(Fwd) Darwin Award
Virtual Mother (withheld@InfoAve.Net)
Wed, 26 Mar 1997 21:54:41 -0500 (EST)
>>You may recall a Darwin award from not too long ago where
>>a guy decided to strap a cargo plane rocket booster to his
>>car to see how fast it would go and ended up hitting a cliff
>>several hundred feet in the air (& the guy who got flattened
>>trying to break into a coke machine). Here's one more.
>>
>>This story was clipped from the recent Darwin awards, which
>>people get for doing something incredibly stupid. True
>>stories. Here's the winner:
>>
>>Larry Walters is among the relatively few who have actually
>>turned their dreams into reality. His story is true, as hard as
>>you may find it to believe . . .
>>
>>Larry was a truck driver, but his lifelong dream was to fly.
>>When he graduated from high school, he joined the Air Force
>>in hopes of becoming a pilot. Unfortunately, poor eyesight
>>disqualified him.
>>
>>So when he finally left the service, he had to satisfy himself
>>with watching others fly the fighter jets that crisscrossed the
>>skies over his backyard. As he sat there in his lawn chair,
>>he dreamed about the magic of flying.
>>
>>Then one day, Larry had an idea. He went down to the local
>>Army-Navy surplus store and bought forty-five weather
>>balloons, and several tanks of helium. These were not your
>>brightly colored party balloons, these were heavy-duty
>>spheres measuring more than four feet across when fully
>>inflated.
>>
>>Back in his yard, Larry used straps to attach the balloons to
>>his lawn chair, the kind you might have in your back yard.
>>He anchored the chair to the bumper of his jeep, and inflated
>>the balloons with helium. Then he packed a few sandwiches
>>and drinks, and a loaded BB gun, figuring he could pop a
>>few balloons when it was time to return to earth.
>>
>>His preparations complete, Larry sat in his chair and cut the
>>anchoring cord. His plan was to lazily float into the sky, and
>>eventually back to terra firma.
>>
>>But things didn't quite work out that way.
>>
>>When Larry cut the cord, he didnt float lazily up; he shot up
>>as if fired from a cannon! Nor did he go up a couple of
>>hundred feet. He climbed and climbed until he finally leveled
>>off at eleven thousand feet! At that height, he could hardly
>>risk deflating any of the balloons, lest he unbalance the load
>>and really experience flying. So he stayed up there, sailing
>>around for fourteen hours, totally at a loss about how to get
>>down.
>>
>>Eventually, Larry drifted into the approach corridor for Los
>>Angeles International Airport. A Pan Am pilot radioed the
>>tower about passing a guy in a lawn chair at eleven thousand
>>feet, with a gun in his lap.
>>
>>Now there's a conversation I would have given anything to
>>have heard!
>>
>>LAX is right on the ocean, and you may know that at
>>nightfall, the winds on the coast begin to change. So, as
>>dusk fell, Larry began drifting out to sea.
>>
>>At that point, the Navy dispatched a helicopter to rescue
>>him, but the rescue team had a hard time getting to him
>>because the draft from their propeller kept pushing his
>>home-made contraption farther and farther away.
>>
>>Eventually, they were able to hover above him and drop a
>>rescue line, with which they gradually hauled him back to
>>safety. As soon as Larry hit the ground, he was arrested.
>>But as he was led away in handcuffs, a television reporter
>>called out, "Sir, whyd you do it?"
>>
>>Larry stopped, eyed the man, then replied nonchalantly, "A
>>man can't just sit around!"
>>
>>BELIEVE IT OR NOT BUT IT'S TRUE!!!
>>
>>James W. Hood
>>Department of English
>>Mars Hill College
>>Mars Hill, NC 28754
>>
>>Telephone: (704) 689-1237
>>E-Mail: jhood@mhc.edu
>>
>>
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