5,000 Awesome Facts (About Everything!) 3

5,000 Awesome Facts (About Everything!) 3 — page 7 — 15 FERRIS WHEEL FACTS The WORLD S FIRST Ferris wheel designed by engineer George Ferris for the Chicago World's Fair in 1893 cost 50 cents to ride and could hold MORE THAN 2 000 RIDERS at once Original Ferris wheels were turned by powerful STEAM ENGINES Most modern wheels run on ELECTRICITY You can ride a HUMAN POWERED Ferris wheel in India with park employees using their BODY WEIGHT to help turn the wheel The NEW YORK WHEEL will tower more than 60 STORIES over NEW YORK CITY making it one of the WORLD S TALLEST Ferris wheels 5 A roller coaster whips through the middle of the BIGO wheel in Tokyo Japan one of the only Ferris wheels to operate without a CENTER AXLE or SPOKES The PACIFIC WHEEL in Santa Monica California U S A is the only entirely SOLAR POWERED Ferris wheel on the PLANET The CAPTAIN WHEEL outside of Washington D C U S A is decorated with 1 6 million LED lights that CHANGE COLOR to the beat of MUSIC 8 Turkmenistan is home to the LARGEST ENCLOSED Ferris wheel in the world a 156 foot 47 5 m tall ride built inside a GLASS and MARBLE structure 8 5 000 AWESOME FACTS 3

5,000 Awesome Facts (About Everything!) 3 — page 8 — TO MAKE YOUR HEAD SPIN Despite being damaged during WORLD WAR II the 120 year old Wiener Riesenrad in VIENNA AUSTRIA still spins with 15 of its original 30 cars The TRANSPORTABLE Roue de Paris wheel that has popped up in PARIS ENGLAND BANGKOK and AMSTERDAM can be DISMANTLED in 60 HOURS and built in 72 HOURS Each year more than 3 7 MILLION PEOPLE take a spin on the LONDON EYE Europe's largest Ferris wheel built to mark the NEW MILLENNIUM in 2000 12 It takes 30 MINUTES to make a FULL ROTATION on the SINGAPORE FLYER a massive wheel that's nearly as tall as the WASHINGTON MONUMENT An artist created a PEDAL POWERED Ferris wheel powered by a TRIO OF RIDERS simultaneously pedaling to propel and rotate the ride The TIANJIN EYE looms large over a SIX LANE BRIDGE in northern China with cars and pedestrians PASSING BELOW the 394 FOOT 120 M wheel With a TIME DISPLAY at the center of a giant Ferris wheel the COSMO CLOCK 21 in Yokohama Japan can claim to be the world's LARGEST CLOCK YOU HAVE LEARNED 16 FACTS 5 000 AWESOME FACTS 39

5,000 Awesome Facts (About Everything!) 3 — page 9 — 75 THROW AWAY FACTS ABOUT TRASH 1 In 2012 Americans produced 251 million tons 227 7 million MT of household and business waste It would take 26 7 million garbage trucks to haul this amount of trash 19 Americans throw away enough trash to fill more than 73 000 garbage trucks every day THIERRE More than 100 cities and counties in the United States have passed legislation that bans the use of plastic bags in stores Plastiki a catamaran made from 12 500 recycled plastic water bottles sailed 8 000 miles 12 875 km from San Francisco California to Sydney Australia in a little more than four months in 2010 It takes 500 years for a Styrofoam cup to decompose About one out of every six big trucks in the United States is a garbage truck A man in Cancún Mexico used 150 000 plastic bottles to create the base for his own personal floating island One of the first journalists to interview J K Rowling threw away the copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone that was given to him during the interview A first edition of this book would now be worth about 40 000 6 People in the U S buy 29 billion bottles of water each year That's more plastic water bottles than any other country in the world The first garbage truck was invented by George Roby Dempster in 1935 18 The United Nations estimates that about one third of all the food produced every year worldwide never gets eaten 19 The Belaz 75710 is the biggest dump truck in the world It can haul a load of up to 504 tons 457 2 MT IN ONE YEAR AMERICANS DISPOSED OF MORE THAN 150 MILLION CELL PHONES THAT S ONE PERSON THROWING AWAY FIVE CELL PHONES EACH SECOND 20 Plastic debris at sea is carried away by ocean currents into large circulating whirlpools called gyres There are five major gyres in the world's oceans 8 San Francisco California U S A has the highest recycling rate of any city in that country 9 Studies show that the more repetitive your diet eating the same things day after day the less food you throw away 20 An anthropology professor in Tucson Arizona U S A started the Garbage Project He and his students studied the trash local residents threw away to learn more about society 0 It's estimated that 22 to 55 million tons 20 to 50 million MT of used electronics are thrown away worldwide each year 2 Landfills are made with plastic liners on the bottom to prevent any contamination from getting into the nearby groundwater 0 By studying what was discarded in ancient landfills archaeologists learn about the daily life of people in ancient civilizations 23 On your next car trip you might just be riding on top of used tires Tires are recycled to make asphalt for highways 12 A college student designed the recycling symbol in 1970 for a contest about raising awareness for the environment He won 2 500 for creating a logo that is now recognized worldwide 29 A 500 YEAR OLD WOODEN BED USED BY ENGLISH KING HENRY VII WAS FOUND DUMPED IN A PARKING LOT IN CHESTER ENGLAND 13 Recycling one million laptops saves the energy equivalent of the electricity used by 3 657 homes in the United States in one year 5 In 1997 the Great Pacific Garbage Patch a floating island composed of tiny pieces of plastic and other marine debris was discovered by a boat captain who was racing in a yacht competition 10 5 000 AWESOME FACTS 3

