Storm suck / McDonald's "Old-School" Cheeseburger

Today's Sucky Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

A Chinese paraglider may have suffocated or frozen to death after being sucked upwards into a storm cell at a rate up to 20 metres per second. The body of Beijing man He Zhongpin, 42, was found by the Westpac Rescue helicopter 25 kilometres south-east of Bingara in northern NSW about 2 PM on February 15, 2007. Mr. He, a member of the Chinese national paragliding team, was in training for the Paragliding World Championships, which start next week in nearby Manila. The paraglider, who had 10 years' experience in the sport, was last seen about 3 PM on Wednesday as thunderstorms were moving into the area.

Hang Gliding Federation of Australia general manager Chris Fogg said Mr. He was probably sucked into the cumulonimbus storm system and propelled to high altitude. "We assume he was taken to an altitude where he may have suffocated and may have become radically chilled," he said. "At the top of thunderstorms is typically where hail forms, and there's lots of agitation and turbulence. I understand he was above 9000 metres, so that's below zero [degrees]. This system 1 sounds as if it was pretty strong - he could have been taken up at 1200 feet a minute and beyond. "Most pilots will try to get down to the ground before they get close to something like that."

Culled from: Sydney Morning Herald

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Even more amazingly - a German woman was sucked up into the same storm system and SURVIVED!!! Now that's Girl Power!

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Follow-Up Du Jour!

A couple of days ago, I featured Costco coffins as a morbid trinket. Teena writes with a warning about their poor quality:

"The Costco caskets are awful. They look extremely cheap and are often delivered dented / scratched. We have had a couple bought by people and brought to our funeral home, and they end up looking absolutely horrible (and not in a nice creepy way)."

So, morbid buyer beware!

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Wretched Recommendations!

Guy has a film recommendation:

Threads (1984)

"I'd like to comment on the recommendation of The Day After. It is a fairly good morbid movie, lacking in some areas but generally good in a mid-eighties, made for TV movie sort of way. A better film from that time though is Threads. It's set in the English midlands and follows a group of people through a nuclear war. The special effects aren't as good as The Day After, but the story's more compelling and grim. Some characters (like the protagonist's husband) disappear never to be seen again, as would happen in a real blast. Some perish immediately afterward, and some suffer slow deaths. The ending is a real downer, but I shan't say anything to spoil it.

"In The Day After, there always seems to be an underlying taint of American optimism despite the grimness of the story and despite the sad ending. There's none of that in Threads. All hope eventually dies. I'd recommend that one instead."

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Morbid Link Du Jour!

Jacob Weisberg of Slate wrote a very entertaining article on the Deathstyles of the Rich and Famous. It's a great read!

Thanks to nightwisp for the link.


McDonald's "Old-School" Cheeseburger

Cook the burgers using the regular hamburger recipe and place one THIN slice of American cheese on the crown side before adding meat patty. Don't use Kraft singles or Velveeta. (or anything termed as "American processed cheese FOOD") Use only real American cheese. That is KEY! Please Note: Most slices of American cheese are too big for McDonald's cheeseburgers. So take about 1/4" off two edges to make a smaller square.