Impromptu striptease on Delta flight ends in hospitalization

It’s always wild when passengers do crazy stuff on flights, but the trend has taken a new twist: the media always seems to be present. A CNN photographer was on hand to find bullets left behind by a law enforcement officer, and now a news manager from Newsday was present to witness a passenger stripping.

On Delta Flight 6562 over the weekend the woman, who hasn’t been named, peeled off layers until she reached a state only the TSA could appreciate, as flight attendants tried in vain to cover her up. According to the Associated Press, she yelled, “No! No! No!”

The woman was said not to have interfered with the flight and was taken to Jamaica Hospital Medical Center in Queens when the flight landed. She isn’t expected to face criminal charges. There’s no word on whether she left the flight with a thong full of singles.

There is a silver lining in all this. Not too long ago, Delta was proclaimed the worst airline in the United States. With perks like this, I expect that perception to change.

[photo by Steve Zak Photography]

The photographer who changed the way we see the world


We’ve all seen them, those grainy series of black and white images showing animals walking or nude people climbing stairs or jumping. They’ve been used in art pieces, music videos, and are part of our visual heritage, but what are they all about?

A new exhibition at London’s Tate Britain tells the story of the photographer who took these enduring images. Eadweard Muybridge was a British immigrant to the U.S. in the 1850s. A skilled photographer, he traveled the world taking giant panoramic shots that he would then put on display, sort of an IMAX theater for Victorians. His seventeen-foot long panorama of San Francisco is one of the exhibition’s highlights.

His fame comes from his experiments with high-speed film in the 1870s. Muybridge wanted to answer the question of whether a galloping horse took all four hooves off the ground at the same time. People had been arguing about this for ages but the movement was too quick to catch with the unaided eye. Muybridge hired the Sacremento racetrack and put up a series of high-speed cameras that would be set off when the horse hit their tripwires. This technological innovation proved horses actually do leave the ground while galloping.

Muybridge became fascinated by human and animal movement and produced thousands of images. The people in his photographs are generally nude. While stuffy Victorian morality frowned on this sort of thing, since it was in the name of science Muybridge got away with it. One wonders how many of his books sold not for their scientific value, but because they contained plenty of cheesecake. He even made movies by stringing the images together on a spinning wheel called a zoopraxiscope. Muybridge was making movies twenty years before the movie camera was invented.

Muybridge at Tate Britain
runs until 16 January 2011.

[Photo courtesy Library of Congress]

England’s naked roller coaster


Only in England, right? The Green Scream (above) at Adventure Island in Southend-on-Sea, Essex, took an unexpected turn last week: a naked one.

In a stunt to raise money for Southend Hospital Charitable Foundation’s Bosom Pals Appeal, BBC News reports that 102 people showed up at Adventure Island ready to bare all and ride the Green Scream. The dabbling nudists, most of whom have been affected by cancer in some way, came from all over the UK to help the organization purchase new mammography machines and other additions to their breast care unit. The coaster had to go commando three times to accommodate all the naked Brits. Over £22,000 was raised.

“Takes of lot of nerve to take off all your clothes” said Barbara Warner of Bosom Pals, adding that she “would like to say a massive thank you to everyone who was brave enough to bare all and raise such a huge amount of cash — more than £22,000 — for our vitally important cause.”

We get why they took their tops off (breast cancer), but why the bottoms? Let’s all hope everyone carefully wiped the seat with a wet nap or something before sitting down — and after! People riding the coaster an hour later might have had no idea what just happened there. This all sounds like a good reason to travel with hand sanitizer to me.

[via BBC News]

Top five tips for newbies visiting nude beaches

Are you planning to go “clothing optional” for the first time? From what I understand, you can have a lot of fun, but there are rules to be followed. Failing to do so can lead to an awkward situation or worse. Most of this is common sense, of course, which is probably why it’s worth mentioning. You can have fun without coming across as a disgusting nut job. I found a list of suggestions for first-time visitors to nude beaches over on Fox News and pulled the top five for you, below:

1. Wear protection: you’ll have much more of your body exposed to the sun than usual, so bring and apply sunscreen – lots of it. Could you imagine getting a sunburn on your… exactly. Test out sunscreen on areas where you may not be accustomed t wearing it, because your body may have an unexpected (and unpleasant) reaction.

2. Expect to be a hottie: if you think you’re going to find tight bodies pulled into provocative positions all over the beach, prepare yourself for some disappointment. You may get lucky and run into something sweet, but much will sag and drag.

And speaking of getting lucky … 3. Forget about sex: to feel comfortable on a nude beach, it seems, you need to be ready to take sex out of the equation. This isn’t the case at some beaches, however, which specialize in fostering carnality. But, be ready for bodies ready to be put to work. Look at (2) above, and prepare for the tables to be turned. Do a little jogging before hitting one of these destinations.

4. Leave your camera at home: even if you think you’re the next Larry Flynt, you should leave your inner shutterbug behind for a day. Photography and video are highly inappropriate. So is staring, in case you couldn’t figure that out on your own. Would you want anyone to do this for you? Wait … don’t answer that (except maybe in the comments below).

5. Take a towel: there are some places where you’ll need to cover up. Dining areas, bathrooms and entering and exiting the beach typically call for modesty, however much you may loathe it. Don’t do it for you – do it for everyone else.

[photo by ilovememphis via Flickr]

Spanish flight attendants produce nude calendar to publicize bankruptcy

When the going gets tough, the tough get…naked.

The cabin crew of Air Comet, a Spanish airline, have come up with a creative way to draw attention to the company’s recent bankruptcy: a nude calendar. Air Comet isn’t the first European airline to have pulled this kind of stunt; Ryanair and Viva Aerobus have also produced more SFW versions.

Through saucy photos that lend further credence to the “sexy stew” image, the female flight attendants are hoping to generate publicity about the 600-cabin crew members’ nine months of lost wages. They also hope to earn enough to fund their legal battle against Air Comet.

Photo spreads feature the fetching flight attendants in various flight-related poses, including one of a nude woman stretched across a jet engine, clad only in an emergency flotation vest.

This is not the first time Air Comet’s “air hostesses” have used their bodies to political effect. Last February, one woman conducted a naked interview in which she vented her anger at the company’s president. How very…Euro.

[Via www.eturbonews.com]

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