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Illustration by Holly Randall
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Arizona Daily Wildcat
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
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Things you always never wanted to know
The most extreme form of Siamese twins is known as dicephales tetrabrachius dipus - two heads, four arms and two legs. The only fully reported example of this is Masha and Dasha Krivoshlyapovy, who were born Jan. 3, 1950, and died within 17 hours of each other April 17, 2003, aged 53 years and 104 days.
At RAF Boscombe Down, Wiltshire, Aug. 2, 2003, Billy Baxter reached a speed of 164.87 mph while riding a 1200-cc Kawasaki Ninja motorcycle - blindfolded.
Curtis Rivers performed a bungee jump from a hot-air balloon at 15,200 feet over Puertollano, Spain, May 5, 2002.
Arulanantham Suresh Joachim of Sri Lanka balanced on one foot for 76 hours and 40 minutes at Uihara Maha Devi Park Open Air Stadium from May 22 to 25, 1997.
Vesna Vulovic was 23 years old and working as a Jugoslavenski Aerotransport hostess when the DC-9 she was working aboard blew up Jan. 26, 1972. Vulovic survived the fall inside a section of tail unit from 33,333 feet over Srbsk, Kamenice, Czechoslovakia (now Czech Republic), despite breaking many bones. She was in a coma for 27 days and remained in the hospital for 16 months.
The least spherical star in our galaxy studied to date is the southern star Acehnar (Alpha Eridani). Observations made in fall 2002 using the Very Large Telescope Interferometer at the European Southern Observatory's Paranal Observatory, in Atacama, Chile, have revealed that Achenar is spinning so rapidly that its equatorial diameter is more than 50 percent greater than its polar diameter.
Maurice Creswick of South Africa has donated blood for a record 59 consecutive years since 1944, giving his record 336th unit of blood July 9, 2003. Having given blood since turning 18 years old, he has donated a total of 50 gallons.
By the end of January 2004, ticket sales for the United Kingdom's National Lottery (launched in November 1994) reached the equivalent of $81 billion.
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