Train surfing: The new way to die in many parts

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Train surfing

See the world while you lose your legs

By Brandi Fisher : May 12, 2009.

I admire adventurous people. I love hearing about teens who climb Mount Everest, grandmothers who go sky-diving, and the Christian youths involved with Steven Baldwin's amazing skate exhibitions.

A youth risks his life train-surfing in AustraliaBut when someone tells me that train surfing is adventurous, I know their brains are mashed peas.

Train surfers ride on the outside of trains. Or on the top of train cars. Or on the back of trains with only windshield wipers to hang on to.

It's an unusual way to travel. And it's an unusual way to lose both your legs, die by electrocution, or hang in pieces from the roof of a train until someone asks your family to try to identify your body.

If you don't think this happens, then look at a few news reports about some of the world's great train surfers, and what accidents on trains can do:

  • In May 2008, train passengers at Flinders Street Station in Melbourne, Australia, were horrified to see the dead body of a youth lying on top of the last carriage. The 20-year-old from Werribee had been train-surfing during the night. His right arm was petrified and his fingers were rigid. He had been electrocuted by 1500 volts of electricity.
  • In September 2004, the BBC reported that a 14-year-old boy had lost both his legs after jumping on the roof of a train with a group of friends and falling off.
  • In November 2002, a teenager in England was train surfing and his body was crushed and shattered when the train went under a bridge.
  • In May 2007, Danish train surfer Martin Harris, 22, had the life crushed out of him when a train he was surfing went under a viaduct in Jutland, Denmark. He had previously bragged about his trainsurfing stunts in interviews and on YouTube.
  • In December 2003, a 15-year-old girl suffered horrific burns to her stomach, chest and shoulders in a train surfing accident in Melbourne, Australia. She had been trainsurfing with friends when she came into contact with the train's power supply. Her scars are expected to be permanent.
  • In June 2006, a 15-year-old in Johannesburg, South Africa, fell while swinging out of a train. Most of his scalp was ripped off.

And so it goes on, year after year. Compared with other sports, there are not many train surfers, yet their deaths and injuries are frequently in the news.

Unfortunately, many teens don't read or listen to the news, so they don't know about all the electrocutions, lost scalps, and missing limbs that train surfers suffer. Many think they are expert train surfers because nothing has happened to them in the past. This is what Martin Harris thought before he was crushed to death in Denmark.

I think of some of the Bible's advice regarding foolishness and wisdom. The Book of Proverbs is bristling with wisdom, and although it doesn't mention train surfing, it does give some principles that train surfers ignore at their peril.

“He who trusts in himself is a fool: but whoever walks wisely shall be delivered.” (Proverbs 28:26)

“The wise shall inherit glory: but shame shall be the promotion of fools.” (Proverbs 3:35)

Train-surfers, unfortunately, seem to be branding themselves as the kings and queens of fools.

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