Bad Timing or Thinning The Herd II - You Decide Quiz

Answer: walked into a spinning helicopter blade

While on location in Oregon, Boris Segal was killed when he inadvertently walked into a spinning tail rotor blade after disembarking from the helicopter in the parking lot of the Timberline Lodge in Oregon.

The investigation of the May 22, 1981 accident revealed that Segal turned the wrong way after exiting the aircraft, and walked into the blade which partially decapitated him.

Segal was rushed to a hospital in Portland, Oregon, where he died five hours later. Segal, a well respected director of movies and television, had well over 100 credits, directing movies and episodes of many of the most popular television series during his career, spanning from 1955 until his death.

Boris Segal was the father of singer-songwriter and actress Catherine Louise "Katey" Segal. Katey Segal is probably best remembered for her role as Peg Bundy on the 1987 hit sitcom, "Married... With Children".

Answer: accidentally jumped from the 24th floor of his office building during a demonstration

Garry Hoy, a highly respected attorney in his law firm, died while attempting to demonstrate the strength of the windows on the 24th floor of his office building in a stunt he had successfully performed dozens of times before.
Hoy would explain to visitors that the windows were unbreakable, and then fling himself against the window, always bouncing harmlessly off the glass.

During a meeting on July 9, 1993, with a group of prospective apprentice legal clerks, Hoy again tried to prove his point, throwing himself at the window and bouncing back. The results were different when he repeated the stunt a second time. True to his word, the window didn't break, but the force of his body hitting the window caused it to pop out of its frame, resulting in Hoy flying out of the window and falling 24 floors to his death.

Before becoming a lawyer, Hoy worked as a professional structural engineer, having received an engineering degree. Hoy was well aware of the structural specifications of the building and the shatter-proof windows.

Hoy's bizarre death earned him honorable mention in the list of "1996 Darwin Awards" for unusual deaths.

Answer: sudden depressurization of their cabin during reentry preparations

The three cosmonauts had the unfortunate distinction of becoming the first, and only humans during the 20th century, to have died outside of the Earth's atmosphere.

In what appeared to be a normal re-entry of the Soyuz-11 spacecraft after its 23 day mission, and completing 383 orbits of the Earth, the recovery team located and opened the space capsule. To their shock, the corpses of the three cosmonauts were discovered.

An investigation of the incident revealed that a valve had opened just before the spacecraft completed its last orbit, causing the atmosphere inside the capsule to vent into space. This caused depressurization within the crew cabin, and resulted in the crew experiencing hypoxia as the spacecraft descended towards Earth.

Answer: crushed by the limb of a plant he shot

Twenty-seven year old David Grundman was killed when he was crushed by a giant limb from a cactus he shot with his shotgun, separated from the plant and fell on him.

At the time, Grundman and his roommate, James Suchochi, were involved in the illegal activity of "cactus plugging". Cactus plugging is the willful practice of vandalizing or destroying cacti, simply for fun. One favorite target are the Saguaro giant cacti, which can grow to a height of 70 feet, with thick branches that resemble arms.
The so called "sport" of cactus plugging is to shoot the plant until it falls to the ground.

Standing less than 10 feet from a 27 foot tall Saguaro, Grundman fired one shot from his weapon, blasting a portion of the plant off. On his second shot, the blast broke off a heavy limb of the cactus, which fell on him, pinning him to the ground and killing him. The limbs of the cactus weighed several hundred pounds.

Answer: run over on tarmac by a responding rescue vehicle

By most accounts, 16-year old Ye Men Yuan survived the plane crash. It was reported that Yuan was rescued by a firefighter, removed from the plane, and placed on the tarmac a short distance away.

The plane was still burning and firefighters used foam to fight the blaze. Reportedly, Yuan was covered in the foam while on the tarmac, and was struck and killed by one and possibly two rescue vehicles responding to the fire.

Of the 307 passengers aboard the Boeing 777-200ER as it made its final approach into San Francisco International Airport, two fatalities were reported at the scene, one being Yuan, and a third passenger died several days later in a hospital.

Answer: shot in face by fellow soldier who tried to cure his hiccups

PFC Young was shot in the face by him friend, SPC Patrick Edward Myer, who pointed his weapon at Young, attempting to scare him and cure his hiccups!

