Florida is back in the news! They must have gotten tired of Indiana, Pennsylvania, and other states getting all the crazy attention and they are back in the lead for craziest yet basically harmless crime. This is the way it works in Florida, most of the time the crazy "crimes" wouldn't really harm anyone except the person involved so in that way I don't really consider them crimes but I suppose the police need to do their jobs.
In this situation the person attempting the stunt would have almost certainly died so perhaps they did the man a favor by not letting him attempt to do something really strange when he was attempting to cross the entirety of the Atlantic Ocean in a giant inflatable hamster wheel.
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The owner of this contraption is Ray "Reza" Baluchi, and he is an extreme marathon runner who wants to I guess be the first person to cross the Atlantic in a self-propelled inflatable. That hasn't been done before has it?
Now for me I would think it would be more sensible to try something a bit more realistic like navigating to Cuba or The Bahama before taking on the enormity of the entire Atlantic ocean but Reza likes to aim high I suppose.
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Not much is known about the contents of the hamster wheel because Reza and the Coast Guard aren't telling us but previous showcases he made show that it is actually a lot more advanced than you think. It has solar power a fresh-water desalination device, and even a pump for showers. I don't know if this is the same model as he used in previous unsuccessful water runs but I suppose that it is plausible that he actually COULD make it. I'm just curious about how he navigates but then again, what do I know about maritime activities?
To be fair to Rey, he was spotted and taken in a full 70 miles off the coast of Georgia. The Coast Guard didn't track him down, they happened to spot him when they were making preparations for an incoming hurricane. I bet it would be wild and also terrifying to be inside of an inflatable during a hurricane. Would it get airborne? Would it just blow him back to shore?
The nerves on this guy are admirable and for once in Florida, there wasn't any meth involved, so congratulations to Reza for thinking outside the Florida box.
When he was stopped by the Coast Guard he informed the sailors that he was on his way to London and to leave him alone. He actually threatened to commit suicide if they attempted to remove him from the floating contraption. They did remove him and he didn't attempt suicide. The just towed the device back to Florida without removing Rey from it.
Rey has a history of doing extreme athletic stuff such as running across the entire country Forrest Gump style multiple times and once he attempted to do it barefoot.
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to be fair, that thing does look rather unsinkable, but what about sharks?
Rey is now facing criminal charges including Federal ones. I don't know what to think about this thing but since I am a big believer in that a person should be allowed to do whatever they want as long as it doesn't harm another person then I think that they should just leave the guy alone, even if it means he is going to die in the process. It is his choice after all. I don't think it should be the government's job to protect us from ourselves. You CAN die from getting hit by a golf ball but we don't see SWAT raiding the local links now do we?
