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The brightest of the bright
Posted by: be carefull ya'll ()
Date: August 16, 2010 04:03PM

This year's Darwin nominees are:

Nominee No. 1: [ San Jose Mercury News]:
An unidentified man, using a shotgun like a club to break a former girl friend's windshield, accidentally shot himself to death when the gun discharged, blowing a hole in his gut.

Nominee No. 2: [ Kalamazoo Gazette]:
James Burns, 34, (a mechanic) of Alamo, MI , was killed in March as he was trying to repair what police describe 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."

Nominee No. 3: [ Hickory Daily Record]:
Ken Charles Barger, 47, accidentally shot himself to death in December in Newton, NC . 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.

Nominee No. 4: [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 buildings windows to visiting law students. Hoy previously has conducted demonstrations of window strength according to police reports. Peter Lawson, 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.

Nominee No. 5: [The News of the Weird]:
Michael Anderson Godwin made News of the Weird posthumously. He had spent several years awaiting South Carolina 's electric chair on a murder conviction before having his sentence reduced to life in prison. While sitting on a metal toilet in his cell attempting to fix his small TV set, he bit into a wire and was electrocuted.

Nominee No. 6: [The Indianapolis Star]:
A cigarette lighter may have triggered a fatal explosion in Dunkirk, IN. A Jay County man, using a cigarette lighter to check the barrel of a muzzleloader, was killed Monday night when the weapon discharged in his face, sheriff's investigators said. Gregory David Pryor, 19, died in his parents' rural Dunkirk home at about 11:30 PM. Investigators said Pryor was cleaning a 54-caliber muzzle-loader that had not been firing properly. He was using the lighter to look into the barrel when the gunpowder ignited.

Nominee No. 7: [Reuters, Mississauga , Ontario ]:
A man cleaning a bird feeder on the balcony of his condominium apartment in this Toronto suburb slipped and fell 23 stories to his death. "Stefan Macko, 55, was standing on a wheelchair when the accident occurred," said Inspector Darcy Honer of the Peel Regional Police. "It appears that the chair moved, and he went over the balcony," Honer said.


Finally, THE WINNER!!!: [ Arkansas Democrat Gazette]:
Two local men were injured when their pickup truck left the road and struck a tree near Cotton Patch on State Highway 38 early Monday. Woodruff County deputy Dovey Snyder reported the accident shortly after midnight Monday. Thurston Poole, 33, of Des Arc, and Billy Ray Wallis, 38, of Little Rock, were returning to Des Arc after a frog-catching trip. On an overcast Sunday night, Poole 's pickup truck headlights malfunctioned.

The two men concluded that the headlight fuse on the older-model truck had burned out. As a replacement fuse was not available, Wallis noticed that the .22 caliber bullets from his pistol fit perfectly into the fuse box next to the steering-wheel column. Upon inserting the bullet the headlights again began to operate properly, and the two men proceeded on eastbound toward the White River Bridge .

After traveling approximately 20 miles, and just before crossing the river, the bullet apparently overheated, discharged and struck Poole in the testicles. The vehicle swerved sharply right, exited the pavement, and struck a tree. Poole suffered only minor cuts and abrasions from the accident but will require extensive surgery to repair the damage to his testicles, which will never operate as intended.

Wallis sustained a broken clavicle and was treated and released. "Thank God we weren't on that bridge when Thurston shot his balls off, or we might be dead," stated Wallis
"I've been a trooper for 10 years in this part of the world, but this is a first for me. I can't believe that those two would admit how this accident happened," said Snyder.

Upon being notified of the wreck, Lavinia ( Poole 's wife) asked how many frogs the boys had caught and did anyone get them from the truck? Though Poole and Wallis did not die as a result of their misadventure as normally required by Darwin Award Official Rules, it can be argued that Poole did in fact effectively remove himself from the gene pool.

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Re: The brightest of the bright
Posted by: Johnny Walker ()
Date: August 16, 2010 04:29PM

These are not new.

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Re: The brightest of the bright
Posted by: MrMephisto ()
Date: August 16, 2010 04:44PM

be carefull ya'll Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> This year's Darwin nominees are:
>
> ...
>
> Nominee No. 4: :
> 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 buildings
> windows to visiting law students. Hoy previously
> has conducted demonstrations of window strength
> according to police reports. Peter Lawson,
> 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.

This happened in 1993.

--------------------------------------------------------------
13 4826 0948 82695 25847. Yes.

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Re: The brightest of the bright
Posted by: Gonads & Strife ()
Date: August 16, 2010 04:51PM

MrMephisto Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> be carefull ya'll Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > This year's Darwin nominees are:
> >
> > ...
> >
> > Nominee No. 4: :
> > 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
> buildings
> > windows to visiting law students. Hoy
> previously
> > has conducted demonstrations of window strength
> > according to police reports. Peter Lawson,
> > 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.
>
> This happened in 1993.


And was featured on 1000 Ways To Die only they set it in L.A.

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Re: The brightest of the bright
Posted by: Biinnngggg ()
Date: August 16, 2010 07:50PM

Another account from the archives of a 30-year ER MD.
In the late fall and early winter months, snow-covered mountains become infested with hunters. One ambitious pair climbed high up a mountain in search of their quarry. The trail crossed a small glacier that had crusted over. The lead hunter had to stomp a foot-hold in the snow, one step at a time, in order to cross the glacier.

Somewhere near the middle of the glacier, his next stomp hit not snow but a rock. The lead hunter lost his footing and fell. Down the crusty glacier he zipped, off the edge and out of sight.

