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Quiz about When Oops Just Doesnt Quite Cover It
Quiz about When Oops Just Doesnt Quite Cover It

When Oops Just Doesn't Quite Cover It... Quiz


People make mistakes. But there are mistakes and MISTAKES. Sometimes people make a mistake so huge, so monumental, that we can only shake our heads. This quiz relates to some of 'em.

A multiple-choice quiz by Correspondguy. Estimated time: 9 mins.
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Time
9 mins
Type
Multiple Choice
Quiz #
317,963
Updated
Feb 01 22
# Qns
15
Difficulty
Average
Avg Score
10 / 15
Plays
9470
Awards
Editor's Choice
Last 3 plays: fatcat49 (14/15), Zippy826 (12/15), maryhouse (10/15).
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Question 1 of 15
1. "Oops, I guess I should have checked that..."

In 2005, McDonald's unveiled a new marketing slogan. Apparently, some advertising people had heard a particular phrase and decided it meant "I want that." It actually does, but only in the sense of "I want to have sex with that [person]." McDonald's therefore unveiled a campaign which suggested they catered to people who want to have sex with food. What phrase should they have checked before putting it on billboards?
Hint


Question 2 of 15
2. "Oops, I think I spilled something..."

In London in 1814, nine people were killed when a huge container failed. The rupture of that vat caused other vats to fail. The net result was a flood of approximately 376,018 US Gallons (or 1,470,000 liters) of a fluid. Many people would be thrilled by a flood of this fluid, but this was definitely too much of a good thing. What was it?
Hint


Question 3 of 15
3. "Oops, I guess I kinda mixed up the priorities..."

In 1991, there was a fire at a chicken processing plant in Hamlet, North Carolina. Twenty-five people died and fifty-four were injured. The key reason for the deaths would have been discovered had the plant ever been the subject of a safety inspection, but no one had ever conducted one. What obvious safety hazard should have been corrected?
Hint


Question 4 of 15
4. "Oops, maybe I should have proofread that..."

In 1999, the Mars Climate Orbiter failed to enter Mars orbit at the correct altitude, resulting in the loss of the unmanned spacecraft. Analysis of the failure led to the revelation that someone had messed up the math. What was the miscommunication that resulted in the loss of a significant element of a $327 million-dollar project?
Hint


Question 5 of 15
5. "Oops, that probably wasn't the best plan..."

In World War II, a lot of bizarre weapons showed up. Some of 'em were successful. One that was not was the Soviet Union's attempt to train dogs to blow up tanks. Basically, they strapped bombs to dogs, trained them to run under tanks, and then let them loose on the battlefield. What led to the failure of the program?
Hint


Question 6 of 15
6. "Oops. I forgot to check the map..."

In 1844, the United States Government began construction on Fort Montgomery, intended to protect the citizens of the United States from the Canadian hordes. (Although I doubt there was really all that much concern, since the fort wasn't completed until 1871.) However, the 1844 fort wasn't the first one. One was begun in 1816, but was never completed because someone messed up. What was the embarrassing mistake?
Hint


Question 7 of 15
7. "Oops. I think we jumped the gun on that one..."

One of the great blunders in American journalism occurred in 1948. The Chicago Tribune, under deadline pressure and based on the analysis of experienced political commentators, pollsters, and (probably) wishful thinking, published an edition with a banner headline announcing the wrong result. What was the headline?
Hint


Question 8 of 15
8. "Oops. I forgot that reporters shouldn't do that..."

In 1981, Janet Cooke, a reporter for the Washington Post, won the Pulitzer Prize for an article entitled "Jimmy's World." "Jimmy's World" described the life of an eight year old heroin addict. Unfortunately, the Post returned the prize three days later, and Ms. Cooke resigns due to her breach of journalistic ethics. What had she done?
Hint


Question 9 of 15
9. "Oops, maybe that was kinda important..."

