RANDOM FACT #28 - Over 230 TEETH Were Removed From a Boy in India...

That's a lot of teeth! And we complain when we have to remove one or two. 
Every major news site and more was carrying this story at the time in 2014...

Composite odontoma is a rare defect in humans in which a benign tumor forms in the mouth, generally as a result of the abnormal growth of a single tooth, causing additional teeth to form within the tumor. Most cases have been found in the upper jaw of patients. Unchecked growth of the tumor can make swallowing and eating difficult, and can also lead to grotesque facial swelling.

In most cases, surgery is required to remove the extra teeth and tumorous tissue. Prior to 2014, the maximum recorded number of teeth removed in such an operation was 37. However, in July 2014 Ashiq Gavai, a 17-year-old boy in India, suffered from an extreme case of composite odontoma in his lower jaw, which required the removal of more than 232 teeth altogether. The surgery was performed by Dr. Sunanda Dhiware, head of Mumbai's JJ Hospital's dental department in India.

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According to the BBC, the teenager had been suffering for 18 months with this condition before travelling to the city from his village seeking help, after local doctors failed to identify the cause of the problem.

Doctors have described his condition as "very rare" and "a world record".

"At first, we couldn't cut it out so we had to use the basic chisel and hammer to take it out.
"Once we opened it, little pearl-like teeth started coming out, one-by-one. Initially, we were collecting them, they were really like small white pearls. But then we started to get tired. We counted 232 teeth," she added.

The surgery conducted involved two surgeons and two assistants.

Ashik now has 28 teeth.

Source(s): wikipedia | bbc

RANDOM FACT #27 - The CIA Once Used a WIRED-UP Cat to Spy on the Russians...

Everyone likes to eavesdrop on everyone else but at what lengths are willing to go through?
Thanks to some (partially) declassified documents in 2001 from the CIA's Science and Technology Directorate, one can get an idea of just how far. Back in the 60s, the CIA attempted to train a surgically altered cat, wired with transmitting and control devices, to become a mobile, eavesdropping platform...

RANDOM FACT#26 - Silbury Hill is the TALLEST Prehistoric Man-made MOUND in Europe...

RANDOM FACT#25 - ASBESTOS was Once Used in Movies as FAKE SNOW

RANDOM FACT#24 - Texas' LAST MEAL was ABOLISHED after a REALLY HUGE Last Meal Request NEVER GOT EATEN!

RANDOM FACT #23 - There's an actual WORD for 'The day after tomorrow"...

Now whether anyone in the Western world uses such a word today - if ever, is a whole other story!

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RANDOM FACT #22 - The Most LIGHTNING-STRUCK Place on Earth Occurs Over THIS LAKE

RANDOM FACT #21 - An American Dad Named His Sons 'WINNER' and 'LOSER'

RANDOM FACT #20 - The LARGEST STONE Ever MOVED BY MAN Weighed 1250 Tonnes

RANDOM FACT #19 - A Bible Published in 1631 was Called the WICKED BIBLE

RANDOM FACT #18 - In some Countries, ANESTHESIA is REQUIRED Before Performing Surgery on Octopuses

RANDOM FACT #17 - Mosquitoes KILL MORE HUMANS than any other Animals in History

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When it comes to killing humans, no other animal even comes close:

The word "mosquito" is Spanish for "little fly". Thousands of species feed on the blood of various kinds of hosts, mainly vertebrates, including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and even some kinds of fish. Some mosquitoes also attack invertebrates, mainly arthropods. Though the loss of blood is seldom of any importance to the victim, the saliva of the mosquito often causes an irritating rash that is a serious nuisance. Much more serious though, are the roles of many species of mosquitoes as vectors of diseases. In passing from host to host, some transmit extremely harmful infections such as malaria, yellow fever, west Nile virus, dengue fever, filariasis, and other arboviruses, rendering it the deadliest animal family in the world.

Source | Source

RANDOM FACT #15 - The First-Ever SELFIE Was Taken Back in 1839 by an American Chemist

RANDOM FACT #11 - THERE'S A TREE THAT GROWS 40 KINDS OF FRUITS

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Artist rendition

Sam Van Aken, an artist and professor at Syracuse University, uses "chip grafting" to create trees that each bear 40 different varieties of stone fruits, or fruits with pits. The grafting process involves slicing a bit of a branch with a bud from a tree of one of the varieties and inserting it into a slit in a branch on the "working tree," then wrapping the wound with tape until it heals and the bud starts to grow into a new branch. Over several years he adds slices of branches from other varieties to the working tree. In the spring the "Tree of 40 Fruit" has blossoms in many hues of pink and purple, and in the summer it begins to bear the fruits in sequence—Van Aken says it's both a work of art and a time line of the varieties' blossoming and fruiting. He's created more than a dozen of the trees that have been planted at sites such as museums around the U.S., which he sees as a way to spread diversity on a small scale.

