Quehanna Wild Area is a wildlife area in Cameron, Clearfield, and Elk
counties in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. At 48,186 acres (75 sq mi;
195 km2), it is the largest state forest wild area in Pennsylvania, and
hosts herds of native elk. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the
logging industry cut the area's virgin forests. In 1955 the Curtiss-
Wright Corporation bought 80 square miles (210 km2) of state forest for
a facility developing nuclear-powered jet engines. A succession of
tenants further contaminated the nuclear reactor facility and its hot
cells with radioactive isotopes, including strontium-90 and cobalt-60.
Pennsylvania reacquired the land in 1963 and 1967, and in 1965
established Quehanna as a wild area, but retained the nuclear facility
and industrial complex. The facilities were used to treat hardwood
flooring with radiation until 2002. The cleanup of the reactor and hot
cells took over eight years and cost $30 million. Quehanna Wild Area
has many sites with radioactive and toxic waste; some have been cleaned
up, but others have been dug up by black bears and white-tailed deer.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quehanna_Wild_Area>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1576:
The cornerstone of Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe's observatory
Uraniborg was laid on the island of Hven.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uraniborg>
1956:
A major mining disaster killed 262 workers, mainly Italian
nationals, at the Bois du Cazier coal mine in Belgium.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bois_du_Cazier>
1963:
The Zimbabwe African National Union was formed when Ndabaningi
Sithole, Robert Mugabe, and others decided to split from the Zimbabwe
African People's Union.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimbabwe_African_National_Union>
1998:
The Iranian consulate in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan, was
raided by Taliban leading to the death of 10 Iranian diplomats and an
Iranian journalist.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998_killing_of_Iranian_diplomats_in_Afghanistan>
2009:
Nine people died when a tour helicopter and a small private
airplane collided over the Hudson River near Frank Sinatra Park in
Hoboken, New Jersey, U.S.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Hudson_River_mid-air_collision>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
filch:
(transitive) To illegally take possession of (especially items of low
value); to pilfer, to steal.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/filch>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
O lovely chance, what can I do To give my gratefulness to you? You
rise between myself and me With a wise persistency; I would have broken
body and soul, But by your grace, still I am whole.
--Sara Teasdale
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sara_Teasdale>
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