The Mammoth Book of Weird News (Mammoth Books)

by Geoff Tibballs

  VISITING LEADER GREETS PM’S CHAUFFEUR BY MISTAKE

  Arriving at London’s Heathrow Airport in the early 1970s for a state visit, Yugoslav leader Marshal Tito walked straight past British Prime Minister Edward Heath, who had his arm outstretched in welcome, and shook hands instead with Heath’s baffled chauffeur.

  SHORT PEOPLE ORDERED TO STAND BEHIND SARKOZY

  Twenty short people were brought in by bus to stand behind French President Nicolas Sarkozy while he delivered a televised speech from a Normandy auto technology plant. The workers – all under Sarkozy’s height of 5 foot 5 inch – were chosen specially in order to make the diminutive President look taller. Sarkozy, who is extremely sensitive about his height, did not want a repeat of a previous incident when he was caught standing on a footstool while delivering a speech alongside Gordon Brown and Barack Obama.

  INQUIRY LAUNCHED INTO COUNCILLOR WHO MADE SHEEP NOISE

  An English council was left feeling decidedly sheepish in 2006 after spending $15,000 on an investigation to discover the identity of the councillor who “baaed” like a sheep at a planning meeting. Havering Council in Essex took 12 months to compile a 300-page report into the bizarre incident, which occurred during an application to build a mobile home on a farm where rare sheep are bred. When a male councillor impersonated a sheep, another councillor was so outraged that he filed an official complaint which in turn led to the inquiry. But by the time the report appeared, the chief suspect was no longer a councillor and therefore could not be punished.

  PRESIDENT’S MEN ROBBED WHILE TAKING A SWIM

  When President Clinton decided to go for a swim at Daytona Beach, Florida, in 1996, the three Secret Service agents who were assigned to protect him had no choice but to follow him into the sea. The agents returned to shore to find that their Secret Service badges, wallets, credit cards, hotel room keys, jewellery and clothes had all been stolen.

  MAYOR FINES MEN WHO HAVE FUN ON A THURSDAY

  Javier Checa, mayor of the Spanish town of Torredonjimeno (population 14,000), declared Thursdays to be “ladies’ night” in 2003 and vowed that he would fine any man found out and about on the town’s streets. In a measure designed to encourage men to stay at home one night a week and do the chores, all males discovered in a bar on a Thursday evening were liable to a $5 fine. Unsurprisingly the men of Torredonjimeno were less than ecstatic about the proposal.

  GOVERNMENT MINISTER IS SCULPTED IN DUNG

  In a conservation protest a New Zealand artist sculpted the head of the country’s environment minister out of cow dung. Sam Mahon created the dung likeness of government minister Nick Smith because he was upset about plans to dam a river on the South Island. Mahon put his sculpture up for sale on the Internet but said that if he couldn’t sell it, he would simply regrind it and spread it on the garden.

  BIRTHDAY PARTY FOR POTHOLE

  Residents in Bromsgrove, Worcestershire, threw a birthday party in 2001 for a 30-yard long pothole after the council left it unrepaired for a year.

  CANDIDATE ROBBED AFTER PRAISING LOW CRIME RATE

  During a 1998 TV appearance, congressional candidate Hale McGee maintained that his Ontario, California, district did not have a crime problem. Shortly after leaving the studio, McGee and his campaign manager were robbed at gunpoint when they stopped at a gas station.

  MAYOR CALLS FOR “UGLY” WOMEN TO POPULATE TOWN

  The mayor of an Australian town where men outnumber women five to one has urged the country’s “ugly ducklings” to move there in order to improve the ratio and find lasting happiness. John Molony, Mayor of Mount Isa, Queensland, said the mining town – population 21,421 in 2006 – was in desperate need of young women, even ugly ones. “We should find out where there are beauty-disadvantaged women and ask them to proceed to Mount Isa,” he said, adding: “Quite often you will see walking down the street a lass who is not so attractive with a wide smile on her face. Whether it is the recollection of something previous or anticipation for the next evening, there is a degree of happiness. Beauty is only skin deep. Isn’t there a fairy tale about an ugly duckling that evolves into a beautiful swan? So a move to Mount Isa is perhaps an opportunity for some lonely women.”

