2009 At-Risk Survivor

The stupidity displayed by the participants in the following tales stops short of the ultimate Darwin Awards sacrifice. Nevertheless, we salute the spirit and innovation of their misadventures.

ICanSayIToldYouSo 2009 At-Risk Survivor Unconfirmed by Darwin (July 2009, Iowa) A doctor at the University of Iowa's oral surgery clinic relayed the almost unbelievable story of a patient he had treated in the emergency room. As you will soon find out, it took a miracle to prevent this man from taking home the grand prize. The man, in his late 20's, and his wife were driving down the highway when they were involved in a one-car accident from which the wife emerged unscathed, while her husband sustained two broken legs, multiple rib fractures, a broken arm, a broken collarbone, and the worst facial trauma the 55-year-old oral surgeon had ever seen. "We put his forehead back together like a puzzle, intermixing pieces of bone and metal plates." Wondering how there could be such a fantastic difference in their injuries, he decided to ask the wife a few questions. While driving, the couple had been arguing about the man's reckless habits, specifically his love for "street skating." In an activity almost too absurd to exist, the participants get a vehicle going at a good speed, sometimes up to 30 mph, open the door, hang on for dear life, and drag the soles of their feet on the pavement. The wife began the discussion in the car that day by using her sane mind to tell her Evel Knievel wannabe husband that he was going to get killed by willingly jumping out of, hanging onto, and dragging his feet alongside a moving vehicle. He set out to prove to his wife that this activity was, in fact, not dangerous. Traveling at 60 mph--in a car he himself was driving--he opened the door, got a good grip, and hopped out, forgetting that he was traveling at double or triple the "normal" speed for this asinine stunt. His feet immediately caught the pavement and were pulled out from under him, but he did not fall from the car quite yet. He held on long enough for the out-of-control vehicle to roll into a ditch and for him to come into face-first contact with a telephone pole, stopping the argument faster than an auctioneer could spit out, "ICanSayIToldYouSo." Miraculously, this champ will live to fight another day with a fully functional--or at least as functional as it was prior to the accident--brain, as he sustained no lasting head injury. MEDIA REFERENCES DarwinAwards.com © 1994 - 2012 Submitted by: Conor D Awful? 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Great? Hate it! Love it!

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