2003 Darwin Awards
In case you have been waiting breathlessly for this year's Darwin
Awards,here they are. The awards this year are, once again, truly
classic.

These awards are given each year to bestow upon (the remains of) that
individual, who through single-minded self-sacrifice, has done the
most to remove undesirable elements from the human gene pool. Just
think... until these events, these same people were walking the
streets like normal people.

5th RUNNER-UP:
Goes to a San Anselmo, California man who died when he hit a lift
tower at the Mammoth Mountain ski area while riding down the slope on
a foam pad. The 22-year old David Hubal was pronounced dead at Central
Mammoth Hospital.

The accident occurred about 3 a.m., the Mono County Sheriff's
department said. Hubal and his friends apparently had hiked up a ski
run called Stump alley and undid some yellow foam protectors from lift
towers, said Lt. Mike Donnelly of the Mammoth Lakes Police Dept. The
pads are used to protect skiers who might hit towers. The group
apparently used the pads to slide down the ski slope and Hubal crashed
into a tower. It has since been investigated and determined the tower
he hit was the one with its pad removed.

4th RUNNER-UP:
Goes to Robert Puelo, 32, was apparently being disorderly in a St.
Louis market. When the clerk threatened to call the police, Puelo
grabbed a hot dog, shoved it into his mouth and walked out without
paying. Police found him unconscious in front of the store. Paramedics
removed the six-inch wiener from his throat where it had choked him to
death.

3rd RUNNER-UP:
Goes to poacher Marino Malerba of Spain, who shot a stag standing
above him on an overhanging rock and was killed instantly when it fell
on him.

2nd RUNNER-UP:
"Man loses face at party." A man at a West Virginia party (probably
related to the winner last year, a man in Arkansas who used the .22
bullet to replace the fuse in his pickup truck) popped a blasting cap
into his mouth and bit down, triggering an explosion that blew off his
lips, teeth, and tongue. Jerry Stromyer, 24, of Kincaid, bit the
blasting cap as a prank during the party late Tuesday night, said Cpl.
M.D. Payne. "Another man had it in an aquarium hooked to a battery and
was trying to explode it." "It wouldn't go off and this guy said I'll
show you how to set it off." He put it into his mouth, bit down and it
blew all his teeth out and his lips and tongue off, Payne said.
Stromyer was listed in guarded condition Wednesday with extensive
facial injuries, according to a spokesperson at Charleston Area
Medical Division. "I just can't imagine anyone doing something like
that," Payne said.

1st RUNNER-UP:
Doctors at Portland University Hospita... [ Read More (0.4k in body) ]

] 2003 Darwin Awards

Um, though amusing, be aware that this is from a hoax email.

The Darwin Awards are real, but the listed events in this thread are not the 2003 awards. Some of them are mentions from years past (like I know the ski lift one was a nominee from 1998). Others are flat out false urban legends which have been circulating for years.

To see the real awards (only two monthly winners for 2003 have been posted so far) check here:

http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/index_darwin2003.html