“Three Months And Counting Without Them Noticing”: 50 Times Adults Played Epic Pranks On Parents

In 1974, panic erupted in the sleepy town of Sitka, Alaska. Once just a big piece of ice, it’s since melted and is now home to just over 8,000 people. Accessible only by air and sea, the place is relatively drama free. But on this particular morning, emergency services were inundated with calls from panicked residents. 

They’d woken to a plume of black smoke rising from the Mt Edgecumbe volcano, which lies about 16 miles away. The volcano was considered dormant, having last spewed lava more than 4,000 years ago. So it’s only natural, people would be freaking out.

As they continued to frantically alert firefighters and police, the Coast Guard sent out a helicopter to investigate. But when the pilot hovered over the crater, he noticed something strange. Where was the lava? Upon closer inspection, he saw a huge pile of charred black tires. And then, the words APRIL FOOL spray-painted boldly across the snow next to them.

Proof that some people will, quite literally, go to great heights to pull off a good prank.

The epic practical joke was the work of a local prankster, Oliver “Porky” Bickar. He’d spent three years planning his prank, collecting hundreds of old tires, gallons of kerosene and other equipment. Bickar enlisted the help of a helicopter pilot and some friends. They flew to the volcano, did the deed and casually left.

While he did make international news, “Porky” didn’t get into trouble for his shenanigans because he’d informed police of his plans beforehand. He’d just forgotten to let the Coast Guard know. Oops!

And once the town realized they’d been tricked, most people erupted into laughter.

As "Porky" proved, a well-played prank can elicit feelings of panic, fear, irritation and even anger in the moment but we will often look back on them afterwards and have a good giggle.

“Pranks can seed inside jokes that friends and groups share and remember forever. They are frequently part of reminiscing, and when recalled decades later, participants are likely to be amused and laugh all over again,” wrote Dr. Kathleen Pike, a Professor of Psychology and Director of the Global Mental Health WHO Collaborating Centre at Columbia University.

Dr. Joseph Polimeni is an internationally recognized expert in the science of humor. In an exclusive interview with Bored Panda, he said people have probably been pranking each other for tens of thousands of years. 

“Pranks are a form of humor. In fact, the proposed cognitive structure of humor can be nicely demonstrated inside most pranks. Humor requires two disparate views of one social situation, with at least one view containing a social violation,” he said. 

“So, for example, my children, during their grade school years, once planted a plastic mouse in a cupboard to scare their mother. This scenario created two social views of one situation: 1) the perception that a real mouse was in the cupboard and 2) there was just a piece of plastic in the cupboard. The social violation pertains to an attempt to unnecessarily scare another person.”