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TIL the CIA once called an assassination team the Health Alteration Committee to "incapacitate" an Iraqi Colonel

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gM6Wb TIL of Chad Varah—a priest who started the first suicide hotline in 1953 after the first funeral he conducted early in his career was for a 14-year-old girl who took her own life after having no one to talk to when her first period came and believed she’d contracted an STD.
0drmp TIL Elton John's moving song "Someone Saved My Life Tonight" was written as a tribute to a friend who talked him out of suicide and helped him come to terms with his homosexuality. The friend was musician Long John Baldry more well known nowadays for voicing Dr. Robotnik in the 90s Sonic cartoon.
nWlm9 TIL In 1966, the United States Air Force lost 4 hydrogen bombs above Palomares (Spain) after a midair collision. Two of these bombs spreaded radioactive material, including plutonium-239, over a wide area. A large amount of contaminated Spanish soil was removed, packed up, and ship to the US.
7rRpM TIL that American employees at large-sized companies (1000 or more employees) only spend 45 percent of their time actually "working"—that is, time spent on primary job duties and not on meetings, administrative tasks, and interruptions.
9xkp TIL more rain falls on a Saturday than any other day, thanks to a seven-day dust cycle caused by traffic and industrial activity during the working week. Since Nature doesn’t generally follow 7 day patterns, they’re a human invention.