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Did you know that Australia is wider than the Moon? We've collected our favorite facts that will absolutely warp your sense of geography. Grab your map and let's jump into it. Don't miss a video! Subscribe NOW: https://www.youtube.com/@MentalFloss?sub_confirmation=1 About Mental Floss: Mental Floss is where curious people come for trivia-tastic information. Mental Floss produces lists of fun facts, debunks common misconceptions, and tells untold stories from history, science, culture and more. Website: http://www.mentalfloss.com Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/mental_floss Facebook: https://facebook.com/mentalflossmagazine Discord: https://discord.io/mentalfloss Copyright Notice: This video and YouTube channel contain dialog, music, and images that are property of Mental Floss. You are authorized to share the video link and channel, and embed this video in your website or others as long as a link back to this YouTube Channel is provided. 2025 Mental Floss 19 Geography Facts That Will Change Your Perspective | Mental Floss https://www.youtube.com/@MentalFloss
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Alaska is famous for being the biggest state in the U.S., but it holds another
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arguably more impressive, distinction. Thanks to its unique geography, Alaska is simultaneously
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the westernmost and easternmost state. The fact that it stretches farther west than Hawaii and
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California is obvious from looking at a map, but its claim to the east is more surprising
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Eastern and western longitudes are demarcated by the 180th meridian, which falls on the exact opposite side of the globe from the prime meridian passing through
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Greenwich, England. The 180th meridian cuts through Alaska's Aleutian Islands. That means
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after watching the sunrise over America's easternmost point on Semisapachinoy Island, you could take a boat 70 miles to Amatignac Island and watch it set over the westernmost spot
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Hi, I'm Erin McCarthy, Editor-in-Chief of Mental Floss. If that hurt your brain
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get ready for 18 more facts that will absolutely warp your sense of geography. Let's get started
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Despite occupying opposite sides of the 180th meridian, Amatignac Island and Semisapachnoi
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Island aren't a full day apart. The Aleutian Islands and Hawaii all fall within the Hawaii
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Aleutian time zone, which doesn't correspond with neat longitudinal lines. Rather, it's
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marked by an awkward, jagged line that keeps Western Islands on Western time and Eastern
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Islands on Eastern time. That's why Samoa is a full day ahead of American Samoa, even
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though they're less than 100 miles away from each other. If you have access to a boat
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you can celebrate the planet's first New Year's in Samoa and experience one of the last celebrations in American Samoa
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The clock varies wildly depending on where you are in Russia, which spans 11 time zones
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That means when one side of the country is serving breakfast, the other side is sitting
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down for dinner. The country has a maximum east-to-west extent of about 5,600 miles
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which is basically like driving from Miami to Los Angeles and then back
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But though Russia is the biggest country on Earth by area doesn mean it boasts the most time zones That superlative goes to France which bests Russia with 12 This is mainly accomplished through their occupied areas scattered around the globe
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China, which is nearly as wide as the contiguous U.S., adheres to a single time zone known
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as Beijing time. This can result in people eating dinner at midnight or taking tests after sundown
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The system causes the most confusion in the westernmost region of Xinjiang, where your
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ethnicity may determine the time you observe. The Turkic-speaking Uyghurs who reside there usually set their clocks two hours behind Beijing
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time, aligning with neighboring Kazakhstan. The Han Chinese who live there are more likely to live
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by the government's clock, which can make coordinating plans a headache. Daylight saving
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time can make the already awkward time zone system a nightmare to navigate. Arizona isn't
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wanting for sun in the desert, so the state chooses to bypass daylight saving each year
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This becomes especially confusing when you enter the Navajo Nation. Because the semi-autonomous reservation spans Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah, and two of the
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three states do save their daylight, the Navajo Nation decided it was just easier to keep everyone
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on the same time and go ahead with changing their clocks. But the Hopi Reservation, which falls
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fully within the Arizona part of the Navajo Nation, didn't see a need to be separate from the rest of
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the state. So for over half of the year, Arizona is home to a daylight saving donut, where the
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Navajo Nation is an hour ahead of the land inside and around it. If you've been to Reno, Nevada
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you've been farther west than Los Angeles. Despite being 300 miles inland, the biggest
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little city on Earth is technically 86 miles west of the coastal California city. My brain is really
