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Point Nemo – Spacecraft Cemetery

Meet Point Nemo which is the most remote place on planet Earth from dry land. It is situated in the South Pacific Ocean (48°52.5′S 123°23.6′W), just 2,688 km from the nearest land: The Ducie Island to the north, Motu Nui (belongs to the Easter Islands) to the northeast, and Maher Island (near Antarctica) to the south.
The area is so remote that at times the closest human beings are astronauts out of earth in the International Space Station (but just when the station passes above that point) .This area known as the “Spacecraft Cemetery” since hundreds of decommissioned satellites, space stations, and other spacecraft have hit the water at this location upon re-entering the atmosphere so the risk of them hitting inhabited locations or maritime traffic is small.

source:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pole_of_inaccessibility?fbclid=IwAR3OosvB0hCPt5FbnUKnLAB195OWdddBtudt_12UEEo8PFiftGBkhBboM4c#Oceanic_pole_of_inaccessibility

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No, 1000 Japanese soldiers were NOT eaten by Crocodiles

According to the Guinness Book of Records (1968 edition) – Crocodiles attacked and killed about 1,000 Japanese soldiers in one night

Myanmar (formerly Burma) has an island called Ramree,
On February 19, 1945 – the end of World War II, a fierce battle took place between the Allies and a Japanese force and when evening fell, the Japanese force was pushed into the mangrove swamps.
Ramree’s mangrove swamps are populated saltwater crocodiles that reach a maximum length of more than 6 meters and weigh more than a ton.

The Japanese force tried to cross about 16 miles inside these swamps to connect with the rest of the Japanese force on the island. Out of about a thousand soldiers only 20 soldiers survived the journey.
One of the participants in the battle, a British soldier Bruce Stanley Wright, who later became a naturalist, wrote a testimony in his 1962 book “Wildlife Sketches – Near and Far“
In it he described the disappearance of the Japanese and testified that gunshots and the sounds of crocodiles could be heard. Other researchers consider disaster on such a large scale impossible and question the accuracy of the information from Wright’s book.
Although Wright’s testimony has become a fact in Guinness books


In 2000 Steven G. Platt was able to find surviving witnesses from the Japanese forces who confirmed that crocodiles indeed killed some of the men but only about 15 soldiers, the rest died from diseases, snakes, pests, dehydration and lack of means of crossing the swamps and the dense jungles.

Source:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Ramree_Island

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Did whiskey save the life of the chief baker from the Titanic?

April 14, 1912. The Titanic disaster.

first of all – a scientific fact about the human body – Alcohol may make your body feel warm inside, but it causes your blood vessels to expand, thus creating a rapid heat loss from the surface of your skin. Generally, alcohol increase the risk of hypothermia, but Charles Joughin seems to be an outlier.

Charles Joughin, the Titanic’s chief baker, decided to take a nap after another busy day working on the Titanic. While napping, a harsh shake-up woke Charles. He felt the ship rumble.
After some tremors, the ship kept moving. Charles realised something was wrong but did not let it interfere with his rest.
At 11:35 at night, a few minutes after the shake-up, he was called to come to the command bridge. There he learned some disturbing information. The captain sent a crew to inspect the damage on the lower deck and it turned out that 90 feet from the wall just came out of place and water began to seep through the rivets.
The news did not cause any real panic.

The people on board the Titanic believed that the compartments were strong enough to handle glaciers. But now, in a time of crisis, it has become clear that this is not the case. The fourth, fifth and sixth sections were filled with water.
The captain realized that the fate of the Titanic was doomed.
Joughin, did not wait long. He woke up his bakery team and began collecting all the remaining loaves of bread to equip the lifeboats.
Charles Joughin realized that as a crew member there would be no room on the lifeboats and as the ship began to tilt at a frightening angle, He decided to go down to his cell and drink a large amount of whiskey (there were evidences talking about two whole bottles). He then returned to the deck and while intoxicated began to push people into the lifeboats. After he finished pushing people in the hope that they would be rescued, in addition, he threw chairs into the water in the hope that the chairs would be used as floating devices.

Shortly afterwards he jumped into the water, his body did not sink. Because of the amount of alcohol – he began to hallucinate and somehow reached the a rescue craft that already had 25 people on it.
The fact that Joughin survived is no less than a miracle.
Water temperatures were two degrees bellow zero ( Celsius -2 °C = 28.4°f Fahrenheit).
Most people in the water died of hypothermia after 15-20 minutes. But Joughin remained in the water for about 4 hours until he was finally pulled by a lifeboat.
Joughin believed that his miraculous survival was made possible by the large amount of whiskey he drank – We have no proof this is true, but also we have no way of contradicting this story.

Unfortunately 1,517 other passengers from the Titanic did not have such luck, and they died in the water, sober and freezing cold.

