› added 4 years ago

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TIL that Tatooine was planned to be a jungle planet, but was changed because of the idea that spending months filming in the jungle would make Lucas "itchy".

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V9O8 TIL if you’re an American with over $4,436 in your bank account, you are already richer than 50% of Americans.
d8DD7 TIL in 1979, GIGN commandos briefly converted to Islam to advise and assist Saudi counterterror teams in seizing the Grand Mosque in Mecca, infidels not being permitted to step foot in the Holy City - the mosque had been taken over by an estimated 300 - 600 militants
Lk7Am TIL the HMAS Melbourne was initially sold for scrapping, however China bought the rights to scrap and instead fully documented and analyzed the designs for their own carrier program. Decommissioned in 1982, reports suggest it was not scrapped until 2002, having been used for training in those years.
MG78 TIL the Hualapai Tribe in Arizona agreed to allow the builder of the Grand Canyon Skywalk to operate it for 25 years to recoup his $30 million investment. In 2012, just 5 years after it opened, the tribe seized control of the Skywalk. They lost in court and now must pay the builder $28.5 million.
x68Q7 TIL: Fairyflies are very tiny insects, like most chalcidoid wasps, mostly ranging from 0.5 to 1.0 mm (0.020 to 0.039 in) long. They include the world's smallest known insect, with a body length of only 0.139 mm (0.0055 in), and the smallest known flying insect, only 0.15 mm (0.0059 in) long.