05 September 2006
Crikey! I Got Stung!
In MSN News today, Crocodile Hunter's Death Caught on Video."...The dramatic details of Irwin's death Monday as he was shooting a program on the Great Barrier Reef were disclosed by John Stainton, his manager and close friend. He said he had viewed the videotape showing the TV star pulling the poisonous stingray barb from his chest.
"It shows that Steve came over the top of the ray and the tail came up, and spiked him here (in the chest), and he pulled it out, and the next minute he's gone," Stainton told reporters in Cairns, the nearest city to tiny Batt Reef off Australia's far northeast coast where the accident happened...."
They're saying he didn't antagonize the creature, but it probably felt hemmed in by Steve and his camera crew. They also said that stingrays are normally peaceful creatures unless threatened. I knew there was a reason why I didn't feed one of those things on me and Steven's first cruise. I took pictures of him doing it, but I was just too nervous to do it. I got close enuff to pet one, but not feed it. I'm sure it's different when you're in the wild, but the ones we came in contact with are used to humans. Huh. Maybe he should've gone to the same place we went to.
I only watched a handful of his shows and it was a treat each time. This guy made National Geographic seem tame in comparison. It was like in-your-face National Geographic, y'know? And his accent and over the top "Crikey's" made me laff. Especially when other people imitated him. He'll be missed.
*Raising my bottle of water*. To Steve Irwin, oh great Crocodile Hunter. May you wrestle crocodiles for all eternity.