The sinking of the Titanic is not the last drowning disaster experienced. He was on the ship Oregon when it sank in Boston’s port. He survived that disaster too. Although this time it is not known whether we used any bottles of whiskey.

Joughin died at the age of 78, and he is buried alongside his wife in the Cedar Lawn Cemetery, in Paterson, New Jersey.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Joughin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titanic


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The first & last president to serve for more than twice

Under U.S. law, a president can serve only 2 terms, after which he cannot run again. But this has not always been the case – Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president 4 times in a row in 1932, 1936, 1940, and 1944, he was also one of the most popular presidents ever, who was elected by an overwhelming majority:


Unfortunately in 1944 his health condition deteriorated. He passed away 6 months after winning the election for the fourth time, and was replaced by Harry Truman.
Franklin d. Roosevelt was the first and last president to serve for more than twice. Before him it was customary to serve only 2 terms, but this was not fixed by law.

In 1951, the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution, which limits the term of office of the President to 2 terms, was finally approved.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-second_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution



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Who runs faster – a man or a horse?

Horse VS. human, who would win? well, we all know marathons and horse racing, but have you heard of marathons of people competing vs. horses?

Every year in June (excluding the COVID19 period) a competition is held in Wales called Man Vs. Horse – This is a 35 km race in which human runners compete with horse riders. They made sure the horses are in optimal condition and use products like a Horse Fly Spray to repel flies and insects and does not contain any harmful chemicals or pesticides.
The inspiration for the competition came after a hotel owner heard a couple of drunk people from a beer in the hotel bar discussing the relative advantages of running humans over horses in mountainous terrain conditions; One suggested that over long distances in harsh terrain conditions, human performance might be equal o batter than the horse performance.
The owner, Gordon Green, was looking for a new business opportunity and decided to put the absurd idea to the test.
And so, in 1980 the first race got underway.

For 25 years the horses defeated the men, until in 2004 a man named Huw Lobb defeated the horse.
It took him two hours, five minutes and 19 seconds, and he won
£ 25,000 – a prize that grew every year by a thousand pounds until a man won a race.
Huw Lobb was an experienced but unprofessional amateur marathon runner. He works as a management consultant in his day job.

Till this day only two men have managed to beat the horse – in 2007 another man named Florian Holzinger won the race in two hours, 20 minutes and 30 seconds.

In recent years no less than 50 horses and 500 runners have participated in the eccentric competition.

Source:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_versus_Horse_Marathon


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Oreos are now sure to be here in case of an apocalypse

Many of you may have already heard of The Svalbard Global Seed Vault (wikipedia) is a secure seed bank on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen in the remote Arctic Svalbard archipelago which gives hope in the event of extinction. This is great if you want fruits or vegetables, BUT what happens if there is an apocalypse and all you really want are cookies?

Well, right “across the road” the Oreo company also bought some land and set up its own Safe/Vault – the Oreo safe.
It is significantly smaller, and contains only the recipe itself and a some cookies.

The cookies are wrapped and stored in a special polyester that can withstand temperatures of -62 to 150 degrees Celsius and are impervious to certain chemical reactions, moisture and air.

So if there really is chaos in the world, you will always be able to find the cookies!

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The Literal Meaning of Cameroon is – Shrimp

Cameron’s name (the country) means shrimp.

In the 15th century the Portuguese discovered the area and called it “Rio de Camarões”, which means the shrimp river, because of the huge amounts of Shrimps found in the local rivers.

source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cameroon


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The perfect Nazi

The German who appears in the photo is not just a German soldier, but a soldier whose photo appeared at the beginning of World War II in the daily press in Nazi Germany with the caption “The ideal German soldier”. Later, this photo was also used as part of a recruitment posters for the Nazi army. A blond, blue-eyed and handsome soldier – the Nazi ideal.

The soldier’s name was Werner Goldberg, and his father was Jewish.

In 1940 Goldberg was expelled from the Nazi army, when a new order of Adolf Hitler also banned the service of someone who was half-Jewish. Goldberg survived the war, along with his father (whom Goldberg rescued at some point from deportation to the notorious dath camp – Auschwitz), and even became a member of the city council of Berlin in his adulthood.

Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Werner_Goldberg

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About 20% of all Muslims are Arabs

Only about 20% of the Muslims in the world are Arabs.
It is often a habit of people to associate Islam with Arabs or with Arab countries. Indeed, Muhammad, the founder of the Islamic religion, came from Saudi Arabia. However, Out of all the Muslims living in the world, only about 20% of them are from Arab countries. The rest live in non-Arab countries like Indonesia, Iran, Turkey, Pakistan, India etc.

Bonus fact:
The country with the largest population of Muslims is Indonesia (about 13% of all Muslims in the world) with roughly 225 million Muslims.