5,000 Awesome Facts (About Everything!) 3 — page 10 — 26 Floating plastic in the ocean harms marine life Sea turtles often eat plastic bags and albatrosses mistake small pieces of plastic as fish eggs and feed them to their young 39 Only one percent of Sweden's trash ends up in landfills The rest is either recycled or incinerated and converted into energy mostly for heating but also for lighting 3 A woman in New York City once discovered a stolen painting worth 1 million dollars in the trash Since 2011 an artist has sold more than 1 400 clear cubes full of trash picked from the streets of New York City Eat your veggies Why Fruits and vegetables are the most wasted kind of food worldwide Americans are composting almost five times as much yard waste today compared to what was composted in 1990 O Garbage collectors have a dangerous job In the United States it is ten times deadlier than most other jobs Every ton of mixed paper that is recycled can save the energy equivalent of 165 gallons 625 L of gasoline Glass is 100 percent recyclable and can be used over and over again 28 The founder of Adopt a Highway got the idea for this roadside litter pickup program when he was driving in his car and saw trash flying out of the back of a pickup truck in front of him The MIT Trash Track project followed where trash went after it was thrown away by using electronic location tags Some items traveled across the country before finally being disposed of A COMPANY IN CALIFORNIA U S A HAS CREATED GLU6 THE GLUE THAT SAVES PLANET EARTH THE GLUE TURNS RECYCLED STYROFOAM PRODUCTS LIKE TAKEOUT FOOD CONTAINERS AND CUPS INTO GLUE FOR CRAFTS The Mbeubeuss dump in Senegal Africa stretches over 432 acres 175 ha That would cover more than 4 000 basketball courts 29 Recycled plastic bottles are used to make the material that goes in backpacks or sleeping bags Trash buried in a landfill can take an incredibly long time to decompose because the trash is not exposed to air or water which helps it break down Landfills like this are called dry tombs A hotel in the Netherlands is called the Hotel Trash Deluxe But don't worry you won't be sleeping with trash Many of the hotel's decorations are crafted from recycled materials 30 John W Hammes invented the garbage disposal in 1927 He was looking for ways to make it easier for his wife to clean up the kitchen When there was a shortage of food during World War II the U S government started encouraging people to clean their plates with the motto Don't Waste It Each year on average an American family of four people throws away an amount of trash that weighs the same as a large sports utility vehicle SUV Since 1990 the Recology Solid Waste and Transfer Station in San Francisco California has sponsored an artist in residence The artist can use any discarded materials from the site to make art out of the trash 63 The United States makes up less than 5 percent of the world's population but creates 30 percent of the world's garbage Containers and packaging make up the largest portion of municipal waste 69 An artist created a seven foot 2 m tall statue of Optimus Prime of the Transformers out of old car parts 32 Frito Lay started packing SunChips in a bag that was 100 percent compostable The eco friendly bag came with a drawback it made a noise about as loud as a jackhammer when handled Lots of people turn old things into new ones One designer recycled an old suitcase into a double decker cat bed IN CANADA A GARBAGE DISPOSAL IS CALLED A GARBURATOR More than 95 percent of all food waste could have been composted 70 In Pakistan Oscar the Grouch's name is Akhtar and he lives in an oil barrel instead of a trash can In Turkey he lives in a basket and goes by the name of Kirpik Every year people in developed countries waste about the same amount of food that is produced in all of sub Saharan Africa 33 Recycling one ton 0 91 MT of aluminum cans saves the equivalent of 26 barrels of oil 3 Laid out end to end the amount of plastic bags Americans use each year would circle the Equator 1 330 times 16 Strong magnets are used at recycling centers and at landfills to sort out some metal objects A bioreactor landfill adds a controlled amount of air and water to the waste to speed up decomposition 3D WHILE MOST HALLOWEEN CANDY IS EATEN A LARGE AMOUNT OF VALENTINE S DAY CANDY IS THROWN OUT In Sweden recycling centers are located less than a quarter of a mile 300 m from any residential area Oops Not realizing a plastic bag of trash was part of an artwork display at the Tate Britain an art museum in London England an employee accidentally threw it away 12 An employee of a trash removal company found 16 500 worth of ancient Maya artifacts in a cardboard barrel in an apartment he was cleaning out 35 Solid waste can be combusted burned and turned into energy 60 The group Keep America Beautiful sponsors a Recycle Bowl competition for schools in the United States The winning school wins the national title of America's Top Recycling School 36 Composting is nature's way of recycling When organic waste is put into soil microorganisms break it down to simpler reusable parts 48 Some landfills capture methane gas emitted from the decaying garbage and convert it into power A documentary movie about people who pick through trash in a Rio de Janeiro Brazil landfill was nominated for an Oscar in 2011 7 Residents of New York City throw away more than three million tons 2 72 million MT of trash each year That amount of trash would weigh more than 13 000 Statues of Liberty 19 In the 19th century pigs would roam the streets of big cities like Washington D C to eat food scraps residents threw in the streets 61 When a manager at Harvard University saw all the furniture that was left behind when students moved out of the dorms he organized Harvard's Habitat for Humanity Annual Stuff Sale TUSED SCRAP PAPER AND METAL ARE TWO OF THE LARGEST U S EXPORTS BY VOLUME 38 According to the United Nations 1 46 billion tons 1 32 billion MT of trash are generated worldwide each year Only a fraction is recycled 50 To cut down on waste and washing up and to encourage people to be eco conscious some restaurants have started charging diners for any food left on their plates Mount Trashmore in Virginia Beach Virginia U S A was one of the first landfills to be made into a city park after the landfill was filled up and closed B A ski slope is being constructed on top of a high efficiency waste to energy plant in Copenhagen Denmark YOU HAVE LEARNED 91 FACTS 5 000 AWESOME FACTS

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