Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Zipper Accidents (17 page)

Just after liftoff, the rocket carrying
Mariner 1
veered off course when a computer misunderstood the rocket’s trajectory. A ground-based radar system had failed to account for the “radio echo,” the time it takes a signal to reach its target and return to the ground. That 43-millisecond miscalculation meant that instead of going toward Venus,
Mariner
boomeranged back to Earth.

Fearing the rocket might crash into a populated area, mission control sent a self-destruct command to the probe. Less than five minutes after liftoff,
Mariner 1
exploded over the Atlantic Ocean. The mistaken course correction came from a line of code transcribed by a programmer working from a handwritten formula. Several theories exist about the specific mistake, but NASA’s explanation is that the programmer missed a single hyphen. That hyphen cost $18.5 million.

F
ETCH!

Fewer than 300 pitchers have ever struck out more than 1,000 batters in the entire history of professional baseball. Atlanta Braves pitcher Charlie Leibrandt made it to that number in 1992. After he struck out his 1,000th batter in a game against the San Francisco Giants, the catcher paused the game and handed Leibrandt the milestone ball, which he threw into the Braves dugout for safekeeping. The problem: neither the catcher nor Leibrandt had called time-out or asked for a new ball, meaning the ball he’d thrown into the dugout was still technically in play. The runner on first realized it at about the same time as Leibrandt, so while he hustled to the dugout to retrieve the ball, the runner stole second base.

THE SLOW STEAL

The 1926 World Series came down to a decisive seventh game between the New York Yankees and the St. Louis Cardinals. The Yankees came up to bat in the ninth inning, with the Cardinals up 3–2, and two outs. With a full count, Babe Ruth earned a walk—the tying run. Power hitter Bob Meusel came up to bat, and if he got a hit, Ruth would score. Instead, Ruth, well known for being heavyset and slow, and successful at base stealing only 50 percent of the time, decided to steal second
base on the first pitch. Cardinals catcher Bob O’Farrell easily threw him out. Game over, series over, Cardinals win.

BUT WHO’S COUNTING?

The University of North Carolina was heavily favored to win the 1993 NCAA college basketball tournament, but the big story was the University of Michigan’s “Fab Five” lineup of freshmen and sophomore starters who had made it all the way to the final. Among the five were future NBA superstars Jalen Rose, Juwan Howard, and Chris Webber, an All-American that year. In the final game, North Carolina led 73–71 with just 19 seconds left. North Carolina’s Pat Sullivan missed a free throw, and Webber quickly rebounded it and began to take it up the court.

Just past midcourt (and after traveling, which wasn’t called), Webber called time-out, allowing Michigan to reset the clock and inbound closer to their net, and hope to turn at least a two-point play. The big problem with that common late-game strategy was that Michigan didn’t have any time-outs left. Webber was called for a technical foul, and North Carolina got the ball back, sunk two free throws, and won the game.

H
USBAND-DAD

A 60-year old Ohio widow named Valerie Spruill learned a chilling truth in 2004: Her dead husband was actually her father! Sometime earlier she had found out that a “family friend” she grew up with was actually a prostitute…and her mother. Apparently, her father was only 15 years old when he knocked up a “woman of the night,” and the little baby—Valerie—lived a very full life before finding the awful truth. When Spruill’s story made national news in 2012, she served as a warning that familiar familial relations are not always what they seem to be.

HUSBAND-BROTHER

A South African couple had the picture-perfect relationship. After falling in love at first sight when they met at college in 2006, the lovebirds dated for five years. Then they became engaged. Then they finally got around to meeting each other’s single parents. To everyone’s surprise, the parents already knew each other. They’d been together in the 1980s and had two kids. After splitting up (mom cheated on dad), the sibling toddlers were separated and raised 50 miles apart. Making matters even more complicated: The sibling-bride-to-be
was eight months pregnant. “I can’t think straight right now,” the horrified grandma-to-be told reporters. At last report, the sibling couple had split up.

HUSBAND-WIFE

Six months after she got married, Minati Khatua of Rourkela, India, discovered that her husband was actually a woman. She had suspicions that something was wrong because her “husband” would never let her see “him” naked. Khatua finally found out the truth by bursting into the bathroom one day when “he” was taking a bath: The husband had no…husband parts. S/he ran away, taking Khatua’s Jeep and dowry money. S/he remains at large.

TWO ACCIDENTAL DEATHS

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Nancy Lincoln, mother of nine-year-old Abraham Lincoln, died in 1818 after drinking a glass of milk from the family cow, which had been grazing on poisonous snakeroot and passed the poison into the milk.