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starting to hurt now. And if you've been to Maine, you weren't as far north as you might have
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assumed. It's true that Escort Station, Maine, is the northernmost community in the state
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but compared to much of Europe, it's not that high on the map. London, Paris
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Brussels, and Amsterdam are all further north than the Pine Tree State. Maine is also farther east
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than you might have thought. The peninsula of West Kwadi Head is ignoring the Alaska technicality the most easternmost point of the US mainland extending farther into the Atlantic than any state below it It comes within just 3 miles of
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El Beduza, Morocco, making Maine the closest state to mainland Africa. For reference, Florida is
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around 4,000 miles away. Texas is the second biggest state in the U.S. behind Alaska, covering
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a land area of 260,000 some-odd miles. Its population in 2022 was 30 million
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but that's nowhere near its maximum occupancy. If the state was as densely populated as New York City
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it's often stated it could fit the planet's entire population of nearing 8 billion people
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But I should say that while this is a popular WTF trivia fact
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running the current numbers, we'd also have to take over half of Arkansas
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Though Canada beats the United States in size, it doesn't come close to matching its population
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There are around 40 million people living there, and about 332 million in the US
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If Canada's population seems small for such a big country, keep in mind that 60% of it is below
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Seattle's latitude. Both Toronto and Montreal, Canada's biggest metros, fall below the Washington
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City. That means huge swaths of the country are largely uninhabited, and if you've ever experienced
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winter in the far north, you can understand why. Even with its impressive size, you may not expect
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Canada to boast the longest coast on Earth. You might presume Russia or perhaps Australia
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But the Great White North's islands and mainland beaches add up to a record-breaking 151,019
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miles of shoreline. At least, that's the length given by Canada's National Statistical Office
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Calculating a number everyone can agree on is impossible thanks to something called the
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Coastline Paradox. Measuring coastlines in big units leaves out these divots and bends
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Working with smaller units arguably produces more accurate measurements, But it becomes impractical really fast
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So rather than calculating coastlines on a galactic scale cartographers agree to work in big units and put away the measuring tape Even when measured in miles or kilometers small countries can boast surprisingly big coastlines Thanks to its many fjords and islands Norway coast measures roughly 64 miles
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That makes it longer than Russia's, despite the country's relatively small size
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But Norway's probably not top of your list for beach vacations. Australia might be, and if you went on a beach tour of the country, you'd be spoiled for choice
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A 2006 ysis found that Australia has 10,685 mainland beaches. If you visited one a day, that would be over 29 years of beach-going
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Australia can also hold its own against our solar system's heavenly bodies. It stretches 2,500 miles from east coast to west coast, making it wider than the moon's diameter
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In terms of land area, it definitely does not beat the moon, but width
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Australia takes the cake. Foreigners sometimes treat New Zealand and Australia as one and the same, much to the
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annoyance of the people who live there. But in addition to their distinct cultures, the two
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countries are far apart geographically speaking. There are about a thousand miles of oceans
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separating them, a distance big enough to fit an entire second Australia. The Mercator projection
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hanging up in countless classrooms has been criticized for putting an unrealistic emphasis
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on Europe. It's the reason many people think Greenland is comparable in size to Africa
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when in reality, the continent is about 14 times bigger than the island. Maps that more accurately
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present the area look like this. The popular map is also to blame for literally placing Europe at
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the center of the world. Many versions cut off most of Antarctica, which moves Europe to the
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vertical middle and pushes the equator about two-thirds of the way down the map. If publishers
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wanted to be more accurate, they would put Africa at the center of their maps. It's the only
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continent to cross both the equator and the prime meridian. That's enough geographical mind-melting
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facts for today. Let us know in the comments which ones surprised you the most. Or if you're still
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thinking about the time zone donut. Hmm, now I'm hungry
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