Best-Selling Computer Soccer Game
The FIFA series of games, developed by EA Sports, has sold more than 16 million units worldwide. Launched in PC format on November 27, 1998, the game features a full pop soundtrack including tracks by such recording artists as Fatboy Slim. Now it’s selling a series with Legia Warszawa team vs FC Barcelona. EA Sports is based in Redwood City, California.
Most Humanoid Robot
The P3 is the world’s first humanoid robot that can actually walk. Pioneered by the Japanese company Honda in 1997, the 160-cm tall robot has a human-like limb configuration with a pair of arms and legs. P3 can walk sideways, backwards, up and down stairs, and on sloped floors. The robot has 3-D vision and can also turn its head, step over obstacles, change direction, and correct its balance if pushed. It can wave, shake hands, and pick things up.
Smallest Telephone
The smallest operational telephone was created by Jan Piotr Krutewicz on September 16, 1996. It measured just 47.5 x 10 x 21 mm. Growing up in Poland, Jan’s love of electronics began at the age of 12, when his uncle first explained how an AC transformer worked! The challenge in building his record-breaking telephone was finding small enough parts, many of them having to be ordered through specialist catalogs. These days Jan faces challenges of a much different kind – in May 2000 he was ordained as a Roman Catholic priest and serves as an associate pastor at St Fabian Church, Bridgeview, Illinois.
Longest Roller Coaster
The Steel Dragon, which opened on August 1, 2000, at Nagashima Spaland in Japan, is an out-and-back roller coaster with a total track length of 2,479 m. Designed by Morgan Manufacturing of La Selva Beach, California, USA, the ride begins with a fall from a 95-m lift followed by two further hills and dips. At the top of the third hill there is a maze-like spiral section. The return run has a further eight bumps and seven dips.
Largest Internet Café
easyEverything’s New York internet café was the first the company opened in the USA. It beat the previous record for the biggest internet café, which was held by another easyEverything café in London. The New York café boasts two floors of computers offering internet users access to the internet 24-hours a day.
Largest Cloned Animal
On January 6, 2000, Xiangzhong Yang, at the University of Connecticut, USA, and scientists from the Kagoshima Prefectural Cattle Breeding Development Institute, Japan, announced the successful cloning of six calves from skin cells from a bull’s ear.
Largest Rocket
Saturn V (USA) was the largest rocket, but not the most powerful. It was 110.6 meters with the Apollo spacecraft mounted on top and weighed 2,903 tones on the launch pad.
Longest Cable-Suspension Bridge
The main span of the Akashi-Kaikyo road bridge, linking Honshu and Shikoku (in Japan) is 1,990.8 m long. The overall suspended length with side spans totals 3,911.1 m.
Improve your vocabulary!
launch – uruchamiać, wypuszczać
feature – cecha
humanoid – człekopodobny
limb – kończyna
configuration – ustawinie, konfiguracja
sideways – pobocza
backwards – w tył, do tyłu (chodzić)
slope – pochyłość
obstacles – przeszkody
wave – machać, także: rzut; powiewać; fala
transformer – transformator
challenge – wyzwanie
ordain – wyświęcić kogoś na księdza
boast – szczycić się
announce – ogłosić, oświadczyć
calves – cielaki
cell – komórka
rocket – rakieta
mount – montować
spacecraft – statek kosmiczny
span – rozpiętość
overall – ogólny, całkowity
suspended – zawieszony
track – tory kolejowe