Here's a true story...
Back in the early 70's, a local childrens show (Wallace & Ladmo) went to a local mall to promote the arrival of Santa Claus. Since the competition was fierce between the stores to present a better Santa than the others, this one mall decided to have Santa parachute out of a plane to the ground. The plan was to strap a dummy to a parachute, which would open upon being pushed out of the plane. It would land in a big field on the back side of the mall, in which time a person dressed as Santa would walk out and greet all the kids once the dummy was out of sight and on the ground.
Needless to say, things didn't go as planned...
The dummy was pushed out of the plane, the parachute failed to open and Santa fell straight down in front of hundreds of kids at the mall. When the 'real' Santa appeared, most of the kids in the crowd were still crying from the apparant demise of St. Nick.
I still get a big laugh every time I hear this story, even after all these years