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TIL about the USS Oriskany Fire wherein a sailor panicked after accidentally igniting a magnesium flare then tossing it back into the locker filled with 250 flares. This resulted in the death of 44 with 156 injured and nearly sank the aircraft carrier

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M4GV TIL in 2005, a woman performing her first solo skydive jump of 10000 ft survived a parachute malfunction which caused her to slam face first into a parking lot at 50 MPH. During surgery doctors discovered she was pregnant. She made a full recovery and the baby was fine.
QJQdp TIL about "The Whole Shabangs" potato chips, available almost exclusively from US Prison system commissaries. Ex-cons consider these chips to be the best chip out there, and a high-point of their incarceration. Many end up dismayed and disappointed at their lack of availability "on the outside".
VMJeG TIL that the heist in Die Hard with a Vengance was so plausible that the FBI questioned the screenwriter leading to the Federal Reserve changing their security protocal.
YpAjd TIL in 1965, a Swedish student was told by his fiancée in East Germany that she would never be able to leave the country to live with him in Sweden. Undeterred, he took flying lessons for a year, illegally flew a Cessna from Austria into Czechoslovakia, smuggled her out, and married her in Sweden
nGE7 TIL that a Stanford study found a high correlation between walking and creative thought output. Compared to sitting, those who walked demonstrated a 60 percent increase in creative thought output, regardless of walking outside or on a treadmill in a blank room.