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Significant Digits For Friday, August 4, 2017

You’re reading Significant Digits, a daily digest of the numbers tucked inside the news.


1 giant airplane

Boeing took a new set of test engines out for a spin on Wednesday night and — needing 18 hours of time in the air to test the engines’ endurance — set about tracing the outline of a 787 Dreamliner. The tip of the outlined plane is in Wyoming; its tail is in Alabama. [CNN Money]


17 days

President Trump embarks today on a 17-day vacation to beautiful New Jersey. [ABC News]


22.3 percent

I analyzed over 1,000 fortune cookies because I have completely lost control of my life. And most of them aren’t even fortunes! Just 22.3 percent of the unique messages I cracked open said anything about the future. Mostly they just talk about you, the reader, and how great you are. [FiveThirtyEight]


33 percent

Share of the U.S. population that lives in the 13 states (and Puerto Rico) constituting the U.S. Climate Alliance, a group that is hewing to the international climate standards as set out in the Paris Climate Accords. [Futurism]


22,219 times the Duke of Edinburgh showed up to a thing alone

Prince Philip, better known as the husband of Queen Elizabeth II, has retired from his official duties at the age of 96. His final solo appearance, No. 22,219, was a visit to a group of royal marines. [The New York Times]


€222 million

Paris Saint-Germain has signed soccer superstar Neymar away from Barcelona. They paid a whopping €222 million (a bit more than $260 million) to buyout his contract. [ESPN FC]


If you see a significant digit in the wild, send it to @WaltHickey.

Walt Hickey was FiveThirtyEight’s chief culture writer.

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