Karl's Weird News

Machu Picchu tourists ‘stuck without food’:

Travellers trapped at Machu Picchu complained of a lack of food and shelter today as they spent a fourth day stranded at the site in Peru.

About 1,600 are in villages near the Inca citadel, with more arriving, after mudslides cut off the railway.

Rain is hampering helicopter rescues and the railway could take three days to fix.

Officials had hoped to reopen the railway and rescue tourists by Tuesday, but now say they will need two or three more days.

Choppers have flown out more than 1,000 tourists over the last two days, but 250 more arrived yesterday and more were expected today.

Authorities closed the Inca trail, the track that finishes at Machu Picchu, on Tuesday after a mudslide killed two people, but many who started the four-day trek before that will arrive in the coming days.

“It’s worrisome. We didn’t think it would take this long,” said tourism minister Martin Perezy. “We can evacuate 120 tourists per hour, now the only thing we need is for the climate to help us out a little bit.”

Lightning kills 14 in a village in one month:

A BOLT of lightning hit three homesteads in a village in the Transkei and killed four people from one family, including two elderly women and two children, on Tuesday evening.

A third elderly woman from the same family miraculously escaped from a burning house, but sustained serious burn wounds in the process.

The incident, which happened at about 5pm, shocked the residents of Ndwana village in Ntabankulu. The deceased are Nomakethe Myolwa, 60, Maphembetshiya Nfeketho, 70, Ntuthuko Myolwa, 8, and her brother Athini Myolwa, 7.

The survivor, Madumeni Myolwa, 70, managed to crawl out of the burning house. She was admitted to hospital in Mount Ayliff to be treated for burn wounds.

According to OR Tambo District Municipality disaster management, Tuesday’s incident has brought the number of deaths caused by lightning to 14 in Ntabankulu since late October.

Rat poison soup kills cook and clientele

It is a mistake all of us have made in the kitchen at one time or another.

Flustered by the heat from the stove and frustrated by the pressure of conjuring up the perfect beans on toast, we have all added the wrong ingredient at some point.

However, few of us have reached for a packet of rat poison instead of the jar of mixed herbs.

A cook in China killed himself and five other people when he inadvertently spiced up a dish with the lethal ingredient.

U.S. regulators to probe credit rating agencies

Federal regulators said Friday they are reviewing the role credit-rating agencies played in the mortgage market debacle for borrowers with weak credit.

The Securities and Exchange Commission “has begun a review of credit rating agency policies and procedures,” SEC spokesman John Nester said Friday.

That review, he said, will include what ratings mean and whether conflicts of interest were created if rating agencies gave advice to issuers of mortgage debt and originators.

Wrecking Ball Runs Amok In Pa. Town

A wrecking ball wreaked havoc on a small college town in northwest Pennsylvania on Monday.

Wrecking Ball Goes Wild

The 1,500-pound, 3-foot-wide ball broke loose from a crane cable and rolled nearly a mile downhill.
Click here to find out more!

It smashed more than a dozen vehicles and injured three people as it bounced from curb to curb.

Naples’s trash is a challenge politicians are flunking

Business at Pizzeria Napoli Nord is down 70 percent, and no one has the slightest doubt why: The reasons include egg shells, fermenting teddy bears, garlic, hair that looks human, boxes for blood pressure medicine, scuzzy wine bottles – all in an unbroken heap, at places two meters high, stretching the length of a football field along the curb to the pizzeria’s door.

It smells bad.

“If you see all this trash, you don’t have much desire to eat,” said the pizzeria owner, Vittorio Silvestri, 59, who, like most people in and around Naples these days, is very angry at the city’s leaders.

For a dozen years, Naples and surrounding towns like this one have periodically choked on refuse, but the last two weeks have flared into real crisis, as much political as sanitary. The trash began piling high in the streets as places to dump the region’s refuse officially filled up. The last legal dump closed on Saturday.

