1

$125 million for a Grade-school math error

Image: Aaron Lefler

Imagine losing a hugely expensive spacecraft due to a simple mix-up between English and metric measurements . That is exactly what happened to NASA in 1999 when a Mars orbiter designed by Lockheed Martin was lost in space.

The confusion caused a malfunction on the $125 million craft, resulting in the probe’s loss. Although it was unusual for Lockheed to use English measurements for a NASA design (since NASA had stipulated using metric measurements for many years), there were still several instances where the error should have been caught but wasn’t.

2

Toys ‘R’ Us blunder

Image: Taylor Heery

If you think an action figure of a drug dealer isn’t the best idea for a toy store , you’re not alone. Yet, for some reason, Toys "R" Us decided otherwise in October 2014, possibly hoping to cash in on the massive success of the Breaking Bad TV series.

Unsurprisingly, the giant toy retailer was forced to pull from its shelves four collectible dolls based on characters from the AMC hit show, each doll featuring a detachable sack of cash and a bag of meth.

3

Apple Maps' rocky beginnings

Image: CardMapr.nl

When Apple decided to launch its own map application on iOS devices after a conflict with Google in 2012, users quickly realized that the Apple app was not nearly as launch-ready as it should have been .

Locations were mislabeled, roads were missing, and it occasionally steered people in entirely the wrong direction. The problem was eventually, though largely, resolved, but it was an embarrassing misstep for a company known for never launching a product before it was as near-perfect as possible.

4

Bank of America debit card fee

Image: Ali Mkumbwa

Back in 2011, when the backlash against the banking industry had not yet reached its boiling point, Bank of America announced it would charge customers $5 per month to use their debit cards .

It was a bad business decision. More than 300,000 people signed an online petition, and Fox Business Network’s Gerri Willis cut up her debit card on air. The bank pointed to federal regulations as the reason for the charge but ultimately capitulated to consumer demand after a month before the fees went into effect.

5

$33 airline tickets from Toronto to Cyprus

Image: Miguel Ángel Sanz

If buying a business class ticket regularly priced at $2,558 for just $33 sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Except in 2006, when an Alitalia employee accidentally forgot to input two extra zeros when pricing business-class tickets from Toronto to Cyprus.

Due to the exchange rate on that day and the blunder, hundreds of buyers managed to snag fares for just $33. The airline honored those deals, accepting the heavily discounted price for the 509 people who purchased tickets before the error was detected.

6

A $70 million comma

Image: Nattipat Vesvarute

As the folks at NASA and Alitalia have shown us, small errors can lead to costly mistakes. The following blunder comes courtesy of Lockheed Martin , which issued a contract to a customer with a missing comma in the sale price .

The astute customer held the aerospace company to the contract, costing Lockheed Martin $70 million for a C-130J Hercules aircraft in June 1999.

7

Sears misses the ship

Image: Estefania Cortes

A retail giant that faced a situation similar to the one Kodak faced—embrace the new and unknown or cling to the old, successful recipe—Sears sold everything from socks to tires via mail order, shipping across the U.S.

Choosing to stick with the old method, the company ended its catalog and delivery business in 1993 . In 1994, Amazon was founded , filling the business void that Sears had just created. The rest is history.

8

Passing on Microsoft

Image: Jaime Marrero

$60 million might seem like a lot of money to us regular folks, but for someone with very deep pockets like Texas businessman and two-time U.S. presidential candidate Ross Perot, it wasn’t all that much.

In 1979, he was offered the chance to buy Microsoft for that sum. However, his final offer to the tech company was just $15 million, and as a result, the Texan missed out on the opportunity to own what would become one of the biggest companies in the world .

9

Blackberry sticks with the old

Image: Thai Nguyen

Another case of a brand sticking with the old instead of embracing the new, BlackBerry was all the rage at the start of the 21st century— until Steve Jobs came along with the Apple iPhone .

While BlackBerry Messenger was extremely popular, with over 80 million users worldwide, the device lacked the new touchscreen functionality and sleek design of the Apple product. From being a market leader, BlackBerry’s market share plummeted to 0.2% by 2016.

10

RadioShack’s downfall

Image: Jelleke Vanooteghem

Not so long ago, RadioShack was a familiar presence on the streets and the go-to place for buying batteries and electronics. But it was that same brick-and-mortar presence, coupled with a reluctance to embrace e-commerce , that ultimately led to its demise .

