› added 6 years ago

83

TIL That in the Ukrainian language, the word Chernobyl: "чорнобиль" means wormwood. In the Book of Revelation, Wormwood is the fallen star that poisons the waters of the earth.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

rL7y TIL on March 9-10, 1945, 300 B29 bombers dropped nearly 500,000 cylinders of napalm and petroleum jelly on Tokyo creating a 40-sq-km firestorm that killed over 100,000 and maimed another million. It was the most destructive single bombing in history, including Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs.
OJZX TIL a graduate student invented a leaf made of silk that produces oxygen.
X0m6D TIL: Mistletoe, commonly seen during Christmas with people kissing under it, is a parasitic plant that kills trees and produces poisonous berries.
GYw5j TIL The world suffered an invasion of cloned crayfish. Marbled crayfish were first discovered in 1995. Since they can clone themselves, people who bought them as pets ended up dumping their unwanted extra crayfish into rivers. There are now clone colonies all over the world
e0lgg TIL that the Chicago Cubs and the Atlanta Braves are the two oldest teams in major league baseball, both having been founded the same year as the Battle of the Little Bighorn.