Panama: Toothpaste killed 51 people last year

Health experts confirmed Tuesday that two brands of toothpaste pulled from shelves contain the same chemical that killed at least 51 people in the Central American country last year.

Authorities seized about 50 tubes of toothpaste labeled “Excel” and “Mr. Cool” from a Panama City store last week after a customer noticed their labels said they contained the chemical diethylene glycol. Experts at the University of Panama confirmed through tests that the toothpastes contained about a 2.5% level of the chemical.

Health Ministry General Secretary Francisco Sucre said that the levels, “as far we know, don’t cause damage,” but the ministry urged consumers not to use the products.

“This toxic substance should not be in the contents … of a dental product,” the ministry said in a statement. It noted the substance, which is apparently used as a substitute for a more expensive sweetener and thickener, “is prohibited for use in cosmetics, foods and pharmaceuticals.”

Man Dies in Parking Lot Dance Competition

A man died while trying to outdo a rival with an acrobatic move while “battle dancing,” police said. Robert Stitt, 48, and his rival were competing in a parking lot Monday night when he tried a forward flip and landed on his head. “It was just two guys dancing. Everybody was laughing,” Stitt’s friend John Boxley said.

The Boeing 737 stuck in city road:

Residents of the Indian city of Mumbai (Bombay) are wondering how long it will take to remove a disused Boeing 737 that has been abandoned in a busy road. The decommissioned aircraft was being driven through the city at the weekend when the driver got lost and then abandoned the plane.
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It appears that after taking a wrong turn, the driver found himself facing a flyover that was too low for him to take the plane under.

The driver has not been seen since and no-one is assuming responsibility for the 737.

Owner lay dead while pair toured her home

A Janesville real estate agent can’t believe she didn’t realize that a form on the bed at a house she showed Monday night was a woman who apparently had been dead for two weeks.

“I’ve smelled death. I know what death smells like,” she said. “I can’t believe my sinuses were that bad.”

Linda Chabucos-Galow, a realtor with Shorewest, was showing the east side house at 1160 N. Claremont Drive to Justin and Colleen McKeen.

Chabucos-Galow stood in the dining room while the couple walked through the house. She heard Colleen scream as the couple stood at the doorway of the front bedroom.

Trapeze Artist Dies During Performance Without Net in California

A circus trapeze artist working without a net fell 40 feet to his death during a performance, authorities said. Roberto Valenzuela, 35, of Brownsville, Texas, fell headfirst and died Monday night, said Sgt. Jacqueline Gonzalez of the Los Angeles County Police Department. He was performing with Circo Hermanos Vazquez (Vazquez Brothers Circus.) The troupe had traveled from Mexico for the show at the Whittier Narrows Recreation Area, Gonzalez said.

Molten steel shower kills 32 workers in China

At least 32 workers were killed and two injured Wednesday when they were engulfed by molten steel at a metal factory in northeast China, the government said.

The accident was triggered when a steel ladle, with a capacity of 30 tonnes of liquid steel, sheared off from the blast furnace, spilling molten metal onto the factory floor some three metres (three yards) below.

The molten steel then engulfed an adjacent room where all the victims were gathered for a routine shift change, the State Work Safety Administration said in a report.

Suds Fill Streets in Idaho, Alaska

City streets got an unscheduled cleaning as a sudsy citrus-scented foam erupted from manhole covers like geysers.

The bubbles spewed from a three-block stretch on the city’s east side Thursday after American Linen accidentally released detergent into the municipal sewer lines. The combination of gravity and churning water whipped the soap into a sudsy foam.

“We have never had a situation like this before,” said Vince Trimboli, the public works spokesman.

Jet’s flaming space junk scare

Pieces of space junk from a Russian satellite coming out of orbit narrowly missed hitting a jetliner over the Pacific Ocean overnight. The pilot of a Lan Chile Airbus A340, which was travelling between Santiago, Chile, and Auckland, New Zealand, notified air traffic controllers at Auckland Oceanic Centre after seeing flaming space junk hurtling across the sky just five nautical miles in front of and behind his plane about 10pm.

