› added 12 years ago

163

TIL that One-third of the world’s smokers are Chinese, amounting to a smoking population greater than the entire population of the United States.

Read more livestrong.com

via reddit.com

kOjDd TIL Miners would inhale aluminum powder to coat their lungs and "prevent" silica based diseases, resulting in many suffering from ALS today.
4Jmo TIL after days of hiding it from the world, Soviet was forced to acknowledge the Chernobyl disaster after an engineer at a power plant 1000miles away in Sweden surprisingly noticed radiation on his shoes on his way INTO the plant. They traced the wind patterns and reported the location of the source
vb7L TIL Hans-Ulrich Rudel is the only person to be awarded the “Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds”, the highest a soldier could achieve; he flew 2,530 combat missions and was shot down or forced to land 32 times, several times behind enemy lines.
nWj97 TIL some skyscrapers have 150 ton swinging balls at the top for stability, equivalent to 30 elephants
XAxj TIL in the Great Plague in England, sufferers in a village called Eyam decided to quarantine themselves instead of running elsewhere. 260 out of 350 died, but their actions saved 1000s of others.