Eventually, poor profit margins on what they could sell, combined with a loan they couldn’t repay, brought down what was once the go-to place for electronics.

1

Where is the Statue of Liberty really located?

Most of us have always associated the Statue of Liberty with New York City. It’s on postcards, movies, souvenirs, and more. But technically, the famous statue stands in New Jersey’s waters.

The statue itself sits on Liberty Island, which legally belongs to New York, even though it’s actually closer to Jersey City than to Manhattan. Under an 1834 agreement between the two states, New York kept ownership of Liberty and Ellis Islands, while New Jersey retained control of the surrounding waters. So while the Statue of Liberty is officially New York property, it’s technically sitting on New Jersey’s side, something that still surprises many Americans today.

2

Canada is not always north

Because of the way maps have always looked to us, most Americans grow up thinking you always have to travel north to reach Canada; we even call it "our neighbor to the north." For almost everyone, that’s true… except the people in Detroit, Michigan.

Thanks to the curve of the Detroit River and the city’s unusual location, the Canadian city of Windsor actually sits south of Detroit. That means when drivers cross the bridge from Detroit into Canada, their compass literally points south, even though they’re entering "The Great White North."

3

Daylight Saving Time isn't for everyone

Most Americans are used to Daylight Saving Time: clocks move forward one hour on the second Sunday in March and back again on the first Sunday in November. But two "rebel" states refuse to follow the rest of the country.

We’re talking about Hawaii and Arizona, which stay on Standard Time year-round. Hawaii skips Daylight Saving Time because its tropical location means daylight hours barely change between summer and winter. Arizona, meanwhile (except for the Navajo Nation), stopped observing it in 1968 because of the state’s extreme desert heat. During a 1967 trial run, they found that an extra hour of evening sunlight actually increased energy use, so Arizona decided it simply wasn’t worth it.

4

Maps distort Alaska

For generations, the maps hanging in American classrooms have tricked us about the true size of Alaska.

On many US maps, Alaska is squeezed into a small box in the corner, making it seem only slightly bigger than states like Texas or California. But the reality is shocking: Alaska covers about 663,300 square miles, making it so enormous that you could fit Texas, California, and Montana combined inside it. The distortion happens because flat maps shrink and compress distant areas to make them fit neatly on the page. In real life, though, "The Last Frontier" is far more vast than we think.

5

Maine is not located where we thought

If someone asked, "Which is the easternmost US state?" most Americans would probably answer Maine without even thinking twice. But surprisingly, that’s not actually correct.

While it’s true that Maine is the easternmost state in the contiguous US, when all 50 states are included, the answer surprises many: the easternmost state is actually Alaska. How is that possible? It turns out that Alaska’s Aleutian Islands stretch so far west that they cross the 180th meridian into the Eastern Hemisphere, meaning part of Alaska is technically farther east than Maine.

6

Is California always west of Nevada?

If you were standing in California and needed to travel to Nevada, you’d probably assume you’d have to head east. But geography has a surprise here, too.

Believe it or not, Reno is actually about 86 miles farther west than Los Angeles. But how could a city in Nevada be farther west than a city on the Pacific coast? The answer is in California’s curved coastline. Because the coast bends inward so dramatically, Los Angeles sits farther east than most people realize, while Reno stretches surprisingly far west.

7

Not all deserts are hot

When most Americans picture a desert, they imagine blazing sun and unbearable heat, but not all deserts in the US fit that image.

The huge Great Basin Desert, which stretches across much of Nevada and parts of Utah, California, Oregon, Idaho, and Wyoming, is classified as a cold desert. In fact, during winter, its temperatures can plunge below freezing, with heavy snowfall covering the landscape. The lowest official temperature ever recorded in the area was on January 8, 1937: an incredible -50 °F.

8

Almost all of the US is privately owned

Many of us grew up assuming that most land in the United States is privately owned. And in much of the East, that idea is accurate. But for the West, the reality is different.

In the Western United States, about 47% of the land is owned by the federal government . And when you add state-owned land, the share of public land becomes even larger. Some states are especially striking: in Nevada, about 87% of the land is public, while in Utah, it’s around 75% .

9

The most populous state

The incredible New York City is the most populous in the United States, with about 8.48 million residents, and there’s no doubt about that. Maybe that’s why many people naturally assume the state of New York is also the most populated, but it isn’t.

