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The Darwin Awards is a tongue-in-cheek honor named after evolutionary theorist Charles Darwin. Awards are given to people who "do a service to Humanity by removing themselves from the gene pool" or in other words, lose the ability to reproduce either by death or sterilization in a stupid fashion. This is the official site, where everything is checked for authenticity before it is published.

Annual awards are listed, you can do key word searches or browse categories like Guns or Electricity . Examples of Darwin award winners include:

• Juggling active hand grenades (Croatia, 2001).
• Leaving a lit cigarette in a warehouse full of explosives (Philippines, 1999)
• Jumping out of a plane to film skydivers without wearing a parachute (U.S., 1987).
• Trying to get enough light to look down the barrel of a loaded muzzleloader gun using a cigarette lighter (U.S., 1996).
• Using a lighter to illuminate a fuel tank to make sure it contains nothing flammable (Brazil, 2003).
• Attempting to play Russian roulette with a semi-automatic pistol that automatically loads the next round into the chamber.
• Attempting Russian roulette with an unexploded landmine,
• Crashing through a window and falling to one's death in trying to demonstrate that the window is unbreakable.

Northcutt's Darwin Awards site gives "Honorable Mentions" to people who survive their misadventures with their reproductive capacity intact, by luck or chance. One example is Lawnchair Larry, who attached helium filled weather balloons to a lawn chair and floated far above Long Beach, California, in July 1982. He reached an altitude of 16,000 feet and was later fined for crossing controlled airspace. Another notable honourable mention was given to the two men who attempted to burgle the home of "hard man" footballer Duncan Ferguson (who had 4 convictions for assault and had served 6 months in Glasgow's Barlinnie prison) in 2001, with one burglar requiring 3 days hospitalization after being confronted by the player.

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