Primarily composed of native and antique varieties the Tree of 40 Fruit preserves heirloom stone fruit varieties that are not commercially produced or available.

Source(s): youtube | treeof40fruit

RANDOM FACT #10 - THE CHAINSAW WAS ORIGINALLY USED IN THE AID OF CHILDBIRTH

RANDOM FACT #9 - THERE'S A PENCIL YOU CAN GROW - AFTER YOU'RE DONE WITH IT

RANDOM FACT #8 - TAKING A SHOWER DURING A THUNDERSTORM CAN BE DANGEROUS

RANDOM FACT #7 - Planet PLUTO WAS NAMED BY AN 11-YEAR-OLD GIRL FROM ENGLAND

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After the discovery of the planet Pluto was made in 1930 by 23-year-old Kansan, Clyde Tombaugh, at the Lowell Observatory, the news made headlines around the globe. The Lowell Observatory, which had the right to name the new object, received over 1,000 suggestions from all over the world, ranging from Atlas to Zymal.

The name Pluto, after the god of the underworld, was proposed by Venetia Burney (1918–2009), a then eleven-year-old schoolgirl in Oxford, England, who was interested in classical mythology. She suggested it in a conversation with her grandfather Falconer Madan, a former librarian at the University of Oxford's Bodleian Library, who passed the name to astronomy professor Herbert Hall Turner, who cabled it to colleagues in the United States.

The object was officially named on 24 March 1930. Each member of the Lowell Observatory was allowed to vote on a short-list of three: Minerva (which was already the name for an asteroid), Cronus (which had lost reputation through being proposed by the unpopular astronomer Thomas Jefferson Jackson See), and Pluto. Pluto received every vote. The name was announced on 1 May 1930. Upon the announcement, Madan gave Venetia £5 (equivalent to 300 GBP, or 450 USD in 2015) as a reward.

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RANDOM FACT #6 - The "EIGHT-THOUSANDERS" IS THE TERM GIVEN TO THE 14 INDEPENDENT MOUNTAINS ON EARTH THAT ARE...

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All eight-thousanders are located in the Himalayan and Karakoram mountain ranges in Asia. They are the mountains whose summits are in the death zone -  altitudes above a certain point where the amount of oxygen is insufficient to sustain human life.

The world’s tallest mountains are perilous containing towering blocks of ice that can crush climbers in seconds. They are known for their tremendous avalanches of rock and snow that can wipe out entire expeditions. And they are home to spider webs of ice crevasses that swallow humans whole. Even during the summer, average daytime temperatures are frigid. And, hurricane-force winds are common.

These photographs from theInternational Space Station show Annapurna and Manaslu (top) and the central Karakoram, the highest concentration of 8,000-meter mountains on Earth. (Astronaut photographs ISS025-E-011510 andISS037-E-017916 courtesy NASA/JSC Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth)

Then, of course, there is the lack of oxygen. At 5,000 meters (16,404 feet), the atmosphere contains about half as much oxygen as at sea level. By 6,000 meters (19,685 feet), the air is so thin that full acclimatization is no longer possible. No matter how fit, climbers begin to slowly suffocate. By 7,000 meters (22,966 feet), survival times plummet and lucid thought becomes difficult. By 8,000 meters—the so-called “death zone”—even the strongest climbers can survive for a few days at best.

The three most dangerous of the eight-thousanders—Annapurna, K2, and Nanga Parbat—claim the life of about one climber for every four who reach the top. The fatality rate for Annapurna, the most dangerous mountain in the world, is over 30 percent. Bottled oxygen and guided climbs have made Mount Everest much safer than it was decades ago, but the world’s tallest mountain still takes lives regularly. Nine people died on the mountain in 2013. Ten in 2012.



Source | Source

RANDOM FACT #5 - DURING WORLD WAR II, THE BOARD GAME MONOPOLY WAS DISTRIBUTED TO PRISONERS OF WAR CONTAINING SECRET ITEMS TO HELP THEM ESCAPE.