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Bleep test – most participants

The most participants in a bleep test is 575 participants and was achieved by King George V School (Hong Kong), in Hong Kong, China, on 29 Arpil 2014. Out of the 587 participants who started, 575 successfully completed the required number of intervals.

Brightest bioluminescent bay

Mosquito Bay on the island of Vieques in Puerto Rico, USA, contains up to 700,000 tiny dinoflagellates per gallon (4.5 litres) of water. When agitated, these microscopic organisms (Pyrodinium bahamense, ‘whirling fire’) react by flashing a blue-green light for about one-tenth of a second. The island boasts other bioluminescent bays, but Mosquito Bay is the brightest – its narrow mouth prevents the dinoflagellates from being washed out to sea, and decaying mangrove swamps provide them with plentiful food.

Brightest asteroid

The brightest asteroid is 4Vesta (discovered on 29 March 1807). It is the only asteroid visible to the naked eye. This is due to a combination of the brightness of its surface, its size (576 km, 357.9 miles across), the brightness of its surface and the fact that it can approach Earth as as close as 177 million km (110 million miles). It can reach a maximum apparent magnitude of 5.0 as viewed from the Earth, about as bright as the faintest stars visible by Continue reading →

Busiest port for cargo volume

According to the Maritime Port Authority of Singapore, in 2009 a total of 472 million tonnes (1,040 billion lb) of cargo passed through the port of Singapore, making it the world’s busiest. Containerised cargo accounted for 263 million tonnes (580 billion lb), with oil (177 million tonnes or 390 billion lb) accounting for the second largest portion. The remainder consisted of ‘conventional’ and non-oil bulk cargo.

Busiest morgue

The Salt River Morgue, Cape Town, South Africa, handled more than 30,000 cadavers in 1998. Almost 4,000 of these dead bodies have untraceable identities and are often the victims of violent crime. All cadavers undergo an autopsy and the nameless corpses are buried in plots marked with numbers.

Busiest gondola lift

The busiest gondola lift operator is Hakone Ropeway Co., Ltd. (Japan), which carried 2,064,241 paying passengers in the fiscal year 2009. The service operates 4 km (2.5 miles) from Sounzan Station to Togendai Station in Hakone, Kanagawa, Japan. The service started in Hakone, one of the most popular resorts in Japan, in 1959. It takes approximately 30 minutes to go each way.

Busiest station

Shinjuku Station in Tokyo, Japan, is the world’s busiest station. An average of 3.64 million passengers per day pass through the station, which has over 200 exits and serves the city’s western suburbs via a range of intercity, commuter rail and metro services.

Busiest shipping lane

The Dover Strait is the world’s busiest shipping lane. 500-600 ships a day pass through the narrow strait between the UK and France. Cargoes include oil from the Middle-East to European ports, and various commodities from North and South America to European customers. In 1999, 1.4 billion tonnes gross, carried by 62,500 vessels passed through the Dover Strait. The Malacca Straits, off the Malaysian peninsula, is believed to handle more traffic (vessels), but less tonnage. Figures from other areas of the globe (i.e. Malacca, Gibraltar, Continue reading →