Darwin award winners, 2006

[bhodi]

And the candidates this year are.............
MICHIGAN...
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.


CALIFORNIA...
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.


NORTH CAROLINA...
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 5 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.


CALIFORNIA...
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) rammed into the base of his skull as he hit the floor.


DELAWARE...
Sylvester Briddell, Jr., 26, was killed in Selbyvill, 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.


HONOURABLE MENTION:

NEW JERSEY...
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 2 AM, 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.

RUNNER UP:

WASHINGTON...
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 and at least 10 men trooped along the walkway of the bridge at 4:30 AM.

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 WINNER: FROM G-E-R-M-A-N-Y is....
Overzealous zookeeper Friedrich Riesfeldt (Paderborn, Germany) 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 it fly, and suffocated the keeper under 200 pounds of poop!

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."

[Llava]

A little early for that, isn't it?  Someone could top that.  I can't help but think New Year's Eve is a great time for people to do stupid things that will get them killed.

[SurfD]

DELAWARE...
Sylvester Briddell, Jr., 26, was killed in Selbyvill, 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.

Sorry, this guy gets my vote.

Deliberate act of self ending stupidity > freak elephant shit accident

[Lantyssa]

Sorry, this guy gets my vote.

Deliberate act of self ending stupidity > freak elephant shit accident

I was thinking the same thing.

While it was a rather embarrasing way to go, and certainly freaky, should it even be counted as a Darwin?  And at least the guy was knocked unconcious.  His was probably the most peaceful way to go of the lot.  (Still freaky.  With a helping of "eewwww".)

[Krakrok]

If club foot and dynamite wife were to breed you'd have a recipe for a future Darwin award though.

[Big Gulp]

If club foot and dynamite wife were to breed you'd have a recipe for a future Darwin award though.

I still have to say that club foot is even stupider than dynamite woman, though.  Chucking a quarter stick of dynamite from a car headed down the road?  Sure, I can see it.  The window being rolled up is braindead, but not as braindead as leaping off a bridge with a 40 foot length of cable tied to your leg.  And being drunk is no excuse, you deserve death for being that fucking stupid.

[Abagadro]

I thought you were disqualified from the Darwins if you survived as you could still pollute the gene pool.

[geldonyetich]

The Delaware guy would probably have scored higher if it wasn't apparently a common game with certain idiot youth cliques.  They have all sorts of fun names for Russian Roulette.  The Wikipedia entry shows three more deaths from the game, this year, but they probably didn't make the list because the Darwin Awards have a minimum age limit.

As for the winner - being buried in elephant poop, truly amazing, but at least he was unconscious when it happened.  I've new respect for the on-the-job hazards of zookeepers.

[stray]

I knew two people who shot themselves in the head intentionally -- but without the actual intent of suicide.

One was Russian Roulette. I didn't know the guy well though.

Another was a friend's step brother. Just one day, out of the blue, he put a gun to his head like he was playing around, and blew his brains out. No warnings. No signs of depression. Did it with a smile on his face apparently.

[Velorath]

DELAWARE...
Sylvester Briddell, Jr., 26, was killed in Selbyvill, 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.

Sorry, this guy gets my vote.

Deliberate act of self ending stupidity > freak elephant shit accident

It's hard to say without knowing whether or not the guy was following the correct Elephant constipation procedures.

[Tale]

CALIFORNIA...
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) rammed into the base of his skull as he hit the floor.

Guns and dynamite are boring. That guy gets my vote. There's a final millisecond in there of "oops ... torch".

[WayAbvPar]

I can't imagine being drunk enough to even walk out on the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, much less jump off of it. I get a little weak in the knees even driving over it. It is a LONG WAY DOWN to the water (which is Puget Sound btw, not an 'icy river').

[HaemishM]

I think tying yourself to a bridge with a giant rubber band is Darwin-y enough, doing so with no-flex CABLE is the winner hands down. It was only sheer luck that he survived, not lack of the stupid gene.

[Nebu]

I blame SAD.

[WayAbvPar]

That doesn't do the drop justice...I would estimate it is at least 200 feet to the water.

The biggest reason I don't like going over it is I can't get the image below out of my head!