  CHANCELLOR PRAISES OUTPUT OF CLOSED FACTORIES

  Addressing an audience in Consett, County Durham, in 1995, former Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer Ken Clarke said: “At Consett, you have got one of the best steelworks in Europe. It doesn’t employ as many people as it used to because it is so modern.” The steelworks had closed in 1980. He went on: “Consett is also one of the major centres for disposable baby nappies.” That factory had closed in 1991.

  CIVIC PRIDE TAKES A BLOW

  When a fierce storm hit Alma, Arkansas, in May 2008, residents rushed to take refuge in the prestigious new community shelter which the town had just built. However as the winds howled, the 20 people who showed up had to take their chances and sprawl on the ground because the shelter was locked and the deputy who had the key was busy on a call.

  CAR PARK SPLIT BY COUNCIL WRANGLE

  Motorists using a town centre car park in Wales were faced with the prospect of having to pay at one end but not the other because two separate councils each owned half. Powys County Council wanted to charge for its half of the car park but Llanfyllin Town Council planned to keep its side free. “I’ve never come across anything more ludicrous in my whole life,” said Peter Lewis, a member of both the town and county council. “It will be massively confusing. Will they paint a big red line down the middle of the car park?”

  MAYOR BURSTS INTO SONG TO BOOST CITY’S FINANCES

  In a bid to ease the economic crisis gripping the Ukrainian city of Kiev in 2009, its mayor, Leonid Chernovetskiy, released an album of himself singing “heartbreaking 1980s love songs”. Promising that all profits from sales of the album would go into the city’s coffers, the mayor boasted: “I sing very well. I don’t think anyone sings as well as me apart from, maybe, God.” Not everyone was convinced. One elderly woman he serenaded on the street outside city hall fainted after he launched into a Ukrainian love song called “My Lovely”.

  COUNCIL SCHEME FAILS TO SCARE OFF SEAGULLS

  A local council plan to scare off seagulls from the North Yorkshire seaside village of Staithes in 1995 backfired spectacularly. The council hoped that by playing a high-pitched recording of a bird in distress, other seagulls would take flight but instead the wailing sound attracted hundreds of gulls who swooped in to see what was wrong. As the screeching black cloud descended on Staithes, tourists dived for cover and residents prepared for a major clean-up.

  SWAZILAND SPEAKER RESIGNS OVER THEFT OF KING’S DUNG

  Mgabhi Dlamini, speaker of Swaziland’s House of Assembly, was forced to step down in 2000 for taking cow dung from the yard of King Mswathi III. After a man was spotted gathering dung from the royal cattle enclosure, he led soldiers to a car containing the parliamentary speaker. It was claimed that the dung, possibly imbued with special powers because it came from the king’s property, was taken for use in witchcraft and that Dlamini had somehow hoped it would enhance his political standing. Instead it landed him in a heap of trouble.

  POLITICAL SPEECH INTERRUPTED BY FLYING PENIS

  When arch Kremlin critic Garry Kasparov delivered an address at a 2008 Moscow rally designed to unite opposition political forces, his speech was interrupted by a helicopter rotor-assisted flying penis. The radio-controlled chopper buzzed around for about 20 seconds before one of the former chess champion’s minders battered it to the floor. The prank was said to have been staged by a group of pro-Kremlin Young Russia activists.

  STUDENT BUSTED FOR TRYING TO SELL VOTE ONLINE

  A University of Minnesota student tried to sell his vote for the 2008 US Presidential election on eBay. Max P. Sanders, who asked for a minimum of $10, claimed it was a joke but was nevertheless prosecuted under an 1893 law banning the sale of votes.

  NO NEWTS IS BAD NEWS FOR UK COUNCIL

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p; Leicestershire County Council spent $2 million protecting a colony of rare newts on a road construction site, only to discover that none actually lived there. Acting on a report from environmental experts which said that great crested newts – a protected species – inhabited the area, the council delayed the building of the Earl Shilton bypass for three months and spent hundreds of thousands of pounds on special newt-fencing and traps so that the rare amphibians could be moved when hibernation ended in spring. Workers were even required to inspect the traps twice a day once temperatures rose above 41 degrees Fahrenheit. However although the traps caught a number of ordinary newts, the great crested was conspicuous only by its absence. Council leader David Parsons said: “I’m not happy that we have gone a million pounds over on the bypass and then found no great crested newts. It is an awful lot of money.”

