SortStack #2650 — 2033-09-10

By duration · Order from shortest to longest.

1. An average human's reaction to a starting gun 252 ms

   Athletics rules treat any sprint start faster than 100 milliseconds as a false start — it's considered humanly impossible to react that quickly.

2. Half-time in a football (soccer) match 15 min

   The break exists partly thanks to early English schools with different rules — teams switched codes at the interval when playing each other.

3. A flight from London to New York 8.2 h

   Flying west against the jet stream adds about an hour versus the return leg — eastbound flights have surfed the tailwind to under 5 hours.

4. The 1900 Paris Olympic Games 167 days

   Spread thinly through the World's Fair, the Games were so disorganized that some winners died never knowing they had been Olympians.

5. An African elephant's pregnancy 1.8 years

   The longest gestation of any land mammal produces a 100 kg calf that can walk within hours — and is looked after by the whole herd.

6. The Ottoman Empire 622.7 years

   Founded before the printing press, it ended after the airplane — the empire spanned 623 years and three continents at its height.

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