Both men, and a third party had been drinking while watching a Sunday night football game. Myer stated that he thought the gun was loaded with only a "dummy" round, and was trying to scare his friend who was suffering from a severe and prolonged case of the hiccups.

Young died during the ambulance ride to Skylark Field in Killeen, Texas, where he was scheduled for airlift to a hospital.

Because the victim and suspect were soldiers, the case was tried in military court on the Central Texas Army post (Fort Hood). Patrick Myer pleaded guilty to "involuntary manslaughter", and was sentenced to three and a half years in military prison, reduced to the rank of private, and was to be given a "bad conduct" discharge from the military after serving his sentence.

Answer: carrot juice

Basil Brown, a health food addict and scientific advisor, drank up to eight pints of carrot juice a day, supplemented with vitamin A tablets. He died of a carrot juice overdose.

The huge consumption of carrot juice over a ten day period bombarded his system with 10,000 times the recommended amount of vitamin A. His death was due to severe liver damage.

Brown ignored the advise of his family physician, Dr. J. Fabricius, who warned him about his addiction to vitamin A, and sent him to see a specialist, who issued the same warning. As with alcohol, ingesting large quantities of vitamin A can result in cirrhosis of the liver.

A pathologist reported that at the time of his death, Brown's skin color was a bright yellow.

A formal inquest later ruled that the death of Basil Brown was from carrot juice addiction.

Answer: exploded in a decompression chamber

While undergoing a routine decompression aboard the oil rig "Byford Dolphin", a semi-submersible drilling rig in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea, Hellevik, along with three fellow divers, were accidentally exposed to a sudden
explosive depressurization, from nine atmospheres to one atmosphere, within seconds. The sudden change in air pressure resulted in the immediate deaths of all four divers. One of the two "dive tenders", who were assisting with the decompression process was also killed, while the second dive tender survived, sustaining severe injuries.

Hellevik's body was exposed to the highest pressure gradient, and exploded due to the sudden massive expansion of the internal gasses in his body. Fragments of his body were found scattered throughout the oil rig. One part of his body was found on the rig, 30 feet above the decompression chamber.

Answer: first known human killed by a robot

A tragic accident on January 25, 1979, at the Ford Motor Company's casting plant in Flat Rock, Michigan, resulted in assembly line worker Robert Williams, becoming the first human being killed by a robot.

The plant utilized a one-ton robot to retrieve parts from a storage bin. On the day of the accident, the robot malfunctioned and shut down. Unable to restart the robot, Robert Williams, a 25 year old worker was asked to climb up on the deck of the bin to manually retrieve parts from the storage bin.
Without any warning, the robot reactivated and the robotic arm struck Williams in the head, killing instantly.

William's family later filed a ten million dollar lawsuit, charging negligence.
A safety issue considered was that there was no audible warning on the robot to alert workers when the robot was in operation.

It took a Wayne County Circuit Court jury less than three hours to return a verdict in favor of the family, awarding them the amount they sought.

Answer: forced off a 100 foot cliff into a quarry by a flock of 60 hungry sheep

Betty Stobbs died when while on her ATV quad power bike, she was forced off a cliff, falling 100 feet, by a flock of hungry sheep. Stobbs survived the fall, but was killed when her 300 pound bike fell on her.

Stobbs, 67, was in the process of feeding her flock of 60 sheep. She rode to the location with a bale of hay on the back of her quad bike. As she stopped near the edge of the cliff next to a quarry, the sheep, seeing her and their lunch, charged her, forcing her off the cliff into the quarry.

The incident was witnessed by two of her neighbors, Eric Dent and Alan Renfro, who watched in horror, but were both too far away to assist Stobbs. Dent, who was closest to the incident, witness the occurrence from the window of his home, approximately 250 yards away.

Betty Stobbs, a farmer's wife, was merely in the process of performing a daily chore, one she had done numerous times before in her field in Stanhope, County Durham.

The incident involving the death of Betty Stobbs was well documented in the local meadia, which earned "honorable mention" and "runner-up" status on the "1999 Darwin Award" list.