The Weird Florida News Thread

[GoFride]

I have stickied this thread and will be updating it from time to time with new posts. Shouldn't be a problem

Sinkhole Swallows Florida Man
From NBC news (Gabe Gutierrez and M. Alex Johnson, NBC News); Massive sinkhole swallows Florida man — and it's still growing!
Authorities evacuated neighbors Friday around a sinkhole that swallowed the interior of a Florida house — apparently taking a man to his death — describing the sinkhole as "seriously unstable" and likely to keep growing. Jeffrey Bush, 36, hasn't been heard from since he screamed as a 20-foot-deep by 20-foot-wide hole opened underneath his family's home near Tampa late Thursday. Officials and engineers were continuing their search for him Friday.
"I couldn't get him out," said Bush's brother, Jeremy, who tried to rescue him. "All I thought I could hear was him screaming for me and hollering for me, but I couldn't do nothing."
The sinkhole was still growing Friday evening, officials said, and residents of homes on both sides were evacuated. Engineers were using three-dimensional photos of the soil and other data to figure out the best way to stop its spread, said Bill Bracken, president of an engineering firm that was called in to assist. By Friday, the hole's "safety zone" — the land around it that was considered unstable — extended 100 feet, he said at a news conference. Meanwhile, it continued to deepen and presented a significant potential for what authorities called a "sudden collapse."
The sinkhole swallowed part of the interior of the house but left the exterior remarkably intact. The only thing sticking out of the hole was a small corner of a bed's box spring. Cables from a television led down into the hole, but the TV set, along with a dresser, was nowhere to be seen.
Officials lowered equipment into the sinkhole but didn't see any sign of life.
NBC station WFLA of Tampa reported that six people were in the house when the sinkhole tore through it about 11 p.m. ET. All but Jeffrey Bush escaped. "They heard a sound they described as a car crash emanating from the bedroom," Hillsborough County Fire Chief Ron Rogers said outside the house in Seffner. "They rushed in. All they could see was part of a mattress sticking out of the hole. Essentially, the floor of the room had opened."
The hole almost got Jeremy Bush, too. But Hillsborough County sheriff's Deputy Douglas Duvall arrived to save him, WFLA reported.
Sinkholes are relatively common in Florida, but they don't always cause injury or major disruption. Officials said they didn't immediately know whether the neighborhood near Tampa has had problems in the past, but the threat is apparently evident enough that at least two companies in Seffner advertise their expertise in "sinkhole repair.""Florida sits on a system of caverns filled with water," Rogers said. "As that water moves up and down, it erodes those caverns, and from time to time they collapse."

[Mike41793]

Pics or it didn't happen.

[RoseyReps]

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013...l-growing?lite

[BoostedMX3]

Ohh ya it def happened..

[GoFride]

Here are a few highlights from 2012;
We're tough on crime. A judge in Ocala sentenced a homeless man to 180 days in jail and fined him $500 for stealing $2 worth of candy. An Everglades airboat captain was showing an Indiana family the pretty alligators when a 9-footer bit his left hand off. Authorities later charged him with illegally feeding an alligator.
We're serious about our food. A Holly Hill man fatally shot his roommate during an argument over how to prepare pork chops, while St. Petersburg police say a man killed his roommate over a missing corn dog.
Give her an A for effort. A Pasco County teacher had some explaining to do when she was caught using her dog's "cone of shame" on her ninth-graders to "redirect student behavior".
A naked Miami cannibal grabbed a homeless man, held him down, and ate his face.
Florida's notorious bra bandits were finally arrested after stealing thousands of dollars worth of bras.
Police Tasered a man to stop him from using his garden hose to try to keep a house fire from spreading because "that's what insurance is for."
A woman who'd had enough of bad sex was arrested for attacking and beating the crap out of her boyfriend when he, ahem, "arrived" earlier than his lady.
"Hi there. Are you feeling hot?" Our Gov. Rick Scott gave the media a phone sex number to promote a meningitis hot line.
Whenever you hear about some really cray cray story, there is a strong likelihood it took place in Florida. Welcome to the Sunshine State, where weird is a way of life. I'll keep you posted.

[GoFride]

PORT CHARLOTTE, Fla. - A Charlotte County deputy made some surprising finds during a traffic stop that resulted in four arrests on drug charges.The deputy spotted a car without brake lights and pulled it over. When the four people inside were asked if they had weapons, drugs or other contraband in the vehicle, all four said no and consented to a search. When backup units arrived, the search began - and that's when drugs started popping up everywhere. When deputies asked 23-year-old Bradley Jordan Greus if he had anything hidden in his prosthetic leg, he said yes, took off his leg, removed the bag of cocaine he had stashed inside, and handed it over. Deputies then found a baggie with morphine and hydromorphone pills in the bra of 22-year-old Teal Lee Thompson. The driver, 20-year-old Alexis Ann Clancy said she had more pills in her wallet. The fourth suspect, 25-year-old Donald Carlo Acqurelli, jumped out of the car, grabbed her wallet and swallowed at least one of the pills. Deputies continued searching the car and found five hypodermic needles containing a clear liquid that tested positive for opiates. Clancey said the needles were hers and she used them to shoot opiates. Clancey also told deputies she had another hypodermic needle hidden in her butt; she was removed from the patrol car and produced a needle from her backside and gave it to the deputy. Acquarelli and Greus both said they had just bought the cocaine from someone in a WalMart parking lot. All four were arrested and charged with various drug possession charges.