History 1980-2000 has disappeared into the ether. Sorry

We know what was written in the first telegram, sent by Samuel F. B. Morse in 1844: “What hath God wrought?” We know the words spoken by Alexander Graham Bell when he made the first telephone call in 1876, to his assistant, Thomas Watson: “Mr Watson — come here — I want to see you.” (The “polite telephone manner” had not yet been invented.) But we have absolutely no idea what was said in the first e-mail, just 35 years ago.

Woman Impaled in Face With Pipe, Survives

A pipe kicked up by another car broke through a driver’s windshield and pierced the woman’s face and neck, officials said. Brenda Shaw, 36, was impaled Monday after the car in front of her on Interstate 15 ran over the pipe. It was several feet long and 1 1/2 to 2 inches in diameter, officials said. It may have fallen off a construction truck, said Utah Highway Patrol Trooper Preston Raban.

Bugatti Veyron in world’s most expensive crash

An as yet unnamed driver crashed a rented Bugatti Veyron on Sunday in what is being described as “the world’s costliest road accident”.

 The £830,000 supercar, which Times columnist Jeremy Clarkson memorably described last year as being “as fast as a Hawker Hurricane” was travelling in the wet at speeds in the region of 100mph along a 40mph stretch of the B375 near Chertsey, Surrey when the driver lost control and collided with a Vauxhall Astra before ploughing into a 3ft bank.

The passenger of the Vauxhall was a pregnant woman who has since been released from hospital after tests.

‘Jackass’ copycat lands in hospital

Attempts to duplicate a movie stunt landed one man in the hospital with burned genitals and another facing criminal charges. The men were trying to do a stunt from one of the “Jackass” movies, in which a character lights his genitals on fire. Jared W. Anderson, 20, suffered serious burns to his hands and genitals, according to the criminal complaint. Randell D. Peterson, 43, who sprayed lighter fluid on Anderson and lit him on fire, was charged with felony battery and first-degree reckless endangerment Tuesday in Eau Claire County Court.

Rats stalk UN corridors of power

The United Nations headquarters in New York is infested with rats, mice, worms and even salt-water eels, according to staff members.

The crumbling 40-acre complex on Manhattan’s East River, built in the 1950s, is due to undergo a $1 billion five-year refurbishment starting next year – a renovation, it seems, that cannot come soon enough. Staff have complained to Aramark, which provides food to the thousands of delegates and assistants who work there, that some lunches served in the canteen have been nibbled by rodents.

Body parts delivered to Michigan home

A Michigan couple expecting a delivery of furniture parts say they were surprised to receive human body parts instead. The two packages from China — which included a liver and part of a head — were mistakenly dropped off at the couple’s home this week. They say a DHL express driver thought the bubble-wrapped items were pieces for a table.

Girl’s Five Weeks of Hiccups Suddenly Stop

After trying countless remedies and attracting national media attention, Jennifer Mee said her hiccups suddenly stopped around 5 p.m. Wednesday. No one is certain why. “Right now, my nose is burning and my throat hurts,” she told the St. Petersburg Times, but she said she felt a lot better than she has in weeks.

Italian granny finds grenade in groceries

A 74-year-old Italian grandmother who bought a sack of potatoes at her local market found a live grenade among the spuds. “I found a bomb in the potatoes,” Olga Mauriello said. “I went to the market to buy some potatoes, and that’s where the bomb was. But this bomb was covered in dirt, and I put it in water and got all dirt off. And then I realized, ‘It’s a bomb!’”

11 Dead, Over 100 Hurt at Kite Flying Festival in Pakistan

At least 11 people died and more than 100 people were injured at an annual spring festival in eastern Pakistan celebrated with the flying of thousands of colorful kites, officials said Monday.