That distinction actually belongs to the state of California, with around 39.35 million residents , compared to roughly 20 million in New York state.

10

Which state is closest to Africa?

As we’ve seen, flat maps can distort how we think about distance and size. Because of that, many Americans assume Florida is the US state closest to Africa. But that’s actually not true.

Because of the Earth’s curvature, the US state closest to Africa is actually Maine. The northeastern tip at Quoddy Head is about 3,154 miles from El Beddouza, Morocco. By comparison, Florida’s eastern edge (around Singer Island) is roughly 4,085 miles from the African coast near Guerguerat, Western Sahara.

1

The Blues Brothers - Rogues at Full Speed (Spain)

Image: Tanner Boriack

The Blues Brothers sounds like a pretty straightforward name, right? Not for the Spanish , who are very protective of their native language and translate every movie title that comes across their border. When this 1980 movie was released in Spain, its title could have been easily translated as " Los Hermanos del Blues ," but, for some reason, it was named Rogues at Full Speed .

2

Die Hard - The Crystal Jungle (Spain)

Image: Yns Plt

The second entry on the list is also awarded to Spain for its creative title translation of Bruce Willis’ Die Hard as The Crystal Jungle . The reasons for this name remain a mystery . Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that the city can be considered a jungle, and a significant part of the movie takes place in a city. Other than that, we're stumped.

3

Leon The Professional - This Hit Man is Not as Cold as He Thought (China)

Image: Matt Seymour

The Chinese translators of the French movie Léon: The Professional decided that the title wasn’t descriptive enough and opted instead for a name that served as a commentary on the main character .

4

Airplane - The Unbelievable Trip in A Wacky Aeroplane (Germany)

Image: Niels And Marco

Apparently, the Chinese are not alone when it comes to inventing more descriptive names for the movies they translate. The German version of the slapstick comedy Airplane! is translated as The Unbelievable Trip in a Wacky Aeroplane .

5

Thelma and Louise - An Unexpected Ending (Mexico)

Image: Amanda Sandlin

An implied rule when it comes to movie titles is that they should not be spoilers . Mexican translators decided to partially, at least, ignore this rule and went with An Unexpected Ending for the local version of Thelma and Louise . Yes, there could be countless possible unexpected endings, but still...

6

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory - The Boy Who Drowned in Chocolate Sauce (Denmark)

Image: Kaffee Meister

It's well known that Scandinavians have a dark sense of humor , but some things are still surprising. Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory , the 1971 movie featuring Gene Wilder in the title role, received an odd translation from the Danish.

7

Ghostbusters - Exorcists of Spirits (Serbia)

Image: Winston Chen

Serbians are no strangers to the supernatural . Many ghost stories and myths can be found in their beautiful and mysterious land. Perhaps that is why the people responsible for translating Ghostbusters thought it was acceptable to modify the original name to Exorcists of Spirits .

8

Grease - Pomade (Hungary)

Image: Lachlan Rennie

This one is not as far off as the previous examples, but there is something about it that just doesn’t sound quite as right as the original title. Who knows? Maybe that’s what Hungarians call their hair gel .

9

Home Alone - Mom, I Missed the Plane (France)

Image: Liubomyr Vovchak

The French translators could have done a lot worse with this one. After all, while the film’s storyline involves Kevin being stuck home alone, he ends up stuck at home because he missed his flight in the first place .

10

Annie Hall - The Urban Neurotic (Germany)

Image: Dylan Freedom

Yes, this is a Woody Allen movie, and yes, the main character, aside from Annie herself, is an urban neurotic. Maybe that’s why the German translators decided, once again, to change the simple original title of the movie to a description of the leading man’s character .

11

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - It’s Raining Falafel (Israel)

Image: Clark Douglas

Similar, but not the same— not by a long shot. The Israeli title for this children’s movie evokes a somewhat similar image to the one in the original title, but it does so with a more local dish as the element replacing the rain .

12

Deep Impact - The End of the World, the Sky Collapsed, and the Land Collapsed (Thailand)

Image: Viktor Mindt

Some movie title translations seem as if they were written by small children. But then, maybe that’s the kind of content their audience demands, in which case, more power to them. Deep Impact sounds ominous enough, sure. But a title like The End of the World, the Sky Collapsed, and the Land Collapsed is much more exciting , isn’t it?