Posted on 10/22/2003 6:30:41 AM PDT by yankeedame
Man treads on ant nest, falls 100m
October 21, 2003
A MAN who got out of his car to answer a call of nature ended up injured and stranded when he stepped on an ants' nest and fell down a 100 metre slope.
The hapless motorist's ordeal began when he stopped beside the road in the Lamington National Park, on the Gold Coast hinterland, around midnight last night, police said.
He first stood on a nest of meat ants, which swarmed out and began biting him.
As the man scrambled away from the nest he lost his footing and tumbled 100 metres down a steep slope.
Police said his fall was slowed by soil and scrub and he stopped on a narrow ledge above a sheer drop.
His companion raised the alarm and four hours later, ambulance officers and rescue firefighters abseiled down the slope to the injured man, who suffered only minor injuries in the fall.
He was eventually winched back to the road in a rescue basket before being taken to in the Gold Coast hospital hospital suffering from mild hypothermia, scratches and bruising.
AAP
qabseil ("&bzaIl, "&bseIl) [G. abseilen, f. ab down, seil rope.] The technique of descent of a steep face by means of a doubled rope fixed above the climber. So as v. intr., to use the abseil or ‘rope down’ technique in descent. Hence "abseiling vbl. n.
1933 G. D. Abraham Mod. Mountaineering x. 184 To help in the abseil or descent of steep, almost holdless places.
1941 C. F. Kirkus Let's Go Climbing! v. 76 To abseil you must be unroped. Hang the rope over a higher bough, so that it hangs down on either side and both ends are resting on the ground. You thus have a double rope to slide down.
Ibid. 78 In the Alps a great deal of abseiling is done.
1954 Oxf. Mountaineering 1954 59 One member of the party ascended the first pitch of Brant, and was then forced to abseil off, for nobody would, or could, follow him.
1955 M. E. B. Banks Commando Climber v. 80, I had to untie for the last abseil down to the glacier.
1956 R. C. Evans On Climbing xii. 170 He had been abseiling, and the rock over which he had looped his doubled rope had come away.
I guess it was a good thing that there wasn't another ant hill down at the bottom.
Whenever people complain about the snow here in the Northeast, I think about how much better the snow is than fire ants, killer bees, and the rest of the nasty critters that plague more tropical climates.
The Dateline lists the Date and the Location of the news report. It's so bush-league of us to quote from the New.Com.AU and expect us to know this is from Queensland, Austrailia. About 20% of the time, I have no idea where the story is coming from--like the Henrietta Times, or the Podunk Gazette.
Everyone seems to get their Byline correct. Let's practice some Journalism 101 and get the Location noted at the top of the story if the Dateline or the Lead Paragraph does not.
Amen!!
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