The deaths and injuries were caused by stray bullets, sharpened kite-strings, electrocution and people falling off rooftops on Sunday at the conclusion of the two-day Basant festival, said Ruqia Bano, spokeswoman for the emergency services in the city of Lahore.

Man Returns Home, Trips on Corpse

A Haight-Ashbury man returning home from an extended vacation tripped and fell on a corpse in his bedroom after finding his apartment had been ransacked, police said.

Authorities have not released the name of the resident or the victim, identified only as a white male, but are treating the death as suspicious, said Sgt. Neville Gittens.

The resident had just come back from a two-week visit in Humboldt County when he made the grisly discovery Monday, Gittens said.

70-Year-Old Man Found Dead in Front of TV a Year Later

Vincenzo ‘Vinnie’ Ricardo was the proverbial tree that fell in the forest: No one knew.

From what police in Hampton Bays, N.Y., can determine, the 70-year-old was sitting alone watching TV in his two-story home when he died.

That was more than a year ago, and when workers were summoned to his house last week after a report that freezing temperatures had caused the home’s pipes to burst, they found Ricardo’s mummified body still sitting on the couch, the TV still on.

Dog’s Ear Severed, Glued On By Groomer, Owner Says

Anni Sheriffius said she was trying to wash off what she thought was dirt on her dog Jasmine’s ear when the ear fell off.

Sheriffius rushed her dog to the veterinarian to learn that the dog’s ear had been cut off by a dog groomer and super-glued back on.

“And I saw the ear float away, and it freaked me out,” Sheriffius said.

SUV Plows Into Theater As Moviegoers Watch “Dreamgirls”

Some moviegoers in Torrington, Connecticut got to see some real-life action unfold as they were watching the movie “Dreamgirls” on Monday night.

During the 7:00pm showing at the six-theater multiplex, a white sport utility vehicle smashed through a wall of the theater while the audience was watching the movie.

Candy Had Finger Surprise Inside

A man in Germany was put off his Italian chocolate treat when he noticed that a bump in the bar was not a nut but part of a human finger. “He found a fingertip, complete with fingernail, right in the middle of the bar,” said a police spokesman in the town of Mainz, close to Frankfurt.

Truck Spills 165,000 Eggs on Va. Highway

Drivers on their way to breakfast in northern Virginia on Saturday found it all over the road after nearly 165,000 eggs spilled out of an overturned tractor-trailer on the Capital Beltway. “It looked like a large omelet,” said Michael Karbonski, of the Virginia Department of Transportation.

Man shot while snorkeling in Ore. river

William Roderick, 60, of Reedsport, has been charged with assault, being a felon in possession of a firearm, and possession of methamphetamine and marijuana. He was being held in the county jail.

Roderick told deputies he thought Cheesman was a nutria swimming in the Smith River near Reedsport, about 90 miles southwest of Eugene, and shot him with a .22-caliber rifle, police said.

Truck Spills 40 Tons of Cow Intestines:

About 40 tons of cow intestines and bones spilled onto a major highway after a truck driver became distracted by his digital music player and his semitrailer tipped over, officials said.

Raw Sewage Hell For Residents

FURIOUS residents in a Gwent town say they are having to cope with raw sewage running past their front doors. And one of those involved, Pontypool pensioner, Raymond Morgan, said he is concerned about health risks to himself and his wife Emily.

Aliens ask wrong people in van about work

Federal agents taking a break from an unrelated assignment yesterday arrested 24 illegal aliens at a Fells Point 7-Eleven after the men attempted to solicit “underground” employment from the agents.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were stopped in the convenience store parking lot when the group of Hispanic men approached the agents’ unmarked vehicles, ICE spokesman Marc Raimondi said.

Shot boar turns out to be woman

Hunter Jens Gruber, 26, was in a hide in the Zwentendorf forest in Lower Austria when he thought he heard ‘distinctive boar sounds’ and saw something ’snuffling along the ground in the distance’. After taking his shot he burst through the bushes to discover forester Brigitte Zoch, 49.