In Popular Culture
Dry quicksand was occasionally featured in literature. The 1966 movie African Gold (released abroad as Ride the High Wind) shows an actress being trapped in dry quicksand. Mindwarp (1990) also has an actress wandering into dry quicksand before being rescued. The movie 12 to the Moon (1960) shows a crew member being lost in moon dust similar to dry quicksand. In the film Lawrence of Arabia, a servant of T. E. Lawrence "drowns" in dry quicksand (this was never claimed to have happened in real life). The plot of the Arthur C. Clarke novel A Fall of Moondust (1961) was based on the perils of working and traveling on a moon surface covered by a deep layer of dry quicksand, based on the actual risks considered during the planning of the Project Apollo missions. In Universal Pictures' 1999 The Mummy, Captain Winston Havelock's biplane and body disappear into dry quicksand after High Priest/Mummy Imhotep summons a sand storm to make the biplane crash.
In the videogame Xenogears the continent of Ignas (the country of Aveh) is covered mostly by a large desert, and several plot events revolve around characters' gear or vehicles being buried by dry quicksand.
The Princess Bride featured dry quicksand (called "Snow Sand" in the book and "Lightning Sand" in the movie) as one of the three terrors of the Fire Swamp. Dry quicksand was also featured in the movies Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, and the 2004 Chinese film, Kekexili: Mountain Patrol. In the 1993 film Pure Luck Martin Short's character finds himself sinking in dry quicksand in Mexico before being rescued.
In a 1990 episode of Mission: Impossible, "The Sands of Seth", a minister of the Egyptian government heads a cult that meets in an ancient structure with a dry quicksand pit for disposing of undesirable individuals.
Philip J. Fry and Leela drive a (stolen replica) lunar rover from an amusement park into a pit of dry quicksand in the Futurama episode "The Series Has Landed".
The 2004 Chinese film Kekexili: Mountain Patrol depicts a character drowning in a dry quicksand while chasing poachers in the remote Tibetan region of Kekexili (Hoh Xil).
In Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the title character gets caught in a dry quicksand pit while trying to escape from Soviet soldiers. While sinking, Indiana tries to explain the difference between dry and regular quicksand.
World 2 (Desert World) of Super Mario Bros. 3 features many obstacles that resemble dry quicksand.
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