Why is there a Volkswagen Beetle hanging on the side of a mountain?
Some pranks just leave you mystified as to how the pranksters pulled them off. Or even why they resigned. One such prank is happening right now in British Columbia, where authorities are trying to figure out how to remove the shell of an old Volkswagen Beetle that mysteriously appeared above Highway 99 near the Stawamus Chief, a place known for its natural beauty and cultural significance to the Squamish Nation.
The hollowed-out beetle has been left sitting on a cliff face with a Canadian flag on its hood and a giant white letter E on its roof, frozen forever. It’s as if someone had paused a movie where a Volkswagen Beetle had driven off a winding road. Officials have asked the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and park rangers to investigate.
Someone hung a Volkswagen Beetle from a mountainside in British Columbia
As for the who and why of it all, there are no definitive answers yet, but there is a story we can refer to that might give us some clues. There is a long-standing tradition among students at the University of British Columbia of staging elaborate stunts involving full tracking of beetle shells, often setting them up in hard-to-reach or highly visible locations like a diligent serial killer’s calling card. It’s the kind of over-the-top prank that only a team of engineering students with easy access to a mountain of Adderall could even begin to consider.
But just because they were engineering students doesn’t mean they’ve earned those degrees yet, so it’s no wonder local authorities were concerned about potential risks to public safety. The shell is mounted on a simple rig of a few wooden planks, which are themselves being dangled from some hopefully strong cables. Should one of these cables break, it could send the shell tumbling down the mountainside onto a road below. If it happened, it would be the first time. Back in 2009, a similar prank ended when a beetle fell from the Ironworkers’ Memorial Bridge. That prank led to some arrests; luckily no one was hurt.
Will the masterminds behind this prank ever be revealed? Probably not, which almost makes the whole ordeal even better.
