› added 6 years ago

91

TIL that in 1989, a pilotless Soviet Air Force jet fighter crashed into a house in Belgium, killing one person. The pilot had ejected over an hour earlier over Poland after experiencing technical problems.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

a8vNL TIL that Carlo Urbani, an Italian Microbiologist, was the first to identify SARS-COV-1 in Vietnam and report it to the WHO as a dangerous new pathogen. Urbani himself died of SARS himself shortly after, having triggered a rapid response to a potential pandemic, and saving many lives.
D1Qmg TIL Burj Khalifa (tallest building in the world) was built by Samsung!
rXro TIL Quentin Tarantino offered to direct ‘Casino Royale’ with the film set it in the 50’s, make it in black and white and retain Pierce Brosnan as Bond
XENME TIL of a "body farm", where the decomposition of human corpses is studied by leaving bodies outside in a variety of topographic and climate conditions. There are facilities in US, Canada, Australia, India, and UK. Over 100 bodies are donated to the University of Tennessee facility alone every year.
yVXrl TIL backyard ultra, a type of ultramarathon where competitors must run 6.706 km within one hour, repeatedly. The last runner to complete a lap is declared the winner and the only finisher, with all others receiving a "DNF". The longest distance record is 110 laps, covering 737 km over five day.