Post * 7daM — Curious Curator

› added 8 years ago

73

TIL that after a 1946 plane crash, Howard Hughes decided he did not like the design of the hospital bed he was laying in. He called in his engineers and had them design a new bed that would allow someone with severe burns to move freely. It became the prototype for the modern hospital bed.

Read more

XEr56 TIL the FBI built a multi-million dollar eavesdropping tunnel under the Soviet Embassy in Washington, but never used it in the fear of getting caught, instead giving tours of it to high-security officials. It was only discovered by the Soviets when US double-agent Robert Hanssen informed them.

JYogj TIL that it's safe to walk barefoot in New York City. Wounds to a naked foot are less severe as you feel a sharp object early enough to pull their foot back before it can penetrate too deeply. A barefoot enthusiast says: I've stepped on three nails, twice with boots and once without.Hurts either way

kOxym TIL The Quran allows coffee because it defines intoxicants as which “covers the intellect,” i.e., causes inebriation or drunkenness like beer, or euphoria such as cocaine or amphetamines.Caffeine is not an intoxicant in that sense, but rather only a mild stimulant and hence permissible

yVNVX TIL The dwarf planet Haumea, which orbits in the Kuiper Belt out beyond Neptune, is already unusual. It has a strange elongated shape, two moons and a day that lasts only 4 hours, making it the fastest-spinning large object in the solar system.

4XReg TIL that the last survivor of the Crimean War, which ended in 1856, died in 2004 at the age of 160. She was a female tortoise named Timothy who was a mascot for several British naval vessels during the war.