Worst Way to Die . . . Ever? Nomination for the next Darwin Awards: Edward Archbold

Each year, I must admit, I await the announcement of the Darwin Awards with more than a little anticipation. It is in terrible taste to laugh at the fatal misfortunes of others, and I like to think of myself as a kind soul. But, when human beings work this hard and this well to undermine themselves, I just can’t look away. Next year, when the Darwins are announced, I will be shocked, no appalled, if I don’t see Edward Archbold’s name at the top of the list.

According to its website, “the Darwin Awards honor those who make the world a safer place for all by not reproducing.”

My first introduction to the Darwin Awards was the story of “Lawn Chair Larry” Walters, one of the few contenders of the Darwin Awards actually to have survived. (No, it doesn’t make sense, I admit, but there it is.) Larry’s ambition was to float around in a lounge chair equipped with helium balloons. Who hasn’t wanted to do that, right? But, Larry was ambitious. Red and Blue party balloons just wouldn’t do. He went after weather balloons. A bunch of them. Then, things took a turn for the Darwin. According to the Darwin Awards site:

When his friends cut the cord anchoring the lawnchair to his Jeep, he did not float lazily up to 30 feet. Instead he streaked into the LA sky as if shot from a cannon, pulled by the lift of 45 helium balloons, holding 33 cubic feet of helium each.

He didn’t level off at 100 feet, nor did he level off at 1000 feet. After climbing and climbing, he leveled off at 16,000 feet.

At that height he felt he couldn’t risk shooting any of the balloons, lest he unbalance the load and really find himself in trouble. So he stayed there, drifting cold and frightened with his beer and sandwiches, for more than 14 hours. He crossed the primary approach corridor of LAX, where startled Trans World Airlines and Delta Airlines pilots radioed in reports of the strange sight.

Eventually he gathered the nerve to shoot a few balloons, and slowly descended. The hanging tethers tangled and caught in a power line, blacking out a Long Beach neighborhood for 20 minutes. Larry climbed to safety, where he was arrested by waiting members of the LAPD. As he was led away in handcuffs, a reporter dispatched to cover the daring rescue asked him why he had done it. Larry replied nonchalantly, “A man can’t just sit around.

“A man can’t just sit around.” Indeed.

Floridian Edward Archbold (pictured in an undated mug shot above) wasn’t one just to sit around, either. Apparently, when he heard that Ben Siegel Reptile Store was giving away a python to the man who could eat the most cockroaches, Mr. Archbold saw the path laid out clearly in front of him. He went to the store, stood shoulder to shoulder with 30 other contestants (30!!), and consumed dozens of live cockroaches and worms.

Then, after winning the cockroach eating contest and winning an $850 pythoon, Mr. Archbold walked out of the store victoriously and almost immediately dropped dead. Here’s some video of Mr. Archbold’s prize winning and fatal performance.

His cause of death is unknown right now, and experts interviewed about what happened to Mr. Archbold say that eating cockroaches is not fatal. In fact, it shouldn’t even cause illness. Apparently, these contests go on all the time, and no one has ever died. The owners of the store are shocked, and feel awful. Ben Seigel told their local news station WPLG:

“[I am] very saddened by this. I mean, it was a shock. Eddie was a very nice guy. We just met him that night, but everybody that works here was very fond of him.”

He also said that the insects used in the contest were “safely and domestically raised in a controlled environment as food for reptiles.”

If you’re on a roll, now, and think you can stand a little more Darwin Award action, check out this 2011 Darwin Award winning video of a man in an electric wheelchair too impatient to wait for an elevator. It turns out that if you bust the door down before the elevator arrives, things are not likely to go well for you.

I think my takeaway from all this, though, is to stay away from ingesting live insects (and balloon chairs and elevator shafts), at least until we know what happened here. Seems prudent. I can’t just sit around, though. What’s a girl to do?