[GoFride]

From the Tampa Bay Times;
Miami-Dade police dogs, cocaine used in fourth-grade science project

An ounce of cocaine can fetch as much as $1,300 on the streets of Miami, or a three-year mandatory prison sentence in criminal court. Or it can help a fourth-grader win first place in the science fair at Coral Gables Preparatory Academy.
In fact, the Miami Herald reports, Emma Bartelt’s “Drug Sniffing Dogs” project earned her a spot at Saturday’s Miami-Dade County Public Schools Elementary Science Fair at Miami Dade College, alongside experiments exploring name-brand battery life and how to make plastic out of milk.
Emma, who was awarded an honorable mention Saturday, couldn’t have done it without the help of the Miami-Dade Police Narcotics Bureau, which provided three narcotics detector canines and 28 grams of powder cocaine for her experiment. “The purpose for this scientific investigation was to find which dog would find the cocaine fastest using it’s [sic] sense of smell,” Emma, 10, wrote in her abstract.
To pull off her experiment, Emma enlisted the help of her father, Detective Douglas Bartelt, and Detective William Pedraja and Sgt. Samantha Machado, according to her acknowledgments.

[Mike41793]

Im afraid of needles... I cant imagine stashing one in my ass lol...

[GoFride]

Science on NBC News article by Marc Lallanilla

One of the most ferocious insects you've ever heard of — it's the size of a quarter and its painful bite has been compared to being knifed — is set to invade Florida this summer. The Sunshine State, already home to man-eating sinkholes, invading Burmese pythons, swarming sharks, tropical storms and other disasters, can expect to see an explosion of shaggy-haired gallinippers (Psorophora ciliata), a type of giant mosquito, according to entomologist Phil Kaufman of the University of Florida.
Gallinipper eggs hatch after a rainstorm or flood, and the state saw a big jump in the numbers of gallinippers last summer after Tropical Storm Debby dumped its load on Florida. Eggs laid last year could produce a bumper crop of the blood-sucking bugs this summer if Florida sees a soggy rainy season. "I wouldn't be surprised, given the numbers we saw last year," Kaufman said in a statement. "When we hit the rainy cycle, we may see that again."
As insects go, gallinippers are particularly formidable. Their eggs lay dormant for years, awaiting the floodwaters that will enable them to hatch. Even in their larval stage, gallinippers are so tough they'll eat tadpoles and other small aquatic prey. And as adults, the voracious pests feed day and night (unlike everyday mosquitoes, which generally feed only at dawn and dusk). Their bodies are strong enough to bite through clothing, and they're known to go after pets, wild animals and even fish, MyFoxOrlando.com reports. "It's about 20 times bigger than the sort of typical, Florida mosquito that you find," Anthony Pelaez of Tampa's Museum of Science and Industry told Fox Orlando. "And it's mean, and it goes after people, and it bites, and it hurts." Pelaez described the gallinipper's bite as so painful it "feels like you're being stabbed."
The term "gallinipper" isn't recognized by most entomologists, but over the past century, the word — and the insect — entered popular legend through Southern folktales, minstrel shows and blues songs, according to a report from the Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences at the University of Florida. The earliest description of the pest comes from 1897 by a writer who called the insect "the shyest, slyest, meanest and most venomous of them all." (Gallinipper bites don't actually contain any venom — they just feel that painful.)
Will insect repellents help to protect people from the dreaded gallinipper? Maybe, Kaufman said, though the pests may be more resistant to bug repellents — even those containing DEET — because of their large size. If there's a silver lining to a possible invasion of gallinippers, it's the fact that their larvae are so ravenous they eat the larvae of other insects, including mosquitoes, thus reducing the populations of those pests. And they're not known to carry any diseases, though that may be small comfort to beleaguered Floridians.

[GoFride]

A whole week has gone by with nothing weird to report, which is kind of weird. Anyway, here are some favorite news items from 2011 to tide you over - enjoy!

A Palmetto man was arrested after shoving his ex-girlfriend's mother onto a fold-out couch, and then folding her up inside.

A giant Lego man washed up on Siesta Key beach.

A 92-year-old woman was arrested for firing four shots at a neighbor who refused to kiss her.

State Representative Ritch Workman filed a bill to repeal the state ban on dwarf tossing, a bar fad in which individuals of small stature are thrown around for entertainment purposes.

Among various creatures found in swimming pools by startled homeowners were several alligators, at least one python, a bear and a retired racehorse.

Police in St. Petersburg said two would-be carjackers forced a couple out of their car at gunpoint, but then ran away after they couldn't figure out how to drive a stick shift.

$1.25 million worth of cocaine washed up on a beach south of Port Canaveral in September. An additional $2.2 million in cocaine washed up on a Fort Pierce beach the next month.

Two managers of a Lake City Domino's Pizza were charged with burning down a rival Papa John's as a way to increase business.

Two deaf men using sign language were stabbed at a Hallandale Beach bar when another costumer thought they were flashing gang signs.

A North Naples man who was pulled over for a traffic violation called 911 and reported a shooting nearby to get out of a ticket. He still got the ticket and was also charged with making a false 911 call.

A Boynton Beach man splashed rubbing alcohol on his roommate's boxer shorts and set them on fire because he was late with the rent.

A Flagler County woman who bought what she thought was a novelty cigarette lighter called authorities when it turned out to be a real, though not live, grenade.

A celebrity boxing promoter sued Jose Canseco when the former baseball star sent his identical twin Ozzie to the bout instead.

A South Florida man accidentally threw out his wife's engagement ring, then went to the dump the next day and sifted through a 9-ton pile of trash. He found it.

Not that romance always flourished in Florida. A Broward County woman was arrested after holding a steak knife to her husband's throat and demanding he sign the divorce papers.

An Orange County man lay down in front of a car to try to stop his girlfriend from leaving after a fight. But the driver didn't see him and he was run over.