› added 10 years ago

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TIL that the London Underground has its own implementation of the KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System), where the platforms are actually uphill from the surrounding track, so that the Kinetic Energy is turned into Gravitational Potential Energy, and recovered when the train leaves the station.

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ndJ9 TIL A woodpeckers tongue wraps around its head to prevent it from getting headaches when slamming its face into trees
LQ6OZ TIL the name of emperor Charlemagne is just "Charles the Great" written in Old French and run together as one word.
pdx4 TIL that Al-Qaeda has a 5-phase strategy, culminating in the collapse of the US economy due to military overextension. 4 phases are complete.
wLY5M TIL of the Idiot Plot, defined by Roger Ebert, where a story is only happening because all of the characters involved are being idiots (not sharing key info, jumping to assumptions, etc)
ZLJ4 TIL that Sri Lanka and India were connected as recently as the 15th century by a chain of limestone shoals known as “Adam’s Bridge”