› added 10 years ago

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TIL Japan’s flagship high-speed line, the Tokaido Shinkansen, has operated for almost half a century without a single derailment or collision, and in 2007, its average departure delay was a mere 18 seconds along its 320-mile route.

OoDw1 TIL about Lt Commander Joseph Vaghi. He was an US Beachmaster during the invasion of Normandy on D-Day, acting as a "traffic cop" orienting the landing troops. Giving orders under heavy machine gun fire, he ran into an old classmate, who asked him, "Hi Joe, what the hell are you doing here?"
4kdjJ TIL about “sex offenders island”. Washington’s McNeil Island houses 214 sex offenders too dangerous to be released following prison. Annual reviews for release include a penile plethysmography, a tool designed to measure sexual arousal.
grlGA TIL that in the late 1800s, many farmers in the American midwest believed that strong vibrations in the air helped rainclouds form, akin to shaking the branches of a wet tree. This led many to set off dynamite explosives at high altitudes in order to bring rain for their crops.
gME58 TIL Iran's Queen Tadj ol-Molouk played an important part in the abolition of the veil in Iran during the reign of her husband. She was the first Iranian Queen to show herself in public when she attended a gradation ceremony in modern clothes with her two daughters, without veils
oBlBL TIL that Hong Kong is not the only ex-British colony in China. Weihai (formerly Weiheiwei/Port Edward) was also once an ex-British colony in China from 1898 - 1930