SortStack #158 — 2026-11-14
By duration · Order from shortest to longest.
- A single wingbeat of a hovering hummingbird 12.6 ms
Up to 80 wingbeats per second lets hummingbirds hover, fly backwards, and even fly upside down — no other bird can do all three.
- One heartbeat of a hummingbird in flight 48 ms
Hummingbird hearts can hit 1,260 beats per minute in flight, then crash to about 50 at night when the bird enters a hibernation-like torpor.
- James Cameron's film 'Titanic' 3.2 h
The movie runs longer than the actual sinking it depicts — the real ship went down faster than you can watch it go down.
- The Apollo 11 mission, launch to splashdown 8.1 days
Of the whole voyage, Armstrong and Aldrin spent barely 22 hours on the lunar surface — and only about two and a half walking on it.
- The Cold War 43.9 years
Historians call it 'the long peace' — the superpowers never fought each other directly, but proxy wars touched nearly every continent.
- The Hundred Years' War between England and France 116.6 years
Despite the name, it lasted 116 years (1337-1453), punctuated by long truces — and technically England and France stayed at war on paper even longer.