Unable to help, his companion watched him slide away. After a while, he shouted out, "Are you OK?"

"Yes!" came the answer.

Reasoning that it was a quick way off the glacier, the second hunter plopped down and accelerated down the ice, following his friend. There, just over the edge of the glacier, was his friend...holding onto the top of a tree that barely protruded from the snow.

There were no other treetops nearby, nothing to grab, nothing but a hundred-foot drop onto the rocks below. As the second hunter shot past the first, he uttered his final epitaph: a single word, which we may not utter lest our mothers soap our mouths.

Category: hunting, weather, falling

...

(April 2010, Romania) A thirty-five-year-old man from Braila was only trying to fix a broken soil tamper, a tool his father had made himself and used for decades. The metal handle of this family heirloom had rusted loose and our man was trying to weld it back into position, but unfortunately he was welding the metal rod onto an antique WWII cannon shell.
Yes, the family had been banging a cannon shell against the garden dirt for two generations!

Specialists from the Bucharest ISU (General Institute for Emergency Situations) stated that the first weld had been made in a harmless position, but the second weld was made in exactly the wrong spot. The heat triggered the shell to explode, mortally wounding the man. In his defense, he was sure the projectile was harmless because his father had used it to compact earth for almost 40 years.

If one generation doesn't get it right, the next does.
...

2010 Darwin Award Nominee
Confirmed True by Darwin





(1 January 2010, South Africa) Pop quiz, class. Do you or don't you go swimming in the crocodile-infested Limpopo? Do, or don't, leave your friends on the banks of the great grey-green Olifants River (main tributary of the Limpopo) and swim in its limpid waters not once, not twice, but three times the day you are finally devoured by that old crocodile? Let's just say it was a short New Year for Mariska B., 27, a waitress and former swimmer.
According to a long-time resident of Phalaborwa, locals know, "You don't even put a toe in the river. It's teeming with crocodiles and hippos." This local, on her third refreshing dip of the day, didn't have time to scream or struggle. Friends saw just a ripple on the water where seconds before she had been swimming.

Did I mention that swimming was strictly prohibited? Police searched for Mariska's body with long poles, and with the chemical detectors known as sniffer dogs, but found nothing. The cycle of life continues.

SIDEBAR: Olifants = Elephant

.....


(1 January 2010, Netherlands) Every now and then a completely new window into the world opens before our eyes. Here we have rural Dutch families enjoying their traditional winter sport, carbidschieten, or Carbide Shooting. It's a ridiculously dangerous machine akin to a potato gun, designed to hurl projectiless from the mouth of a metal milk can.
Carbide shooting, that wacky Dutch New Year's tradition, begins with moistening calcicum carbide and placing it in a large milk container. The damp CaCb emits acetylene (ethyne) gas which builds up inside the container. Then a spark is supplied, causing the pressurised gas bomb to blow the lid (or packing) off the milk jug.

Our nominee, a 54-year-old male, was having the time of his life--right up until the moment he poured a container filled with liquid oxygen over a fire to "flare it up" -- and the container obligingly exploded.

hmmm.

.....




(10 January 2010, Brazil) An electrical discharge made toast of municipal guard Arthur de Souza Coelho, 47, on Sunday evening. According to police reports, he had installed a tiny electric fence around his car to protect against the frequent robberies that occur in his neighborhood in Belem, Para. Then (direct translation from Portuguese) "he forgot that he had left the fence on and he ended dying with the electric shock."
After all, we are all dying, but some end sooner than others.

.....

Getting Lame

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Re: The brightest of the bright
Posted by: Warhawk ()
Date: August 16, 2010 07:54PM

MrMephisto Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> be carefull ya'll Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > This year's Darwin nominees are:
> >
> > ...
> >
> > Nominee No. 4: :
> > 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
> buildings
> > windows to visiting law students. Hoy
> previously
> > has conducted demonstrations of window strength
> > according to police reports. Peter Lawson,
> > 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.
>
> This happened in 1993.


Maybe the OP still has a 33K modem and Prodigy?

__________________________________
That's not a ladybug, that's a cannapiller.

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Re: The brightest of the bright
Posted by: ThePackLeader ()
Date: August 16, 2010 10:10PM

Warhawk Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> MrMephisto Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > be carefull ya'll Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > This year's Darwin nominees are:
> > >
> > > ...
> > >
> > > Nominee No. 4: :
> > > 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
> > buildings
> > > windows to visiting law students. Hoy
> > previously
> > > has conducted demonstrations of window
> strength
> > > according to police reports. Peter Lawson,
> > > 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.
> >
> > This happened in 1993.
>
>
> Maybe the OP still has a 33K modem and Prodigy?


No, I simply think that they're on another planet. Judging by the time-delay, they're about nine light years away from us, which places them around eps Eridani b.

==================================================================================================
"And if any women or children get their legs torn off, or faces caved in, well, it's tough shit for them." -2LT. Bert Stiles, 505th, 339th (On Berlin Bombardier Mission, 1944).

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Re: The brightest of the bright
Posted by: Snapple ()
Date: August 16, 2010 10:44PM

The brightest of the bright
The strangest of the strange
The coldest of the cool
The lamest of the lame
The numbest of the dumb
I hate to see you here
You choke behind a smile
A fake behind the fear
The queerest of the queer
The strangest of the strange
The coldest of the cool
You're nothing special here
A fake behind the fear
The queerest of the queer

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