World Record Facts

A forest of 47,000 aspen trees in Utah is actually one single organism. Every trunk connects underground to the same root system. The colony is called Pando, and it covers 106 acres. It weighs an estimated 6,000 metric tons - one of the heaviest living things ever found. That root system may be up to 16,000 years old. One tree. 80 football fields.

Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager flew a plane built by volunteers in a Mojave Desert hangar. On takeoff, the fuel-heavy wings scraped the runway and the winglets broke off. They kept flying anyway. Nine days, three minutes and 44 seconds later, they landed after circling the entire globe nonstop. They had just 106 pounds of fuel left, only 1.5% of what they took off with. The plane now hangs in the Smithsonian.

A 61-year-old potato farmer named Cliff Young showed up at the inaugural 875km Sydney-to-Melbourne ultramarathon in work boots and overalls. The professional runners laughed - then slept the first night. Young had no idea runners were supposed to sleep, so he just kept going. He won by 10 hours. He gave $7,000 of his $10,000 prize to the other five finishers.

Antoni Gaudi died on June 10, 1926, struck by a tram on the way to his daily confession. On June 10, 2026 - exactly 100 years later - Pope Leo XIV blessed the Tower of Jesus Christ atop the Sagrada Familia, making it the world's tallest church at 172.5 meters. Construction had taken 144 years.

Methuselah, an Australian lungfish at San Francisco's Steinhart Aquarium, has lived in the same tank since November 1938 - before World War II began. DNA analysis in 2023 estimated her age at between 92 and 101 years old, making her the oldest living aquarium fish in the world. She still gets belly rubs from her keepers and her favorite treat is fresh figs.