In 2004, the "Herald-Leader," the newspaper in Lexington, Kentucky issued a formal apology because the two newspapers which merged to become the "Herald-Leader" had consigned coverage of one of the major changes in American culture to brief notes in a column called "Colored Notes." What movement had the paper "neglected to cover?"
Hint


Question 10 of 15
10. "Oops. I guess we shouldn't have said that..."

In 1919, American rocket scientist Robert H. Goddard published a short book called "A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes." His conclusions were widely mocked by the general public, including the "New York Times." The "Times" was especially irritated by Goddard's assertion that a rocket could escape the earth's atmosphere and travel to the moon. According to the "Times'" scathing editorial, Goddard "...only seems to lack the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." The "Times" finally got around to apologizing to Goddard on July 17, 1969, the day after the launch of Apollo 11. What principle had the "Times" finally accepted?
Hint


Question 11 of 15
11. "Oops. Maybe we should have checked for that..."

The "biggest medical tragedy of modern times," according to a BBC programme, concerns a drug called "Thalidomide." Thalidomide is "an effective tranquilizer and painkiller," but it can cause birth defects, most visibly in the form of shortened or absent limbs. In other words, if a pregnant woman takes the drug, the child may be born with malformed or absent arms or legs. This problem was made far worse because Thalidomide was specifically prescribed to pregnant women to help them with what pregnancy-related problem?
Hint


Question 12 of 15
12. "Oops. Maybe we should have hired different guys..."

In 1990, the duo of Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus, known as Milli Vanilli, were forced to return their Best New Artist Grammy. They were also sued by their fans. What heinous sin had they committed?
Hint


Question 13 of 15
13. "Oops. You think maybe we should change the requirements?"

Marie Curie is on the short list for most awesome scientist of all time. She won a shared Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903, and a second, for Chemistry, in 1911. Not only does that make her the first woman to win a Prize, but she's also the first person to win two in different scientific disciplines. One would think that she'd have been a member of every prestigious scientific community available, but she wasn't. Specifically, she was excluded from the French Academy of the Sciences. Why?
Hint


Question 14 of 15
14. "Oops. Maybe I should have looked at the publication date..."

You know how it is - you're a struggling artist, and suddenly you turn on the TV or radio, and some so-and-so is making a bunch of money by copying your work. Sometimes, this is an inadvertent use (oops!) and everyone reaches an agreement. Sometimes you have to sue the thieving so-and-so. Of course, sometimes the so-and-so's the one with the original idea, and the plaintiff is just trying to make a quick buck. Which one of these works was held to be original with the rich so-and-so? (In other words, the person who claimed they'd been ripped off LOST.)
Hint


Question 15 of 15
15. "Oops. Butterfingers..."

During the Manhattan Project (the Allies' effort to make an atomic bomb in World War II), the scientists weren't sure about some things. One of those things was whether the explosion would ignite the atmosphere and incinerate all life on Earth. (They were pretty sure it wouldn't, but Edward Teller offered to take bets on whether it would.) But on August 21, 1945, Harry K. Daghlian, Jr. died as a result of a rather significant mistake. What was it?
Hint



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quiz
Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. "Oops, I guess I should have checked that..." In 2005, McDonald's unveiled a new marketing slogan. Apparently, some advertising people had heard a particular phrase and decided it meant "I want that." It actually does, but only in the sense of "I want to have sex with that [person]." McDonald's therefore unveiled a campaign which suggested they catered to people who want to have sex with food. What phrase should they have checked before putting it on billboards?

Answer: "I'd hit it!"

Honestly. I'm not the hippest guy in the world, and no one has ever asked me the meaning of a slang expression, but even I knew this one. And, keep in mind that we're talking about a McDonald's campaign here. The phrase was ALL OVER - billboards, television, banners. I wonder how long it took for the genius who pitched the campaign to be fired.
2. "Oops, I think I spilled something..." In London in 1814, nine people were killed when a huge container failed. The rupture of that vat caused other vats to fail. The net result was a flood of approximately 376,018 US Gallons (or 1,470,000 liters) of a fluid. Many people would be thrilled by a flood of this fluid, but this was definitely too much of a good thing. What was it?

