>> 2. The shop was full of customers, in a state
>> where a substantial portion of the adult population is licensed
>> to
>> carry concealed handguns in public places.
>> 3. To enter the shop, he had to step around a
>> marked Police patrol car parked at the front door.
>> 4. An officer in uniform was standing next to
>> the counter, having coffee before reporting to duty.
>> Upon seeing the officer, the would-be robber
>> announced a holdup and fired a few wild shots.
>> The officer and a clerk promptly returned fire,
>> removing him from the gene pool. Several other
>> customers also drew their guns, but didn't fire.
>> No one else was hurt.
>>
>> --------------------------------
>>
>> 1997 DARWIN AWARD HONORABLE MENTIONS (I.E.
>> Non-fatalities)
>>
>> GULF BREEZE, FLORIDA, three unidentified teenage
>> males were using a home video
>> camera to film an action/adventure "movie" one of
>> the boys had written. In a scene that called
>> for each character to be ignited by fire, the
>> "special effects coordinator," age 15, prepared
>> the "stunt" youth by dousing lighter fluid onto his
>> clothes. The intentional fire, which proved
>> unexpectedly difficult to extinguish, left the
>> young man with third degree burns on his left
>> arm, torso, and both legs. It was all captured on
>> film.
>>
>> In BRADFORD, PA, J. Cruwe, 28, caught a small
>> snake in a container which he handed to his wife.
>> She opened the container and, startled to see the
>> snake, dropped it. The excited and poisonous
>> snake immediately bit Mr. Cruwe on the shin. Mr.
>> Cruwe survived the wound and
>> recovered after a short visit to the local
>> emergency room.
>>
>> In rural CARBON COUNTY, PA, a group of men were
>> drinking beer and discharging firearms
>> from the rear deck of a home owned by Irving
>> Michaels, age 27. The men were firing at a
>> raccoon that was wandering by, but the beer
>> apparently impaired their aim and, despite the
>> estimated 35 shots the group fired, the animal
>> escaped into a 3 foot diameter drainage pipe
>> some 100 feet away from Mr. Michaels' deck.
>> Determined to terminate the animal, Mr.
>> Michaels retrieved a can of gasoline and poured
>> some down the pipe, intending to smoke the
>> animal out. After several unsuccessful attempts
>> to ignite the fuel, Michaels emptied the entire
>> 5 gallon fuel can down the pipe and tried to
>> ignite it again, to no avail. Not one to admit
>> defeat by wildlife, the determined Mr. Michaels
>> proceeded to slide feet-first approximately 15 feet
>> down the sloping pipe to toss the match. The subsequent
>> rapidly
>> expanding fireball propelled Mr. Michaels back
>> the way he had come, though at a much higher rate
>> of speed. He exited the angled pipe "like a
>> Polaris missile leaves a submarine," according to
>> witness Joseph McFadden, 31. Mr. Michaels
>> was launched directly over his own home, right
>> over the heads of his astonished friends, onto
>> his front lawn. In all, he traveled over 200 feet
>> through the air. "There was a Doppler Effect to
>> his scream as he flew over us," McFadden
>> reported, "followed by a loud thud."
>>
>> Amazingly, he suffered only minor injuries. "It
>> was actually pretty cool," Michaels said, "Like when they shoot
>> someone out of a cannon at the circus. I'd do it
>> again if I was sure I wouldn't get hurt."
>>
>> TACOMA, WA -Kerrie Bingham had been drinking with
>> several friends when one of them said
>> they knew a person who had bungee-jumped from the
>> middle of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.
>> The conversation grew more heated and at least 10
>> men trooped along the walkway of the
>> bridge at 4:30 a.m. Upon arrival at the midpoint
>> of the bridge they discovered that no one had
>> brought bungee rope.
>>
>> Bingham, who had continued drinking, volunteered
>> and pointed out that a coil of lineman's
>> cable lay nearby. One end of the cable was secured
>> around Bingham's leg and the other end
>> was tied to the bridge. His fall lasted 40 feet
>> before the cable tightened and pulled his foot off
>> at the ankle. He miraculously survived his fall into
>> the frigid waters of the Tacoma Narrows and
>> Puget Sound and was rescued by two nearby
>> fishermen. "All I can say," said Bingham, "Is
>> that God was watching out for me on that night.
>> There's just no other explanation for it."
>> Bingham's severed foot was never located.
>>
>> SEA OF JAPAN, Earlier this year, the dazed crew of
>> a Japanese trawler were plucked out of
>> the Sea of Japan clinging to the wreckage of their
>> sunken ship. Their rescue, however, was
>> followed by immediate imprisonment once
>> authorities questioned the sailors on their ship's
>> loss. To a man they claimed that a cow, falling
>> out of a clear blue sky, had struck the trawler
>> amidships, shattering its hull and sinking the
>> vessel within minutes. They remained In prison for
>> several weeks, until the Russian Air Force
>> reluctantly informed Japanese authorities that
>> the crew of one of its cargo planes had apparently
>> stolen a cow wandering at the edge of a
>> Siberian airfield, forced the cow into the
>> plane's hold and hastily taken off for home.
>> Unprepared for live cargo, the Russian crew was
>> ill-equipped to manage a now rampaging
>> cow within its hold. To save the aircraft and
>> themselves, they shoved the animal out of the
>> cargo hold as they crossed the Sea of Japan at an
>> altitude of 30,000 feet. |
