- A woman on a flight from Scandinavia to the United States
had to be pried free by a rescue team after a high-pressure vacuum flush
sealed her to the toilet seat of a Boeing 767.
-
- At least that was the story in mid January, when it was
featured in dozens of newspapers, Web sites, and TV reports. According
to Reuters, the unnamed woman had filed a complaint with Scandinavian Airlines
System.
-
- "She could not get up by herself and had to sit
on the toilet until the flight had landed so that ground technicians could
help her get loose," an airline spokeswoman said. "She was stuck
there for quite a long time."
-
- Only days later, the story turned out to be untrue. The
airline claimed it mixed up a fictional exercise from staff training with
the real thing. No woman ever filed such a complaint.
-
- But the "Sky Toilet" story won't die that easily.
It's likely to live on as an urban legend that will haunt gullible air
travelers for years to come - just like the tale of the tourist who was
drugged by organ thieves and woke up with both kidneys missing. Great story.
Never happened.
-
- But many urban legends are true - or at least "based
on a true story," as they say in Hollywood. Here's a bone chilling
story that's undeniably true: On the day that American Airlines Flight
587 crashed in New York, both of New Jersey's winning Pick 3 lottery combinations
included the numbers 5, 8, and 7. The morning drawing was 5-7-8. The later
drawing was 5-8-7.
-
- "Urban legends are not the same thing as fictional
tales," says Barbara Mikkelson of Agoura Hills, Calif., who runs www.snopes.com,
one of the leading Web site that investigates urban legends.
-
- "A story becomes a legend when it is circulated
widely and regarded as the truth. Whether they actually occurred or not
is irrelevent."
-
- Some classic legends are completely false (The brassiere
was invented by Otto Titzlinger). Others have a basis in fact (Coca-Cola
once contained cocaine).
-
- And the stories change with the time. Snapple was once
said to be owned by the KKK, now it is rumored to be run by Osama bin Laden.
-
- "When you look into legends, you see that they tell
us a lot about our fears and obsessions" said Mikkelson. "That's
why they make for good storytelling."
-
- With the help of Snopes.com's terrific database of some
1,500 urban legends, here are some strange but true tales. You may have
heard variations that have fictional embellishments. At least this much
is for real:
-
- True Urban Legends
-
- The Leaping Lawyer - A lawyer
demonstrating the safety of windows in a Toronto skyscraper deliberately
crashed through a pane of glass and plunged to his death. Garry Hoy, 38,
fell from the 24th floor of the Toronto Dominion Bank Tower in 1993 as
horrified witnesses watched.
-
- The Accidental Video Porn Star
- In 1986, the sheriff of Council Grove, Kansas, (population 2,300) accidentally
returned an erotic video of him and his wife having sex to his local rental
store. Soon, everyone in town seemed to have a copy.
-
- Cadaver Kin - In 1982, A
student at the University of Alabama School of Medicine recognized one
of the nine cadavers taken to her class for dissection. It was her great
aunt, who had at one time discussed the merits of donating one's body to
medical science.
-
- The Flying Lawn Chair - In
1982, Larry Walters of Los Angeles soared thousands of feet in the air
on a lawn chair tethered to 45 weather balloons. He got so high, he disrupted
air traffic and was eventually fined $4,000 by the Federal Aviation Administration.
The 33-year-old Vietnam Veteran purchased the chair from Sears, hoping
to fly it 300 miles from his home to the Mojave Desert.
-
- Pool Pervert - In 1994, a
33-year-old Floridian man got his penis trapped in the suction hole of
a public swimming pool while apparently seeking sexual pleasure. Paramedics
shut off the pool's pump, but the man's penis had become extremely swollen.
They struggled for more than 40 minutes to pry him loose. After lubricating
the suction fitting, the man was taken to Lakeland Regional Medical Center.
-
- What a Dord! - For five years,
Webster's New International Dictionary mistakenly included an entry for
"dord," a nonexistent word. In the mid 1930s, Dord could be found
on page 771, nestled between Dorcopsis (a type of small kangaroo) and dor
(golden in color), It was defined as "density."
-
- Funhouse Funeral - A prop
corpse hanging in a Long Beach, Calif., funhouse turned out to be the real
remains of an outlaw. In 1976, scenes for the hit TV show The Six Million
Dollar Man were being shot at the Nu-Pike Amusement Park. When a production
worker moved the fun house "hanging man," the prop's arm came
off. Inside was human bone - the remains of train robber Elmer McCurdy.
-
- Pure As Ivory - Early in
her career, porn queen Marilyn Chambers appeared on Ivory Snow boxes, holding
a baby. As her screen legend grew, Ivory sought out a cover girl that better
reflected its image of 99 44/100% purity.
-
- You might not believe everything on Mikkelson's site.
It's always best to get your information straight from the horse's mouth,
unless, of course, if that horse is the famous Mr. Ed. - who has been rumored
to be a zebra.
-
- <mailto:wolfb@abcnews.com>Buck Wolf is entertainment
producer at ABCNEWS.com. The Wolf Files is published Tuesdays. If you want
to receive weekly notice when a new column is published, join the e-mail
list.
-
- http://startribune.com/stories/535/3560407.html
|
