› added 10 years ago

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TIL the European Space Agency and EU are currently deploying an alternative to GPS, called “Galileo”. As well as being accurate to 1cm, it will also have a “Search and Rescue Service”, where distress signals can be picked up from anywhere on Earth. The full system will be completed by 2019.

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p8ZRb TIL that The Japanese marathon runner Shizo Kanakuri lost consciousness while taking a break during the 1912 Olympic marathon in Stockholm. In 1967 the Swedes invited him to return and finish the race. His final time was 54 years, 8 months, 6 days, 5 hours, 32 minutes and 20.3 seconds.
Lk7XP TIL Jiddu Krishnamurti was revered as a prophet from childhood, but during a ceremony meant to establish his messianic status to the world he shocked his followers by renouncing his "coming", dissolving their organization, repudiating organized religion, and denouncing the concept of saviors.
oJoo TIL that grapefruit gets its name from growing in clusters, resembling a bushel of large, yellow grapes.
X0E9j TIL the most distant individual star we've ever seen, Earendel, was detected because of a chance alignment of the Hubble telescopes instruments and a huge galaxy cluster that warped space and acted as a gravitational lens.
5aPD TIL that we are living in the 6th Extinction Event and that humans are credited with causing it.