10 Facts that Sound Exaggerated but are Actually True!


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Sometimes we read something on the internet that makes us wonder if they are completely made up. Most of the time, your gut instincts are right, but not today. For example, take the case of Mike the Headless Chicken who, in the mid-1940’s, lived for almost 18 months without a head. Sounds unreal, doesn’t it? Well, believe it or not, it’s true. This list is about facts that seem implausible but are actually true. Below are some of the most surprising facts that sound so weird, you might think they’re fake.

1. The Guinness Book of World Records was created to settle bar arguments.

The Guinness Book of World Records was created to settle bar arguments, facts, exaggerated
Image: Scott Warman

There are many stories of people breaking unusual world records to get their names in the Guinness Book of World Records. The annual book that catalogs all achievements was actually invented to settle arguments, such as whether the golden plover or the red grouse is the fastest game bird in Europe. Sir Hugh Beaver, the Managing Director of the Guinness Brewery, saw that accurate answers were hard to find to trivias and arguments within bars. So, in 1955, the Guinness Book of World Records was born to settle all kinds of disputes.

2. A typical cumulus cloud weighs about 1.1 million pounds.

cumulus clouds, weight, fact, facts, earth, nature
Image: Aditya Vyas

The first thing that goes through your mind is, “How do you even measure the weight of a cloud?”. In 2013, Peggy LeMone, a senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, did the math for us and discovered that an average cumulus cloud has a water density of half a gram per cubic meter and a volume of one billion cubic meters. Next, by measuring the cloud’s shadow, when the sun is directly above it, the width of the cloud can be obtained. According to Peggy, a typical cumulus cloud is about a kilometer across, and usually roughly cubical—so a kilometer long and a kilometer tall, too. Thus, a single cloud is one billion cubic meters in volume.

To put things into perspective, Peggy says that a single cumulus cloud weighs as much as 100 elephants, and if you are more of a dinosaur person, that’s 33 apatosauruses. So, how does a cloud that big and heavy float above us? It’s because the weight is not concentrated, rather spread out among trillions of really tiny water droplets over a really big space.




3. Pineapples take about two years to grow.

pineapples, grow, nature, fruit, fruits, foodie
Image: Maria Fernanda

Whether you like pineapples on your pizza or not, it doesn’t change the fact that pineapples are slow growing Bromeliads that take around 2 years to grow. The plants can take a long time to flower and set fruit and they are only capable of producing a few edible fruits before withering away. Pineapple plants yield a minimum of three fruits during their lifetime, before needing to be replaced. The naturally growing plant can be planted indoors or outdoors but indoor ones are more likely to produce only one or two fruits in their lifetime.

4. Scientists who work with cockroaches often become allergic to pre-ground coffee and chocolate.

Scientists who work with cockroaches often become allergic to preground coffee and chocolate
Image: Pixabay

According to entomologist Douglas Emlen, cockroaches are known to find their way into stored coffee beans. When industries prepare to grind the beans, the process of extracting roaches from the beans becomes an extremely difficult task. Although there are efforts made to remove them completely, successfully removing them all is impossible. This is why the US Food and Drug Administration allows a certain amount of “insect filth” to be included in coffee and other foods; as long as it does not exceed a pre-established amount.

It’s actually pretty common for researchers to develop acute allergies to the specimens they study. Entomologists who study cockroaches can become allergic to them, thus making them susceptible to coffee and chocolate since the food items are known to have cockroaches grinded within them.

5. One teaspoon of a neutron star is equal to the weight of about 900 Pyramids of Giza.

neutron star, space, universe
Image: Penn State University

Neutron stars are interesting objects that are born from once-large stars, they then become almost eight times the size of the sun, before exploding in catastrophic supernovae. The explosion releases the star’s outer layers into space but the core remains intact; but no longer produces nuclear fusion. Since the core is lacking on fusion reaction, the star can no longer counterbalance gravity’s inward pull, thus causing it to collapse upon itself.

