I received this as an email:
Yes, the ones we''ve all been waiting for: The Darwin Awards 2002. The
candidates have finally been released! For those not familiar with the
Darwin Award, it''s an annual honor given to the person who provided the universal human gene pool the biggest service by getting KILLED in the most extraordinarily stupid fashion. As always, competition this year has been very keen. Some candidates appear to have trained their whole lives for this event!
DARWIN AWARD CANDIDATES:
1. In September 2001, in Detroit, a 41-year old man got stuck and drowned in two feet of water after squeezing head first through an 18-inch wide sewer grate to retrieve his car keys.
2. In October, a 49-year old San Francisco stockbroker, who "totally zoned when he ran," accidentally jogged off a 100- foot high cliff on his daily run.
3. Buxton, NC: A man died on a beach when an 8-foot deep hole he had dug into the sand caved in as he sat inside it. Beach goers said Daniel Jones, 21, dug the hole for fun, or protection from the wind, and had been sitting in a beach chair at the bottom Thursday afternoon when it collapsed, burying him beneath five feet of sand. People on the beach, on the outer banks, used their hands and shovels, trying to claw their way to Jones, a resident of Woodbridge, VA, but could not reach him. It took rescue workers using heavy equipment almost an hour to free him while about 200 people looked on. Jones was pronounced dead at a hospital.
4. In February, Santiago Alvarado, 24, was killed in Lompoc, CA, as he fell face first through the ceiling of a bicycle shop he was burglarizing. Death was caused when the long flashlight he had placed in his mouth (to keep his hands free) went through his mouth and rammed into the base of his skull as he hit the floor.
5. According to police in Dahlonega, GA, Army ROTC cadet Nick Berrena, 20, was stabbed to death in January by fellow cadet Jeffrey Hoffman, 23, who was trying to prove that a knife could not penetrate the flak vest Berrena was wearing.
6. Sylvester Briddell, Jr., 26, was killed in February in Selbyville, Del,
as he won a bet with friends who said he would not put a revolver loaded with four bullets into his mouth and pull the trigger. He did and won. And lost.
7. In February, according to police in Windsor, Ontario, 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.
DARWIN AWARDS HONORABLE MENTIONS:
1. In Guthrie, Okla, in October, Jason Heck tried to kill a millipede with a
shot from his 22-caliber rifle, but the bullet ricocheted off a rock near
the hole and hit pal Antonio Martinez in the head, fracturing his skull.
2. In Elyria, Ohio, in October, Martyn Eskins, attempting to clean out
cobwebs in his basement, declined to use a broom in favor of a propane torch and caused a fire that destroyed the first and second floors of his house.
3. Paul Stiller, 47, was hospitalized in Andover Township, NJ, and his wife Bonnie was also injured, when a quarter stick of dynamite blew up in their car. While driving around at 2 a.m., the bored couple lit the dynamite and tried to toss it out the window to see what would happen, but apparently failed to notice the window was closed.
2002 DARWIN AWARDS RUNNER UP:
TACOMA, WA - Kerry Bingham, had been drinking with several friends when one
of them said they knew a person who had bungee jumped from the Tacoma
Narrows Bridge in the middle of traffic. The conversation grew more heated
during the night until at least ten 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 a 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 tore his foot off at the ankle. He miraculously survived his fall into the icy river water 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 foot was never located.
AND THE 2002 DARWIN AWARD WINNER: PADERBORN, GERMANY - Overzealous zoo keeper Friedrich Riesfeldt fed his constipated elephant, Stefan, 22 doses of animal laxative and more than a bushel of berries, figs and prunes before the plugged up pachyderm finally let fly and buried the keeper under 200 pounds of crap!
Investigators say ill-fated Friedrich, 46, was attempting to give the ailing elephant an olive oil enema when the relieved beast unloaded on him. The sheer force of the elephant''s unexpected defecation knocked Mr. Riesfeldt to the ground, where he "struck his head on a rock and lay unconscious as the elephant continued to evacuate his bowels on top of him," said flabbergasted Paderborn police detective Erik Dern. "With no one there to help him, he lay under all that dung for at least an hour before a watchman came along, and during that time he suffocated. It seems to be just one of those freak accidents that happen."
Can someone say...EEEUUUUWWWW?!?!?
Well Done! And thanks to all of the entries in this year''s contest.
Freak Accidents: The Darwin Awards 2002
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