Poor Man's Nigger Launcher
Byker
cannonball act, only since we wouldn't be dealing with humans, there'd be no
need for a net......
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In rural Carbon County, PA, a group of men were drinking beer and
discharging firearms from the rear deck of a home owned by Irving Michaels,
age 27.
The men were firing at a raccoon that was wandering by, but the beer
apparently impaired their aim and, despite of the estimated 35 shots the
group fired, the animal escaped into a 3-foot diameter drainage pipe some
100 feet away from Mr. Michaels' deck.
Determined to terminate the animal, Mr. Michaels retrieved a can of gasoline
and poured some down the pipe, intending to smoke the animal out. After
several unsuccessful attempts to ignite the fuel, Michaels emptied the
entire 5 gallon fuel can down the pipe and tried to ignite it again, to no
avail. Not one to admit defeat by wildlife, the determined Mr.Michaels
proceeded to slide feet-first approximately 15 feet down the sloping pipe to
toss the match.
The subsequent rapidly expanding fireball propelled Mr. Michaels back the
way he had come, though at a much higher rate of speed. He exited the angled
pipe "like a Polaris missile leaves a submarine," according to witness
Joseph McFadden, 31. Mr. Michaels was launched directly over his own home,
right over the heads of his astonished friends, onto his front lawn. In all,
he traveled over 200 feet through the air. "There was a Doppler Effect to
his scream as he flew over us," McFadden reported, "Followed by a loud
thud."
Amazingly, he suffered only minor injuries. "It was actually pretty
cool,"Michaels said, "Like when they shoot someone out of a cannon at the
circus. I'd do it again if I was sure I wouldn't get hurt."
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