  POLITICIAN LOSES WATCH WHILE SHAKING HANDS

  Running for vice-president of the Philippines in 1998, Senator Edgardo Angara was out shaking hands with voters in the build-up to the elections. However when he thrust his arms into the throng, one of the crowd swiftly removed the senator’s watch from his wrist and fled.

  WIDOW TAKES PARTNER’S ASHES TO COURT TO PROVE HE IS DEAD

  A woman took her dead partner’s ashes to court in 2006 after bureaucrats refused to accept that he was dead and summonsed him for non-payment of $1,200 council tax. Denise Moon told Stockton Borough Council that her partner Stuart McMillan had died the previous year, even sending his death certificate, but the council continued to demand money from him. The issue of the summons proved the last straw, so in order to convince the council that he really was dead, she went to Teesside Magistrates’ Court with an urn containing his ashes. When asked by a court usher where Mr McMillan was, she nodded at the urn. The council apologized and said it was reviewing its procedures.

  MONKEY URINATES ON ZAMBIAN PRESIDENT

  A monkey urinated on Zambian President Rupiah Banda during a 2009 press conference outside his office. Looking up at a tree where the colony of monkeys had set up home, a startled Mr Banda told the culprit: “You have urinated on my jacket.”

  POLITICIAN WROTE NEWSPAPER LETTERS PRAISING HIMSELF

  Paul Reitsma, a Liberal Party member of the British Columbia Legislative Assembly, was uncovered in 1998 as the author of at least ten letters written under bogus names to a Parksville newspaper, the contents of which extolled his virtues as a politician and slammed his rivals. The letter-writer’s true identity was revealed after the suspicious newspaper hired a Royal Canadian Mounted Police handwriting expert to compare a sample of Reitsma’s handwriting to that of letters submitted to the editor by a “Warren Betanko”. In one letter Reitsma managed to misspell his own name and the word “hypocrisy”. He was forced to resign when the deception became public.

  MAYOR APPOINTS PARROT AS OFFICIAL SPOKESMAN

  Irritated by what he considered to be pointless, time-wasting questions from inquisitive journalists, a mayor in Ecuador came up with a solution in 2005 by appointing a parrot as his official spokesman. Jaime Negot, Mayor of Guayaquil, confirmed that the parrot would be responsible for dealing with any “undesirable questions” from the media. The mayor went on: “Some people only talk nonsense to me, so the parrot will answer back in the same way.”

  VILLAGE RE-ELECTS DEAD MAYOR

  The residents of a Romanian village knowingly voted in a dead man as their mayor because they preferred him to his living opponent. Neculai Ivascu defeated opponent Gheorghe Dobrescu by 23 votes in the 2008 election even though he had recently died from liver disease. One Ivascu supporter explained: “I knew he died, but I don’t want change.”

  CANDIDATE RECEIVES NO VOTES

  As a Conservative candidate standing in a Labour stronghold, 72-year-old Shirley Bowes did not hold out much hope of victory at the 2007 English local government elections. But she admitted to being a little disappointed after failing to pick up a single vote. She couldn’t even vote for herself because she lived outside the New Trimdon and Trimdon Grange ward in County Durham.

  CITY SEARCHES FOR LOST TIME CAPSULE

  When the city of Elkhart, Indiana, voted in 2008 to open a time capsule that had been buried 50 years earlier, there was just one small problem – nobody seemed to know exactly where it was. Since no note of the capsule’s whereabouts was made in council meetings of the time, the committee was forced to ransack people’s memories. Several committee members seemed to think that the capsule was buried in a park, but it transpired that they were confusing it with another time capsule buried in the 1970s to commemorate the US bicentennial celebration. A local resident, present at the 1958 event, thought the capsule was buried on a street corner, but that stretch of sidewalk had just been replaced as part of a streetscaping project, so nobody was in a hurry to dig it up again. Meanwhile the city announced that it was planning to create a 2008 time capsule – and this time it was making a note of the precise location. One committee member remarked: “If there’s intelligent life on this planet in 2058, they won’t have to go through this same fiasco.”

