Darwin Awards Newsletter -- 1 September 2000 Mid-Year Darwin Award Winners Announced! Darwin Awards celebrate Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by commemorating the remains of those who contribute to the improvement of our gene pool by removing themselves from it in really stupid ways. The mid-year Darwin Award winners and runners-up have been selected! A criminal with a homemade parachute learns a hard lesson. A father taunts the wrong person. A man demonstrates why one should not play Russian roulette with an automatic weapon. And the filming of a safety video goes awry. HOMEGROWN PARACHUTE 2000 Darwin Award Winner 25 May 2000, Philippines We all enjoy learning from the past. Reflect back to November 24, 1971, aboard a Northwest Orient Airlines flight in Portland. A man who had purchased his ticket under the name of "Dan Cooper" demanded two hundred thousand dollars in cash and four parachutes. The plane made a landing in Seattle to accommodate his requests and disgorge the passengers. Once the plane was back in the air, Cooper asked how to lower the tail stairs, and then ordered the flight attendant out of the cabin. When the plane landed in Reno, the tail stairs were open and Cooper and the money were gone. For all his cool demeanor, Cooper had the crosshairs of evolution on him when he decided to jump. There was a freezing rainstorm outside, and the wind chill from the plane's velocity dropped the effective temperature to -60 degrees Fahrenheit. To seal his fate, he jumped with no food or survival gear into a heavily wooded forest in winter at night. The peanuts provided on the plane were just not enough to sustain his life. It is assumed that the man the FBI called D. B. Cooper died in the mountains or hit the Columbia River and drowned. History, then, teaches us that one cannot jump out of an airplane and survive. You would think that a hijacker would know better, but... We turn to Davao City in the Philippines this year. Augusto was a man with a mission. He boarded a Philippine Air flight to Manila, and donned a ski mask and swim goggles. Then he pulled out a gun and a grenade and announced that he was hijacking the plane. Apparently security is a bit lax at the Davao City airport. He demanded that the plane return to Davao City, but the pilots convinced him that the aircraft was low on fuel, and they continued on toward Manila. Augusto, undaunted, robbed the passengers of about $25,000 and ordered the pilots to lower the plane to 6,500 feet. When a lunatic with a gun orders you to descend, you descend. Meanwhile, Augusto strapped a homemade parachute onto his back, and forced the flight attendants to open the door and depressurize the plane. He probably intended to jump, but the wind was so strong that he had trouble getting out of the plane. Finally one of the flight attendants helpfully pushed him out the door, just as he pulled the pin from the grenade. He threw the pin (oops!) into the cabin, and fell toward the earth carrying the business end of the grenade in his hand. The impact of Augusto hitting the earth at terminal velocity had little effect on the earth's orbit. All that remained aboveground were Augusto's two hands. So history repeats itself with a new twist. Lesson 1: Don't throw yourself out of a perfectly good airplane. Lesson 2: If you feel compelled to violate Lesson 1, least don't roll your own... Parachute, that is. Copyright 2000 DarwinAwards.com FATHER KNOWS BEST -- 2000 Darwin Award Winner http://DarwinAwards.com/darwin/darwin2000-12.html?0009 GUN SAFETY TRAINING -- 2000 Darwin Award Runner-Up 28 February 2000, Texas A Houston man earned a succinct lesson in gun safety when he played Russian roulette with a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol. Rashaad, nineteen, was visiting friends when he announced his intention to play the deadly game. He apparently did not realize that a semiautomatic pistol, unlike a revolver, automatically inserts a cartridge into the firing chamber when the gun is cocked. His chance of winning a round of Russian roulette was zero, as he quickly discovered. Copyright 2000 DarwinAwards.com FORKLIFT SAFETY VIDEO -- 2000 Darwin Award Runner-Up http://DarwinAwards.com/darwin/darwin2000-06.html?0009 Also read six new stories on our website: FATAL CASE OF HICCUPS http://DarwinAwards.com/darwin/darwin2000-39.html?0009 FIREWORKS FIASCO http://DarwinAwards.com/darwin/darwin2000-37.html?0009 SETTLE THE SCORE http://DarwinAwards.com/darwin/darwin2000-38.html?0009 SHELL SHOT http://DarwinAwards.com/darwin/darwin1999-59.html?0009 WHY I'M THE