Answer: Beer

Eight people drowned and one died of alcohol poisoning, mostly because the beer flooded a number of basement apartments. I suppose some people would be happy if their apartment was suddenly filled with milk, but when I was in college, I would have been overjoyed if my apartment was suddenly awash in beer. I'm sure that no one would be happy about the water or the vinegar.
3. "Oops, I guess I kinda mixed up the priorities..." In 1991, there was a fire at a chicken processing plant in Hamlet, North Carolina. Twenty-five people died and fifty-four were injured. The key reason for the deaths would have been discovered had the plant ever been the subject of a safety inspection, but no one had ever conducted one. What obvious safety hazard should have been corrected?

Answer: The fire doors were locked.

There were actually a slew of safety failures, including the fact that phones in the plant couldn't dial out. The owner of the plant, who had ordered the fire doors locked, received a twenty-year Federal prison sentence, but was paroled after four. Lots of people were upset about that.
4. "Oops, maybe I should have proofread that..." In 1999, the Mars Climate Orbiter failed to enter Mars orbit at the correct altitude, resulting in the loss of the unmanned spacecraft. Analysis of the failure led to the revelation that someone had messed up the math. What was the miscommunication that resulted in the loss of a significant element of a $327 million-dollar project?

Answer: The computer was calibrated in pounds and feet, while the engine used meters and kilograms

The software gave instructions in pounds force, while the engine fired in newtons. A newton is 4.45 times greater than a pound force, so the spacecraft entered the atmosphere about sixty miles (100 km) too low. Mars doesn't have much of an atmosphere, but the spacecraft wasn't designed to deal with the amount of stress a miss like that meant.

The thing fell apart and the various pieces crashed and burned.
5. "Oops, that probably wasn't the best plan..." In World War II, a lot of bizarre weapons showed up. Some of 'em were successful. One that was not was the Soviet Union's attempt to train dogs to blow up tanks. Basically, they strapped bombs to dogs, trained them to run under tanks, and then let them loose on the battlefield. What led to the failure of the program?

Answer: The Russian and German tanks smelled different.

According to "The Red Army of the Great Patriotic War, 1941-45," by Steven J. Zaloga, the difference in smell was due to the fact that Russian tanks had diesel engines, while German tanks had gasoline engines. For the record, "The Red Army of the Great Patriotic War" indicates that the "failure due to different smell" story was the German's take, while the Soviets claimed that 16 dogs destroyed 12 German tanks at the Battle of Kursk. I happen to believe the Germans, for two major reasons. First, the two countries did use different engines (which had other significant effects), and second, it's the kind of mistake people are prone to make. Dogs are far more motivated by smell than people, who tend to focus on vision to find things, and I know I can smell the difference between a diesel and a gas engine.
6. "Oops. I forgot to check the map..." In 1844, the United States Government began construction on Fort Montgomery, intended to protect the citizens of the United States from the Canadian hordes. (Although I doubt there was really all that much concern, since the fort wasn't completed until 1871.) However, the 1844 fort wasn't the first one. One was begun in 1816, but was never completed because someone messed up. What was the embarrassing mistake?

Answer: The fort was actually being built on the Canadian side of the border.

According to the Historic Lakes website covering the works of James Millard, a historian specializing in this area, the 1816 site was north of the US-Canada border. Once the geographic error was discovered, the site was abandoned, with all the stuff just left where it was. The site was never officially named, but acquired the nickname "Fort Blunder."
7. "Oops. I think we jumped the gun on that one..." One of the great blunders in American journalism occurred in 1948. The Chicago Tribune, under deadline pressure and based on the analysis of experienced political commentators, pollsters, and (probably) wishful thinking, published an edition with a banner headline announcing the wrong result. What was the headline?

