I did a search and did not see this posted yet.


Yes, it's the one we've all been waiting for ... the Darwin Award 2002.
 The candidates have finally been released!

 For those not familiar with the Darwin Award, It's an annual honor given to
 the person who provided the Universal human gene pool the biggest service
 by getting KILLED in the most extraordinarily stupid way.

 As always, competition this year has been keen again.

 DARWIN AWARD CANDIDATES

 ·     In September in Detroit, a 41-year-old man got stuck and drowned
    i n two feet of water after squeezing head first through an 18-inch-wide
    sewer grate to retrieve his car keys.

 ·     In October, 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.

 ·     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 usin g heavy equipment almost an hour to
free him while about 200 people looked on. Jones was pronounced dead at a
hospital.

 ·     In February, Santiago Alvarado, 24, was killed in Lompoc, CA, as he
 fell face-first through the ceiling of 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.

 ·     According to police in Dahlonega, GA, ROTC cadet Nick Berrena, 20, was
stabbed to death in January by fellow cadet Jeffrey Hoffman, 23, who was trying
to prove that a knife could not penetrate the flak vest Berrena was wearing.


 ·     Sylvester Briddell, Jr., 26, was killed in February in Selbyville,
 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.

 ·     In February, according to police in Windsor, Ontario, Daniel Kolta,
 27, and Randy Taylor, 33, died in a head-on collision, thus earning a tie
 in the game of chicken they were playing with their snowmobiles.

 DARWIN AWARD HONORABLE MENTIONS

 ·     In Guthrie, Okla, in October, Jason Heck tried to kill a millipede with
a shot from his 22 caliber rifle, but the bullet ricocheted off a rock near the
hole and hit pal Antonio Martinez in the head, fracturing his skull.

 ·     In Elyria, Ohio, in October, Martyn Eskins, attempting to clean out
cobwebs in his basement, declined to use a broom in favor of a propane torch and
caused a fire that burned the first and second floors of his house.

 ·     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 at 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 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 1 0
 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 PADERBORN, GERMANY


 Overzealous zookeeper Friedrich Rie sfeldt 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 groun
d, 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. It seems to be just one of those
freak accidents that happens."

Seems that I've heard many of these before 2002.
Good to read again, though.