  BIRMINGHAM IS RECYCLED TO ALABAMA

  To celebrate the success of its recycling scheme, the city council of Birmingham, England, printed a congratulatory pamphlet featuring a picture of the city’s skyline. Unfortunately the city skyline it chose was that of Birmingham, Alabama, over 4,000 miles away. The error was spotted when one of the 720,000 pamphlets was sent to a local man who also happened to be a frequent visitor to the US.

  FOOT POWDER ELECTED MAYOR

  Voters in the Ecuadorean town of Picoaza accidentally voted a foot deodorant as mayor. As election posters appeared in the region, the enterprising manufacturer of foot deodorant Pulvapies decided to cash in on the publicity by adding one of his own: “Vote for any candidate, but if you want well-being and hygiene, vote Pulvapies.” Then on the eve of the election the company stepped up the campaign by distributing leaflets the same size and colour as the official voting papers and urging: “For Mayor: Honorable Pulvapies.” In the ensuing confusion, the electorate cast more votes for Pulvapies than any other candidate, thus voting the deodorant into office. The rival candidates were distinctly unamused.

  PRESIDENT PUTS FAITH IN TOILET PAPER MYSTIC

  Lithuanian President Rolandas Paksas came under fire in 2008 for placing his faith in a mystic who wraps people in toilet paper to cure their ills. Lena Lolisvili claims to energize toilet paper, which she then wraps around her patients. She also says God tells her the future. The country’s largest newspaper commented: “Lithuania risks becoming the laughing stock of the world.”

  MAYOR’S PANTS FALL DOWN DURING LIBRARY VISIT

  The Lord Mayor of Leicester felt obliged to apologize after his pants fell down in front of hundreds of schoolchildren during a 2010 visit to a local library. When Colin Hall stood up to thank the organizers of the event at Southfields Library, his pants dropped to his ankles in what was described by onlookers as a “Benny Hill moment”. The mayor’s wardrobe malfunction occurred because he had recently lost weight and was not wearing a belt. On his Twitter site, the 16-stone politician joked: “I was wondering how to publicize the progress of my diet. It looks like the issue has been resolved!”

  MAYOR DEMANDS POLICE PROTECTION FOR TOILET VISITS

  In the wake of an altercation with a city councillor, the mayor of Snellville, Georgia, requested a police escort for whenever he needed to go to the toilet. Jerry Oberholtzer said he no longer felt comfortable going to the toilet alone after a verbal bust-up with councillor Robert Jenkins in the gents at City Hall in 2008.

  WELSH ROAD SIGN IS LOST IN TRANSLATION

  Wanting to erect a sign barring heavy goods vehicles from a road, Swansea Council opted for a bilingual sign – in both English and Welsh. Accordingly, it contacted its in-house translation service by email so that the Welsh version could be printed below the English “No entry for heavy goods vehicles. Residential site only”. However as the translator was not available, the council
received an automated email reply in Welsh saying: “I am not in the office at the moment. Please send any work to be translated.” Alas the council thought this was the translation, and put it on the sign, which meant that Welsh-speaking drivers were greeted with a road sign saying: “I am not in the office at the moment.” This was not the first problem involving Welsh language signs. In 2006, cyclists between Cardiff and Penarth were left confused by a bilingual sign telling them “bladder inflammation upset” instead of “cyclists dismount”. In the same year a sign for pedestrians in Cardiff reading “Look Right” in English was translated in Welsh as “Look Left”.

  ENTIRE TOWN FORGETS TO VOTE

  Voter apathy in the small farming town of Pillsbury, North Dakota, was so great in 2008 that nobody bothered to turn up to vote in the June mayoral elections – not even the candidates. Incumbent mayor Darrel Brudevold said he had intended to vote but was busy tending to his crops on election day.

  MAN EATS UNDERWATER TO BEAT BREATH TEST

  When 18-year-old David Zurfluh of Stettler, Canada, was stopped by police for erratic driving, he chose an ingenious way of trying to beat the breathalyzer test – he started eating his own underwear. Sitting in the back of the patrol car he suddenly ripped the crotch out of his shorts and stuffed the fabric in his mouth before spitting it out in disgust. He had hoped that the cotton fabric would absorb the alcohol before he took the test.