LAST OF NINE CHILDREN http://DarwinAwards.com/personal/personal2000-32.html?0009 A CLEAN TOILET http://DarwinAwards.com/personal/personal2000-31.html?0009 --- * * * --- Darwin Awards Newsletter -- 15 September 2000 DARWIN AWARDS celebrate Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by commemorating the remains of those who contribute to the improvement of our gene pool by removing themselves from it in really stupid ways. APOLOGIES to anyone who received this newsletter in error. Recent problems with the Lyris server resulted in thousands of extra names mysteriously appearing on the list. If one of them is yours, please accept my apologies, and just reply to this email with the word "cancel" to unsubscribe. YOU LOVE THE Darwin Awards. Now enjoy your guilty pleasure in the privacy of your own home. Our new book includes archived and new stories, favorite winners from years past, a history of the awards, Darwin Haiku, and over a dozen humorous discussions of the implications of evolution. On sale now! (October/November delivery.) http://www.DarwinAwards.com/book/?0009 - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - Subscribe! subscribe@darwinawards.com Cancel? cancel@darwinawards.com - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - DARWIN AWARD: Moscow Marauder Confirmed True by Darwin (8 September 2000, Russia) A man who threatened to "deal with" his wife and her lover blew himself up with a home-made bomb on Friday in the far eastern Russian city of Khabarovsk. The bomb exploded when the man tried to attach it to the door of their not-so-secret apartment boudoir. -Copyright 2000 DarwinAwards.com - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - URBAN LEGEND: The Party's Over http://DarwinAwards.com/legends/legends2000-10.html - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - HONORABLE MENTION: Cheez Whiz Confirmed True by Darwin (22 May 2000) Every year Britons chase Double Gloucester cheese wheels down Cooper's Hill in an astoundingly bizarre and unexpectedly dangerous competition. Several seven-pound cheeses are hurled down the hill, and dozens of contestants take off in pursuit. If they catch a cheese they get to keep it. But Cooper's Hill is so steep that the cheese chasers invariably tumble as far as they run. This year was no exception. Winner Craig Carter broke his arm, yet managed to smile triumphantly while confessing that he had broken his other arm in his winning dash several years ago. At least eighteen people were injured, including a spectator who tried to dodge a bouncing cheese. He was hospitalized for a head injury after a 100-foot tumble down the steep slope. Despite its bloody track record, the Gloucestershire tradition has continued for hundreds of years, and contestants show no signs of slowing down. Therefore they earn an Honorable Mention, and we fondly anticipate a cheese-chasing Darwin Award nominee in the near future. -Copyright 2000 DarwinAwards.com - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - Want great jokes, daily cartoons, daily funny, celeb, and bikini pictures? OhYesUAre has all of the above and more content added weekly! Visit OhYesUAre today for a great laugh! http://www.ohyesuare.com/ - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - PERSONAL ACCOUNT: Feeding the Dolphins "I'm an active duty member of the United States Coast Guard and I was stationed In Destin, Florida in 1995. While on routine patrol I noticed a lady waving baitfish around. She was standing in four feet of water about 75 feet from the beach. "I thought she was feeding the dolphins, which is illegal in the state of Florida, so I pulled up alongside her to advise her of the infraction. I looked down in to the water and noticed that the tails on these creatures were moving from side-to-side, as opposed to up-and-down like a dolphin. Also none were coming up for air. This misguided lady was hand feeding a school of sharks! Without trying to alarm her, I asked if she had noticed anything unusual. "When she realized she was surrounded by ten sharks, her face turned white as a ghost and she jumped into my boat before I knew what had happened! The guys back at the station got a good laugh out of that one." -Copyright 2000 DarwinAwards.com - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - URBAN LEGEND: Dental Calamity http://DarwinAwards.com/legends/legends2000-11.html?0009 - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - URBAN LEGEND: Puffy Fox Cheeks http://DarwinAwards.com/legends/legends2000-09.html?0009 - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + -