China is ancient and beautiful. But cherry blossoms and the Great Wall aside, the country’s freakiest issues could harm its own population, the international community, and even unborn sacred leaders.

SEE ALSO: 10 Ways You Are Ruled By Communist China

There is a terrifying reason why China is never short of organ donors. Its social point system is also straight out of a dystopian novel. Some mysteries are equally creepy. Nobody knows why the government remains quiet about a deadly virus, or what happened that day when American diplomats experienced a bizarre attack on Chinese soil. If you think those things are weird, you won’t believe these strange occurrences:

10. The J-20 Fighter Jet

China gave one look at an American fighter plane, the F-22 Raptor, and decided to counter it. Enter the J-20. For a long time, the stealth aircraft was designed and tested in secret. In 2018, it rolled out onto the tarmac for everyone to see. The answer to the Raptor was finally combat-ready.

The sinister aura fostered during its secretive beginnings was missing. More correctly, a little bit delayed. A set of WS-15 engines was supposed to make it equal or better than the F-22. Instead, after an explosion during a ground test in 2015, the engines were excluded from the plane’s design. This means that while China’s latest jet is operational and capable, it cannot yet growl at the F-22.

For the time being, the J-20 flies with weaker engines until the WS-15 problem is sorted out. This could take a few years but the aircraft remains special. An array of weaponry arms this beast, making it China’s best defense against the stealth planes of the U.S.

9. Most New Pharmaceuticals Are Fake

In 2016, the Chinese government investigated the latest pharmaceutical drugs. The study focused on products waiting for approval. The analysis included 1,622 clinical trials and additional data like application paperwork, ingredients, and the creation timelines of the drugs. The results were disturbing.

Over 80 percent of the data was fraudulent. Records about side effects had been deleted. Information was twisted until it “proved” that the drugs worked. Other information was incomplete or missing. Many products were not even new. Instead, somebody just mixed existing medicines. The investigators also found that several trial results were written before any experiments were performed.

The dishonesty ran deep. Scientists, pharma companies, laboratories, and even other investigators were implicated. This seedy network was not purely motivated by greed. Pharmaceutical employees are under enormous pressure to produce groundbreaking work or risk getting fired. Add the cut-throat competition among companies and the rampant corner-cutting starts to make sense.

8. Presidential Enemy – Winnie The Pooh

A lot of things we take for granted are blocked in China. In 2017, Winnie-the-Pooh joined the censored club. The reason was not that the lovable character made remarks about the government. Or disagreed with Chinese law. Or refuse to wear pants. His terrible crime? Chinese citizens started to compare President Xi Jinping to the iconic bear.

Revenge was swift. Pooh was banned from Chinese social media and his stickers were removed from chat apps. China’s upper crust famously lacks humor. They cannot stand civilians with clown genes. For example, those individuals who first started the trend in 2013 after they compared Xi and President Obama with a picture of the tubby bear walking next to the fit-looking Tigger. A year later, Xi fumbled a handshake with Japan’s Prime Minister and the internet struck with a meeting between Pooh and Eeyore. In 2015, China’s most censored image was that of Pooh popping up through a toy car’s roof. It was a composite that also showed Xi standing up through the opening of his parade car’s roof.

7. Mysterious “BreedReady” List

In 2019, a Dutch researcher stumbled upon a database in China and anyone could read it. This was more than a little disturbing. The cache held the private information of 1.8 million Chinese women. Not only did the database reveal their phone numbers and home addresses (a stalker’s dream) but it also gave each person a “BreedReady” status.

Some speculated that poor translation caused the bizarre word. The database was written in English. A language-challenged individual from China could easily have mangled the word without any sinister intentions. The original Chinese phrase could have referred to women of child-bearing age or whether they had children. Indeed, the average age was 32.

Alternatively, the creepy options were legion. The government could be identifying women who can “breed,” since birthrates are falling too fast. It might not even be a government registry. Another company, dating app, or hacker could have compiled the list which also included details about the women’s education levels and political views. We might never know who gazed at those ovaries. The database was taken down soon after the Dutch researcher spilled the beans.

6. The Electromagnetic Railgun

One of China’s latest naval toys is an electromagnetic railgun. Spotted for the first time in 2011, it uses electromagnetic energy instead of conventional gunpowder to fire. Incredibly, the force shoots projectiles at 2.6 kilometers per second (1.6 miles per second).

In 2019, photos showed the first Chinese warship mounted with the gun. The Haiyangshan was a Type 072II Yuting-class tank landing ship. It was first noticed on the Yangtze River where the vessel was docked near a shipyard. A few months later, more photos appeared on social media and they apparently showed Haiyangshan sailing the open ocean. It was still armed with what looked like the electromagnetic railgun. This raised suspicions that the weapon was being tested under sea conditions.

This kind of firepower is enough to give other nations the willies. But China is not satisfied. US defense sources claim that the country wants, by 2025, a warship with electromagnetic railguns that can hit a target at 200 kilometers (124 mi.) away.

SEE ALSO: Top 10 Utterly Bizarre Things Banned In China

5. Reincarnation Must Obey Chinese Laws

For the first time in history, the world might see two Dalai Lamas living at the same time. This remark came from the current Buddhist leader during a 2019 interview. The 83-year-old man was chosen for this exalted position when he was two years old. For the past 60 years, the Dalai Lama lived in India after he fled the Chinese in his native Tibet.

Recently, Beijing said that his reincarnation must comply with their laws. It’s called the “New Regulations on Religious Affairs and the Rules on the Management of the Reincarnation of Tibetan Living Buddhas.” According to this mouthful, China reserves the right to approve the selection of the child destined to be the next Dalai Lama.

The present leader knows how dangerous this is. His successor would be under the control of China’s Communist Party, which persecutes most religions. Additionally, in 1995, the Dalai Lama identified a child as the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama. This position is the second-highest rank after himself. The Chinese government took the 6-year-old Tibetan boy into “protective custody.” Beijing provided a Panchen Lama of their choice and nobody ever saw the Tibetan kid again. Due to this, the current leader implored people to only trust a Dalai Lama reborn in a free country and not the one chosen by China.

4. Dystopian Credit System

Imagine not being able to ride a train or get quick treatment at a hospital. The reason? You lack enough government points. In 2018, China implemented a surveillance and population control project unlike anything the world had ever seen.

Called the Social Credit System, a score is given to every citizen and business. A positive score is bolstered by things like paying the bills on time, sorting recycling items properly, and doing charity. Perks include cheaper travel rates, better credit opportunities, and shorter waiting periods at a hospital. A chilling statement provided the other side of the coin, saying that the system was designed to “make it hard for the discredited to take a single step.” This epic public coercion is made possible by the country’s 200 million CCTV cameras. They are hooked up to facial recognition software and once a person is identified, the system can riffle through their private records and watch for disobedience.

A point deduction is frighteningly easy. People can lose points for smoking in forbidden zones, jaywalking, or struggling to pay their bills. One journalist, Liu Hu, reported government corruption and was scored as “dishonest.” He was denied access to public transport, his social media accounts were closed down and his career was destroyed.

3. Sonic Attacks

In 2017, American diplomats stationed in Cuba fell ill. The mysterious circumstances surrounding the event, which many suspect was a sonic attack, soured relations between Cuba and the US. At one point, all Cuban diplomats were kicked out of the States. This episode is well-known to those who follow the news. A fact that received less attention was that during the same year, and a few months into 2018, the same thing happened in China.

American diplomats stationed in Guangzhou started hearing funny noises. This was followed by splitting headaches and insomnia. One consulate, who also reported abnormal feelings of pressure, ended up with brain trauma. Highly alarmed, the American government withdrew several staff members and their families. The consequences between the two countries did not reflect the Cuban kaboodle. Chinese diplomats were not expelled, but officials from China expressed their concern when the US refused to play open cards with them. A local investigation found no wrongdoing but said it would remain open-minded to any information the Americans might share, which was not forthcoming.

2. China Is Hogging A Lethal Virus

The United States and China had an understanding: Ever since the H7N9 bird flu was first detected in China in 2013, samples would be provided to the US on a regular basis. Initially, things went swell. China shared the new flu strains and all related data. Over time, communication deteriorated until the samples stopped. No amount of asking could produce a single vial.

The implications are not immediately obvious. However, China’s refusal is a disaster waiting in the wings. H7N9 has a 40 percent fatality rate. If that is not terrifying enough, the strain keeps evolving. American scientists need to follow and understand this shapeshifting to protect people from a pandemic. But since the silence fell, there came with it the chance that the world might experience an outbreak nobody is prepared for. Indeed, there is no way to develop a vaccine without the latest samples.

Worse, China experienced two bumper infections in the meantime, in 2016 and 2017. Scientists outside of the country know nothing about the type of H7N9 that felled hundreds. No samples or patient information were ever released. Should this virus hogging continue, many scientists fear that it could lead to an international crisis and countless deaths.

1. A Terrifying Organ Trade

China is known for its efficiency. However, some fields cannot produce zippy results without causing suspicion. For instance, every country struggles with the number of patients needing organ transplants. There are not enough donors. Most people wait for years to replace a defective organ. In China, the period is more like weeks.

In 2016, around 640 organs were transplanted. This sounds normal until you check the facts. All 640 operations occurred over a period of 10 days. The official donors were listed as 30 individuals, which runs to an impossible 21 body parts harvested per person. In the past, China plucked organs from prisoners without their permission. The country claimed to have abandoned this practice. But in 2019, a tribunal interviewed witnesses and combed through records. They found that the forced harvesting was still very much alive.

One doctor testified that he was ordered to remove the kidneys from a prisoner who had been shot in the head. He performed the operation while the man was still alive and struggling. Criminals are not the only targets. The so-called dissidents, or people arrested because they catch the government’s dislike, are also slaughtered like cattle. Among them are ethnic minorities and especially hard-hit are the members of a spiritual movement called Falun Gong.

Have you ever done something that you thought was unique or unusual and wondered if you were the only person in the world doing it right at that moment? With around 8 billion people in the world, it’s doubtful that we are doing something so unique that no one else is doing it, but of course, there’s no way to know. That said, statistically speaking, it’s surprising to learn what is happening at any given moment in the world. 

10. There are 2,000 Thunderstorms Happening Right Now

Fort Myers, Florida, is the thunderstorm capital of the United States. The city has about 89 thunderstorms annually. On the far end of the scale, if you don’t want to see rain ever, you should head to Las Vegas. Of all the major cities in the United States, it gets the least amount of rain, with 0.2 days per year being marred by storms.

We tend to think of weather on scales like this. Annual rainfall, how many storms you have, and how many storms you don’t have.  That is why it is surprising to learn that, at any given moment, are 2,000 thunderstorms happening worldwide. Every second of every day, the Earth is struck by lightning 100 times. In the US alone, there are 100,000 thunderstorms every year. The United States only makes up 1.867% of the Earth’s surface. So 2,000 thunderstorms at any given moment seems more reasonable when you expand it to a global scale.

9. One in Fifty U.S. Drivers is Drunk At Any Given Moment

Based on polls, about 63% of American adults drink alcohol sometimes. Worldwide, around 2.3 billion people are considered to be drinkers. Of those, around 107 million are thought to have an alcohol use disorder. It’s safe to say many people are drinking in the world right now. As the old saying goes, it’s five o’clock somewhere. 

At any given moment, one in 50 drivers on the road in America is intoxicated. There are 115 million drivers on the road in America every day. That’s 2.3 million people intoxicated people over the course of a day. 

A statistic often cited says 0.7% of the world’s population is drunk at any given moment, though the source of this alleged stat is unclear. 

8. There Are 25 to 50 Serial Killers at Large in America at Any Given Moment

If you like the idea of feeling safe and secure, you may want to skip this one. At any given moment, the FBI believes that between 25 and 50 serial killers are operating in America. That sounds pretty terrifying, but it’s worth noting that it’s also believed serial killers account for just 1% of all murders in America. That works out to about 150 murders yearly, meaning each serial killer potentially kills three victims per year. Mind you, these are averages, so if one killer takes a year off, another is taking up the slack.

According to statistics, far more serial killers are operating in a given year than you’re likely aware of. The 1980s averaged 102 serial killers per year. Those were just the ones caught, however. In 1987 alone, 128 killers had three or more victims. That number has dropped considerably, but what’s a comfortable number of serial killers that will allow you to rest easy? 

7. Just 4,548 Stars are Visible at Any Moment from Earth

You have to start using rough estimates when you get to massive numbers. For instance,  we estimate the universe has roughly 200 billion trillion stars. That number is so preposterously big that it might as well be gibberish. In our own little corner of the universe, the Milky Way galaxy, We estimate between 100 and 400 billion stars.

Despite that massive number, you can only see just over 9,000 stars from Earth at any given time. It requires both hemispheres to do that. Otherwise, you can only see 4,548 stars from one hemisphere or the other with the naked eye. If you live in the city’s suburbs, you can thank light pollution for reducing that number to a paltry 446 stars.

6. Only 25 Grams of Astatine Exist On Earth at Any Time

Astatine is the rarest naturally occurring element in the world. It’s a product of the decay of uranium and thorium and is highly unstable. Even its most stable form has a half-life of just over eight hours. As a result, you won’t find much of it lying around all willy-nilly. When it decays, it turns into an isotope of bismuth or polonium.

Everything about this element is pretty hard to believe. No one has ever seen it in its elemental state because it would have already destroyed itself with its own radioactivity by the time you gathered it. When scientists want to study it, they have to make it in a lab, which is no easy task. Only 0.05 micrograms have ever been produced. It’s believed just 25 grams of it exist on Earth at any moment.

5. Only 20,000 T. Rexes Existed at Any One Time

The world’s lion population is estimated to be between 23,000 and 39,000. It may be as low as 20,000, however. The population of African elephants is around 415,000, but perhaps as few as 40,000 Asian elephants remain. Blue whales, the largest creatures to ever live, are thought to exist in numbers as low as 10,000 to 25,000. All of these have seen great decline in the last century. For instance, 100 years ago, there were over five million elephants in Africa.

While it seems like, devoid of human interference, animal populations would be massive, but that’s not always the case. We can look back to a time before humans even existed and see how things were in the age of dinosaurs. 

Arguably the most famous dinosaur of all, it’s believed that 2.5 billion Tyrannosaurus Rexes existed during the creature’s two million-year reign. Given their size and range, their population density was minimal. At any given moment in history, only about 20,000 T. Rexes would have been walking the Earth. 

4. 80% of An Ant Colony Is Awake and Working at Any Given Time

Ants can be found almost everywhere on Earth. They’re not fans of the cold, so you won’t find them in Antarctica, and they are also not present in Iceland or Greenland. Some isolated islands have not been invaded by ants either. Beyond that, you will find them everywhere else, sometimes in staggering numbers.

If you’ve ever seen footage from a rainforest of leaf-cutter ants, you’ll notice they’re very industrious creatures. Lines of thousands of ants can be seen carrying pieces of green leaves from trees back to their homes. They move like they’re working in a factory, which never seems to end. This begs the question, does it ever end? Do ants ever go to sleep?

We know a lot more about the Sleep habits of vertebrates than we do invertebrates. But we have learned that ants do, in fact, sleep.Because of how an ant colony works, they parse out sleeping like they do other tasks. at any given moment, 80% of an ant colony is awake and working, and the other 20% is sleeping. That means that when some ants need to rest again, other ants will wake up and take over so that there is never a time when all the ants are asleep, or all the ants are working. 

3. At Any Given Moment There are 2 Billion Insects on Earth for Every One Human

About 25% of people asked in one survey reported a fear of insects. You can assume that a far greater number of people are simply not fans of bugs. You don’t have to be afraid of a mosquito or a wasp to not want it around you. A decent argument can be made that most people don’t like insects around, to a greater or lesser degree.

Unfortunately, for humans who are not fans of bugs, the numbers are not doing you any favors. At any given moment, there are about two billion insects on Earth for every single human. That’s a staggering number. Total it up, and the estimate for insects roaming the planet is about 10 quintillion. If you wrote that out, it would be a 10 followed by 18 zeroes. That’s an absurd number, so large that it has no longer meaning because it’s impossible to contextualize.

Most scientists agree that most insect species have not even been identified. We know of about 900,000 different kinds. But estimates for actual numbers range from 2 million to as many as 30 million that science has either not discovered or not cataloged in any meaningful way. 

These numbers seem hard to reconcile, but don’t forget how small some insects are and where they can hide. Soil samples show that digging five inches deep over an acre of land yields 124 million bugs. Up to 90 million of those are mites that you could easily overlook with the naked eye. A single ant colony in Jamaica was found to have 630,000 members. These things are very good at packing large numbers into unseen spaces.

2. On Any Given Day 13% of America is Eating Pizza

There’s no denying that Americans love pizza. Pizza restaurants made over $46 billion in 2022. Americans spend about $11 billion on delivery. It’s been said Americans eat 100 acres of pizza every day, and 350 slices are sold every second. That’s 30.2 million slices every day. 

On any given day, 13% of Americans are eating pizza. That works out to 43.45 million people, which is greater than the population of Canada. That includes 25% of all males ages 6 to 18 who eat pizza on any given day. One in six males is eating it for breakfast.

1. 90,000 People in America are Missing at Any Given Time

There was a famous New York TV broadcast that started in the 1960s in which the viewer was asked, “It’s 10 p.m.; do you know where your children are?” It became the standard opener for the 10 p.m. news through the 1970s and 1980s. More or less, the purpose was to encourage parents to think about where their kids were in a time of youth curfews. For most people, it was just a signal that the nightly news was starting.

The real value of the PSA was never explored much, but it’s definitely worth considering. That’s because, at any given moment, roughly 90,000 people in America are missing. According to the National Missing and Unidentified Person System, that number could be as high as 100,000.  Between 2007 and 2020, that worked out to an average of 664,776 missing people per year. Many of them are found, but far from all, and they aren’t always alive when found. There are about 4,400 bodies found every year that can’t be identified. 

In 2012, there were 661,000 missing person cases, of which nearly 659,000 were solved. That doesn’t mean they came home safely necessarily, though most did. Some were found deceased and identified. But 2,079 cases remained open at the end of that year. People never found, alive or dead.

Sea level is so overrated. Wonders abound beneath our feet—sometimes a few meters, sometimes a few miles. Some require nine-figure excavations and a team of international researchers, others a modest shovel and flashlight.

Pioneering scientific experiments, macabre reminders of history both recent and remote, and life forms that eluded mankind’s discovery for millennia are just part of the sublime subterranean scene. Here are ten fascinating things happening underground.

Related: 10 Communities Of People Who Live Underground

10 The Search for Dark Matter

In an abandoned gold mine nearly 1.6 kilometers (1 mile) below the Black Hills of South Dakota, 250 scientists from 37 institutions have constructed the Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF). Its mission is to significantly advance the elusive search for dark matter.

The project is called LUX-ZEPLIN. LUX stands for Large Underground Xenon, while ZEPLIN stands for ZonEd Proportional scintillation in Liquid Noble gases. Well, duh.

The goal is to solve what might be the last piece in dark matter existence’s puzzle. In layman’s terms, we’re well aware of the universe’s matter-centric occupants—everything from rocks, water, and gasses to protons, electrons, and subatomic particles. The problem is that their combined mass doesn’t equal that of the universe—not by a long shot, actually.

To solve this riddle, LUX-ZEPLIN intends to record the presence of a physics unicorn of sorts: a weakly interacting massive particle with the apt acronym WIMP. The task involves a 1.5-meter-tall (five-foot) tank filled with about one-quarter of the world’s annual supply of liquid xenon. The hope is that, should a WIMP pass through, it might glance off a xenon nucleus, which would emit a flash of light or photon—allowing scientists to “see” dark matter.

The site’s exceptionally subterranean location is designed to block the humming interference in the world around us, long an obstacle to the search for dark matter. The experiment is set to run for about five years.^[1]

9 20,000 Corpses Under a Public Park

New York City is a modern metropolis whose early years often entailed a stunning lack of foresight. As late as the 1790s, officials failed to envision the already-bustling city growing more than a mile north, let alone consuming the 21.7-kilometer-long (13.5-mile) island of Manhattan.

In 1797, the city purchased farmland to create a potter’s field for the indigent, poor, criminals, and disease victims. The plot was less than a mile north of the city’s growing urban sprawl. Soon, Yellow Fever hit, with waves of the deadly, contagious disease ravaging New York City through 1803. The field began filling up, reaching capacity in the early 1820s.

In 1827, in a self-interest-driven real estate scheme, Mayor Philip Hone announced plans to transform the field into a public square. In the development rush, disinterment and reburial were completely foregone. The potter’s field was renamed “Washington Military Parade Ground”—a nod to the 50th anniversary of the country’s founding—before being shortened to Washington Square Park.

According to the 2005 book Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York City: “While estimates vary, it seems likely that over 20,000 people were buried in the land… they remain to this day under the grass and pavement of Washington Square.”

The real estate scam paid off: The area’s property values soared 240% in the next five years, gobbled up largely by the college that would become New York University.^[2]

8 Extreme Resilience

Late last year, scores of species were found living in extreme cold and total darkness, 200 meters (650 feet) beneath the ice in one of the world’s most unforgiving habitats: Antarctica’s Ekström Ice Shelf. Seventy-seven distinct types of worms and moss animals called bryozoans were found in pitch-black waters of -2° (28°F). The cornucopia of creatures is changing how researchers consider the livability of such extreme submarine environments.

Though examples of some of these animals have been identified elsewhere in Antarctica, finding such a particularly foreboding locale teeming with life is a first. “This may give us clues into how life in polar seas survived glaciations,” said David Barnes, a marine ecologist with the British Antarctic Survey.

To access the surprising subterranean spot, researchers used a specialized hot water drill to bore through the ice, then dropped cameras down more than 60 stories. Carbon dating revealed that life had continuously existed there for nearly 6,000 years.

Other instances of unexpected existence have been found in Antarctica. In many, microbes seemingly subsist on pulverized bedrock in the sediment beneath the continent. On rare occasions, larger organisms also manage to survive, including sponges some half a mile below the ice—a discovery one researcher said was like “finding a bit of the rainforest in the middle of the Sahara.” While this latest discovery wasn’t as deep, it nonetheless expands the number of environments known to sustain life.^[3]

7 A City Under a City

With due respect to Edmonton and Ottawa, whose average winter temperatures are -7.3°C (18.8°F) and -6.5°C (20.3°F), respectively, Montreal is the coldest bonafide metropolis in North America. It is the second-coldest of its size in the world (Harbin, China is first, with a metro area of over 10 million and an average wintertime temperature of an insane -11.8°C or 10.8°F).

Montreal’s average is just -6.2°C (20.8°F) in winter and, due to its location right on the St. Lawrence River, feels far frostier. Through the decades, the city has perfected a novel way to combat the cold: burrowing beneath it. Just under the frigid feet of those at street level is an immense network of malls, tunnels, and transportation systems that allow Montrealers to literally stay under the weather.

Called le Réso, the network comprises over 32 kilometers (20 miles) of walkways connecting subway stations, office buildings, and housing complexes, much of it lined with top-notch shopping and dining. So commonplace and comprehensive is Montreal’s subterranean lifestyle that many commuters don’t even bother taking a coat with them to work because their day simply doesn’t include stepping outside at all. Ditto for students and visitors, who can leave dorms or hotels and reach schools, universities, museums, theaters, and more…all without packing a jacket.

Montreal’s underground is also an attraction unto itself, featuring such charms as a skating rink and regular public space art exhibitions.^[4]

6 Nothing, Unfortunately

No list of underground marvels would be complete without a legend that has birthed arguably the stupidest show in television history. I’m talking, of course, about The Curse of Oak Island.

Located off the south shore of Nova Scotia, Canada, Oak Island is not large—about a mile long and half a mile wide. And for over two centuries, people have been searching for an alleged treasure whose origins could trace to any number of figures, from pirates Captain Kidd and Edward “Blackbeard” Teach to secret societies like the Freemasons and Knights Templar.

In 2006, Michigan brothers Rick and Marty Lagina bought a 50% stake in the company that owns the island and became the latest in a long line of treasure hunters. Since then, their fruitless adventures have gone from empty-handed to empty-headed, further lowering the IQ of reality television—which is saying a lot. Find trinkets, declare it means “something else must be out there,” repeat.

And repeat. And repeat. In 2021, The Curse of Oak Island completed its treasure-teasing eighth season. That’s 138 separate hour-long episodes of guys digging empty holes in the ground and speculating about where the next hole should be dug. It’s like watching a squirrel try to find a buried acorn—although, in the squirrel’s defense, the acorn is actually real. I guess it’s time to catch up on the emptiness of Season 9!^[5]

5 Nothing, Fortunately

On an unassuming Berlin street, just down the road from the sprawling Holocaust Memorial, is a parking lot surrounded by typical, 1980s-style concrete East German apartment buildings. Until 2006, no indication whatsoever existed of the ground’s dark historical significance. These days, a simple plaque informs passersby of what lies just a few feet beneath them: the bunker where Adolf Hitler met his end.

Sarcastically known by locals as the “Führerbunker Parking Lot,” the paved-over place was once a garden of the Reich Chancellery. It is where the Nazi leader spent the final 3½ months of his life, descending into its depths on January 16, 1945, when the bombing of Berlin became too dangerous to stay above ground. He would go on to celebrate his last birthday there—his gift was the first bursts of Soviet shells on Germany’s capital. Nine days later, he would marry his long-time girlfriend there and, the next day, commit suicide in his chambers. Some honeymoon.

Hitler’s final days were a mix of mania, paranoia, and for his fellow bunker mates, pending doom. As he conducted reviews of Berlin’s waning defenses, held meaningless yet hours-long military strategy sessions, and generally denied reality, those around him tried to wriggle away, making their best excuses for why their presence was no longer necessary.

While much of the bunker was destroyed in Berlin’s rebuilding, some sections remain. They have been sealed off to prevent vandalism—or, even worse, tributes.^[6]

4 Drug Smuggling

While a 3,218-kilometer-long (2,000-mile) wall spanning the border of the United States and Mexico might put a dent in record-high illegal migration, it likely wouldn’t do much to combat drug smuggling. Mexican cartels have long had the resources and incentives to take their underground business…well, underground.

Often, their U.S. destination of choice is San Diego, whose suburbs extend to the Mexico border. On its outskirts, the city offers vast industrial areas yielding the anonymity of large warehouse buildings. The result is a hidden underground highway whose terminus can serve as both a receiving and processing spot. So prolific is the practice that San Diego actually has its own Tunnel Task Force manned with local and federal agents.

The largest of such tunnels was discovered in March 2020 at a warehouse in the San Diego suburb of Otay Mesa. Nearly 1.5 kilometers (1 mile) long and 9 meters (30 feet) deep, agents described the ambitious passageway as the most sophisticated they had ever seen, with an extensive rail and cart system to rapidly transport drugs, forced air ventilation, and high-voltage electrical cables and panels.

Dubbed “Baja Metro” by border agents, the tunnel also had an elevator at its entrance and a complex drainage system. The bust seized more than two tons of drugs, including 590 kilograms (1,300 pounds) of cocaine, at an estimated value of $30 million.^[7]

3 The Doorway to Hell

In Turkmenistan’s remote Karakum Desert lies a tourist attraction that lures thousands each year. It’s called the Darvaza Gas Crater, and it’s a sterling example of both nature’s power and mankind’s stupidity.

In 1971, when the central Asian republic was part of the USSR, a team of Soviet geologists traveled to the Karakum Desert seeking oil (the country is rich in petroleum and natural gas). Upon discovering what they believed was a substantial oil field, they commenced drilling.

But they hadn’t hit oil—they’d hit a cavernous pocket of natural gas that couldn’t support their equipment’s weight. The site collapsed, swallowing their drilling rigs and triggering a domino effect in the crumbly sedimentary rock. By the time the ground stabilized, there were several open craters, the largest of which measured 70 meters (230 feet) across and 20 meters (65 feet) deep. Good work, everyone.

It gets even dumber. Shortly following the event, wildlife in the surrounding desert began to die off. This was due to the craters’ high levels of methane, which in addition to being dangerously flammable, depletes the oxygen supply in its vicinity.

So the scientists decided to light the crater on fire, hoping that all the potentially lethal natural gas would burn away in a few weeks. Their calculations were slightly off. Nicknamed the Gates of Hell, the craters have been burning bright for half a century.^[8]

2 Trees Talking

Recent scientific studies confirm that trees are far more alert, sophisticated, and social than initially thought. Underground, through roots connected via fungi, bacterial matter, or other plants, trees not only communicate information about environmental factors like drought and disease but can even “lend” each other nutrients or water. This exemplifies a far more collective approach to “survival of the fittest” than most nature experts believed trees could exhibit.

There’s even a neat name for the phenomenon: the Wood Wide Web, which is believed to predate the source of its derivative nickname, the World Wide Web, by about 500 million years. In 2019, an international study covering 1.2 million forest plots and nearly 30,000 species produced the first global map of the underground networks comprising this secretive world.

While certainly competing for sunlight above ground, below the surface, trees are strikingly collaborative. Through the web, trees send chemical, hormonal, and slow-pulsing electrical signals to relay information ranging from pending drought and parasitic threats to nutrient disruptions and potential soil toxins. The result is an early warning system aligning with a group-centric “rising tide lifts all ships” concept.

Much of the Wood Wide Web’s success is mycorrhizal, meaning it relies on symbiotic relationships between plants and fungi. Research reveals this system’s importance in limiting climate change through carbon storage and, concerningly, its fragile susceptibility to rising global temperatures.^[9]

1 The Largest Living Thing on Earth

Many people would be able to name the world’s largest animal, the blue whale. And perhaps they’d even come up with the world’s largest tree: the Giant Sequoia, whose tallest specimen currently stretches some 84 meters (275 feet) into the sky, with a base diameter of an astounding 11 meters (36½ feet).

But to find the world’s largest living thing, we must venture underground. Discovered in 1998, a single fungal organism in Oregon’s Malheur National Forest covers an area of 9 square kilometers (3½ square miles)! That’s one humongous fungus among us.

Called Armillaria ostoyae, the reason so few know about this record-holding life form is its almost exclusively subterranean existence. Armillaria ostoyae is not a mushroom but rather a network of fungal threads and cords called hyphae. A parasitic fungus, it infiltrates tree bark and root systems, spreading out across the forest floor to find new hosts to colonize. While parts of it do pop up from time to time to reproduce, the massive non-mushroom remains mostly out of sight.

Notably, fake photos of Armillaria ostoyae have recently circulated online. One shows a mushroom the size of a house, towering over dazzling spectators. Another shows a mushroom stalk as thick as a tree trunk. The fraudulent fungal photos have led to many duped, disappointed visitors to the national park.^[10]