According to National Geographic, the small core itself is nearly 1.5 times the mass of our sun and just a small sugar cube of neutron star matter would weigh about one hundred million tons on Earth.




6. There are more captive tigers in the US than wild ones in the rest of the world.

There are more captive tigers in the US than wild ones in the rest of the world, tigers, US, captivity
Image: Humphrey Muleba

According to the World Wildlife Fund and Global Tiger Forum, there are roughly 3,890 tigers in the wild today. The US government and conservation groups estimate that there are almost 10,000 tigers living in the US; either in zoos or privately owned. Several exotic animals such as tigers are not covered by the 1973 Endangered Species Act, allowing people to keep them as pets as long as they are not taken from the wild. These animals are either bought from irresponsible breeders or cub petting industries within America. It is estimated that Texas, a conservative state, alone has between 2,000 and 5,000 tigers as pets.

7. The US Geological Survey estimates that China used more cement in three years — between 2011 and 2013 — than the US did in the entire 20th century.

The US Geological Survey estimates that China used more cement in three years — between 2011 and 2013 — than the US did in the entire 20th century, China, concrete, cement, country
Image: Usukhbayar

The fact that China used more cement in three years than the entire US did during the 20th century, stunned Bill Gates. Even though it’s hard to believe, China’s economy has grown at an extraordinary rate, and China also has four times the population of the US. China and the US are roughly the same size in terms of geographic area, but statistics show that during the 20th century, the US used up to around 4.4 gigatons of cement, whereas China used around 6.4 gigatons of cement in the three years of 2011, 2012 and 2013.

8. A large percentage of U.S. currency bears traces of cocaine on it.

money, drugs, dollars
Image: Jeremy Paige

It is true that a large percentage of the US currency is tainted by the drug, not necessarily because it was once in the hands of a drug dealer. Neither have those bills been used to snort cocaine. The fine powdery substance can easily pass from one bill to another through ATM’s, sorting or counting machines. While ATM’s only contribute a small amount to spreading the drug, counting machines in banks and casinos play a big role. While it’s hard to accurately predict the amount of cocaine laced bills, a third to a half of all random samples of $50 and $100 bills tested, bore traces of cocaine.




9. In 1958, the US Air Force lost a nuclear bomb somewhere off the coast of Georgia.

Georgia, bomb, lost, US Air Force
Image: Wikimedia

We’ve heard stories of huge airliners going missing and being discovered years later, but have you ever heard of a nuclear bomb going missing (and never being found)? On February 5, 1958, an F-86 fighter jet accidentally collided with a B-47 that was carrying a nuclear bomb. Howard Richardson, who was flying the B-47 with the bomb, was also carrying two passengers onboard for a training mission. The fighter pilots plane’s radar failed to pick up the B-47; causing it to descend directly above it.

The impact caused the F-86 to lose a wing, while damaging the fuel tank of the B-47. Richardson feared that upon landing, the nuclear bomb would detonate, so he ditched the bomb in the water before landing the plane at Hunter Air Force Base outside Savannah. The B-47 landed safely and the US Navy immediately started a search and recovery effort. The search continued for two months but the bomb was never discovered. In 20o1, a report was released, which explains that even if the bomb was to detonate, the risk associated with the spread of heavy metals is low. In 2004, retired Air Force pilot Derek Duke detected high radiation in shallow water off the coast of Savannah. Although officials investigated, they determined that the radiation readings were normal for the naturally occurring minerals in the area.

10. About 7% of all humans who have ever lived are alive today.

cemetery, fact, facts
Image: Neil Thomas

According to the Population Reference Bureau, more than 108 billion people have been born on Earth. The current global population of about 7.5 billion means those of us currently alive represent about 7 percent of the total number of humans who have ever lived. PRB also estimates that by 2050, the human population will be 9.9 billion; which means that about 113 billion people will have ever lived on Earth.




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