More Darwins

Carrie has these for us. Truth truely is stranger than fiction.

2006 Darwin Awards

In case you haven't received them yet, here are this year's Darwin Awards -- the annual honor given to the person who improved the "gene pool" the most by killing themselves in the most extraordinarily stupid way. As always, competition this year has been keen. 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 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.

HONORABLE 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:
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.