Date: Thu, 08 Aug 1996 08:01:47 -0400
From: "R. Andrew Bailey" <bailey9@MARSHALL.EDU>
Subject: RE: Inquiry
The Darwin awards:
These are nearly always 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.
[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.
[News of the Weird, 18 May 93, San Jose Mercury News]
A 24-year-old salesman from Hialeah, Fla., was killed near Lantana, Fla.,
in March when his car smashed into a pole in the median strip of
Interstate 95 in the middle of the afternoon. Police said that the man
was traveling at 80 MPH and, judging by the sales manual that was found
open and clutched to his chest, had been busy reading.
[Unknown, 25 March 1993]
A Vapid Death 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 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 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 rescue workers 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]
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 down 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 doctors' 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 ten seconds. 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."
