THE DARWIN AWARDS are given every 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. Here are some
current candidates:

5th Runner Up: A San Anselmo, California man died yesterday when he hit a
lift tower at the Mammoth Mountain ski area while riding down the slope on
a foam pad, authorities said. Matthew David Hubal, 22, was pronounced dead
at Centinela 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 the lift towers, said Lieutenant Mike Donnelly of the
Mammoth Lakes Police Department.  The pads are used to protect skiers who
might hit the towers. The group apparently used the pads to slide down the
ski slope and Hubal crashed into a tower. It has since been investigated
that the tower he hit was the one with its pad removed.

4th Runner Up: Robert Puelo, 32, was apparently being disorderly in a St.
Louis market. When the clerk threatened to call police, Puelo grabbed a
hot dog, shoved it in his mouth, and walked out without paying for it.
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: To poacher Marino Malerba of Spain, who shot a stag standing
above him on an overhanging rock-and was killed instantly when it fell
onhim.

2nd Runner Up: Man Loses Face at Party. A man at a West Virginia party
popped a blasting cap into his mouth and bit down, triggering an explosion
that blew off his lips, teeth and tongue, state police said
Wednesday. Jerry Stromyer, 24, of Kincaid, bit the blasting cap as a prank
during a 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,"
Payne said. "It wouldn't go off and this guy said, "I'll show you how to
set it off." "He put it in his mouth and bit down. It blew all his teeth
off, his tongue and his lips," Payne said. Stromyer was listed in guarded
condition Wednesday with extensive facial injuries, according to a
spokesman at Charleston Area Medical Division. "I just can't imagine anyone
doing something like that," Payne said.

1st Runner Up: Doctors at Portland's University Hospital said an Oregon man
shot through the skull by a hunting arrow is lucky to be alive, and will be
released soon from the hospital. Tony Roberts, 25,  lost his
right eye last weekend during an initiation into a men's rafting club,
Mountain Men Anonymous, in Grants Pass, Ore. A friend tried to shoot a beer
can off His head, but the arrow entered Roberts' right eye. Doctors said
had the arrow gone 1 millimeter to the left, a major blood vessel would
have been cut and Roberts would have died instantly. Neurosurgeon Dr.
Johnny Delashaw at the University Hospital in Portland said the arrow went
through 8 to 10 inches of brain, with the tip protruding at the rear of his
skill, yet somehow managed to miss all major blood vessels. Delashaw also
said had Robert tried to pull the arrow out on his own he surely would have
killed himself. Roberts admitted afterwards he and his friends had been
drinking that afternoon. Said Roberts, "I feel so dumb about this." No
charges have been filed but the Josephine County district attorney's office
said the initiation stunt is under investigation.

THE WINNERS: (The late) John Pernicky and his friend, (the late) Sal
Hawkins, of the great state of Washington, who decided to attend a local
Metallica concert at the Amphitheater at Gorge, Washington.
Having no tickets (but 18 beers among them) they thought it would be easy
enough to hop over the nine-foot high fence and sneak into the show. The
two friends pulled their pickup truck over to the fence and the plan was
for John, 100 pounds heavier than Sal - to hop over, and then assist his
friend over the fence. Unfortunately for John, there was a 30 foot drop on
the other side of the fence. Having heaved himself  over, he found himself
crashing through a tree. His fall was abruptly halted by a large branch
which
Snagged him by his shorts. Dangling from the tree, with one arm broken,
John looked down and saw a group of bushes below him. Possibly figuring the
bushes would break his fall, John removed his pocket knife and proceeded to
cut away his shorts to free himself from the tree. Finally free, John
crashed below
into Holly bushes. The sharp leaves scratched his entire body and now being
without his shorts, he was the unwilling victim of a holly branch
penetrating his rectal cavity. To make matters worse, his pocket knife
proceeded to fall with him and landed three inches into his left thigh.
Seeing his friend in considerable pain and agony, Sal decided to throw him
a rope and pull him to safety by tying the rope to the pickup truck and
slowly driving away. However, in his drunken state, Sal put the truck into
reverse rather than first, and crashed through the fence, landing on and
killing his friend. Sal was thrown from the truck, suffered massive
internal injuries and died at the scene. Police arrived to find a pickup
truck with its driver thrown 100 feet from the truck. Upon moving the
truck, they found John under it, half naked, with scratches, a holly stick
up his rectum, a knife in his thigh, and his shorts dangling from the tree
branches 25 feet in the air. Congratulations, gentlemen