SortStack #1299 — 2029-12-29

By duration · Order from shortest to longest.

1. One full rotation of the London Eye 30 min

   It moves so slowly — about 0.9 km/h — that it usually doesn't stop to let passengers on; you simply step into the moving capsule.

2. A standard university lecture 50 min

   Attention research suggests student focus starts lapsing after 10-15 minutes — which is roughly when most lecturers are just warming up.

3. Alcock and Brown's first nonstop transatlantic flight 16 h

   The 1919 crossing ended nose-first in an Irish bog they mistook for a meadow. Brown had climbed onto the wings mid-flight to chip off ice.

4. A frilled shark's pregnancy 3.5 years

   At an estimated three and a half years, it's the longest known gestation of any vertebrate — embryos grow just over a centimetre a month.

5. The time since the last woolly mammoths died out 4K years

   A dwarf population survived on Wrangel Island until about 2000 BC — meaning mammoths were alive while the Giza pyramids were already centuries old.

6. The age of the Lascaux cave paintings 17K years

   Four teenagers and a dog named Robot found the caves in 1940 — visitor breath damaged the art so badly that today tourists see a replica.

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