Strange Things That Actually Happened

[MediumTex]

How about Randy Johnson hitting a bird with a pitch in a major league game?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxEUW3pQ ... ata_player

[MediumTex]

Japanese lieutenant Hiroo Onoda went into the jungle in the Philippines during World War II and continued fighting a guerrilla war until 1974, when he was finally persuaded that the war had ended (he was, however, disappointed to hear that Japan had not won).

http://history1900s.about.com/od/worldw ... ersurr.htm

[Lone Wolf]

Japanese lieutenant Hiroo Onoda went into the jungle in the Philippines during World War II and continued fighting a guerrilla war until 1974, when he was finally persuaded that the war had ended (he was, however, disappointed to hear that Japan had not won).

This is one of my favorites.  No matter how many times I ponder this one, it still reliably blows my mind.  While I don't think it would ever be possible for me to understand Imperial Japan, stories like this do at least give me tiny fragments to work with.

Incredibly, Onoda and his compatriots were still conducting raids on "the enemy" for years.

[Lone Wolf]

Bobby Leach was the second person (and the first man) to ever go over Niagara Falls and survive.  He made the 167 foot drop in a metal barrel and although he got badly banged up, he made a full recovery.  He enjoyed years of worldwide fame afterward.

While on a publicity tour, Bobby injured his leg when he slipped on an orange peel.  This injury worsened, became infected, and ultimately killed him.

[Lone Wolf]

In 1986, an enormous pocket of carbon dioxide gas suddenly erupted from Cameroon's Lake Nyos.  The eruption caused a tidal wave some 80 feet high and the carbon dioxide gas poured out from the lake over the countryside.

The moving cloud of carbon dioxide displaced the oxygen in the air, suffocating everything and everyone unlucky enough to be close by.  At least 1700 people were killed.

If things weren't Biblical enough, the water turned from blue to red after the eruption.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... -1,00.html