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===The exploding whale=== | ===The exploding whale=== | ||
Or, for a more distant example, the celebrated — [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6CLumsir34 check it out for yourself] | Or, for a more distant example, the celebrated exploding whale of Lane County, Oregon, from 1970 — [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6CLumsir34 check it out for yourself] . | ||
What is most amazing here is not that onlookers, held behind barriers a quarter of a mile away, had to run for their lives while brick-sized lumps of stinking, fetid, whale flesh rained down on them from from the sky, but that no-one — not the highways authority, not the project manager, not the forklift driver, not the reporter, not the film crew, not the gelignite vendor, not the hundreds and hundreds of spectators — not a single one of them asked that most basic of questions: “you are proposing to detonate a rotting whale with half a ton of dynamite. Have you completely lost your mind?” | |||
What is most amazing here is not that onlookers, held behind barriers a quarter of a mile away, had to run for their lives while brick-sized lumps of stinking, fetid, whale flesh rained down on them from from the sky, but that no-one — not the highways authority, not the project manager, not the forklift driver, not the reporter, not the film crew, not the gelignite vendor, not the hundreds and hundreds of spectators — not a single one of them asked that most basic of questions: “you are proposing to detonate a rotting sperm whale with half a ton of dynamite. Have you completely lost your mind?” | |||
Actually, one had, and this is where the irony gets positively Homeric. A certain Walter Umenhofer, a military veteran with explosives training who happened to be in the area to take advantage of a “Get a Whale of a Deal” promotion in a nearby car dealership, warned the crew that half a ton of dynamite was far too much. Umenhofer suggested 4 kg would be enough. His advice went unheeded. | Actually, one had, and this is where the irony gets positively Homeric. A certain Walter Umenhofer, a military veteran with explosives training who happened to be in the area to take advantage of a “Get a Whale of a Deal” promotion in a nearby car dealership, warned the crew that half a ton of dynamite was far too much. Umenhofer suggested 4 kg would be enough. His advice went unheeded. | ||
Miraculously no-one was hurt during the blast. There was just one casualty: a brand new Oldsmobile Regency 98 was flattened by a hunk of blubber the size of a truck tyre. It was Umenhofer’s new car. A whale of a deal, indeed. | Miraculously no-one was hurt during the blast. There was just one casualty: a brand new Oldsmobile Regency 98 was flattened by a hunk of blubber the size of a truck tyre. It was Umenhofer’s new car. A whale of a deal, indeed. | ||
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