Answer: "DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN"

According to the Chicago "Tribune" website, the newspaper had to go to press before some East Coast states had even reported their results, and relied on polls and professional analysis to call the election. I had always assumed that the headline was the mistake, but when I researched this quiz, I discovered that the mistake went deeper - there was a comprehensive article explaining what had happened by a veteran columnist. (For the record, most headlines are written by editors rather than the people who write the stories, and are not necessarily consistent with the tone of the article.)
8. "Oops. I forgot that reporters shouldn't do that..." In 1981, Janet Cooke, a reporter for the Washington Post, won the Pulitzer Prize for an article entitled "Jimmy's World." "Jimmy's World" described the life of an eight year old heroin addict. Unfortunately, the Post returned the prize three days later, and Ms. Cooke resigns due to her breach of journalistic ethics. What had she done?

Answer: She'd made "Jimmy" up.

So, here's the story. Ms. Cooke hears rumors of an eight-year-old heroin addict. She looks for him. She can't find him. She then decides to make him up. After the Post publishes the moving and tragic story on September 29th, 1980, there's a public outcry that Ms. Cooke provide information so the city can find Jimmy and help him.

She refuses, claiming that drug dealers would kill her if she failed to protect her sources. Meanwhile, the city expends a great deal of time and effort trying to find Jimmy. No one can. People start to think that maybe Jimmy doesn't exist. Finally, when Ms. Cooke wins the Pulitzer, her bosses at the Post demand that she produce evidence of Jimmy's existence.

She can't, and admits that she made him up. Scandal ensues.
9. "Oops, maybe that was kinda important..." In 2004, the "Herald-Leader," the newspaper in Lexington, Kentucky issued a formal apology because the two newspapers which merged to become the "Herald-Leader" had consigned coverage of one of the major changes in American culture to brief notes in a column called "Colored Notes." What movement had the paper "neglected to cover?"

Answer: The Civil Rights Movement

In the words of the apology, "It has come to the editor's attention that the 'Herald-Leader' neglected to cover the civil rights movement. We regret the omission."
10. "Oops. I guess we shouldn't have said that..." In 1919, American rocket scientist Robert H. Goddard published a short book called "A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes." His conclusions were widely mocked by the general public, including the "New York Times." The "Times" was especially irritated by Goddard's assertion that a rocket could escape the earth's atmosphere and travel to the moon. According to the "Times'" scathing editorial, Goddard "...only seems to lack the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." The "Times" finally got around to apologizing to Goddard on July 17, 1969, the day after the launch of Apollo 11. What principle had the "Times" finally accepted?

Answer: That a rocket can function in a vacuum.

The exact wording of the apology is "Further investigation and experimentation have confirmed the findings of Isaac Newton in the 17th century and it is now definitely established that a rocket can function in a vacuum as well as in an atmosphere. The Times regrets the error." Goddard, unfortunately, had died in 1945.
11. "Oops. Maybe we should have checked for that..." The "biggest medical tragedy of modern times," according to a BBC programme, concerns a drug called "Thalidomide." Thalidomide is "an effective tranquilizer and painkiller," but it can cause birth defects, most visibly in the form of shortened or absent limbs. In other words, if a pregnant woman takes the drug, the child may be born with malformed or absent arms or legs. This problem was made far worse because Thalidomide was specifically prescribed to pregnant women to help them with what pregnancy-related problem?

Answer: Morning sickness

A Canadian physician working for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Frances Oldham Kelsey, refused to approve the drug until the manufacturers could demonstrate it was safe. As a result of Dr. Kelsey's refusal, the United States only had 17 cases of Thalidomide-related birth defects, while there were several thousand in Germany and four-hundred odd in the United Kingdom. What's remarkable about that is that it was Dr. Kelsey's first assignment for the FDA and she was under enormous pressure to approve the drug. See the National Library of Medicine website for a brief biography.
12. "Oops. Maybe we should have hired different guys..." In 1990, the duo of Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus, known as Milli Vanilli, were forced to return their Best New Artist Grammy. They were also sued by their fans. What heinous sin had they committed?

Answer: They weren't the actual singers on the record.

Basically, Milli Vanilli was one of those groups created by a producer to sell records. (See also: The Monkees, the Spice Girls, the Sex Pistols, and The Fresh Beat Band.) The producer, Frank Farian, put together a group that sounded good, but recruited "Morvan and Pilatus, two younger and more photogenic model/dancers he found dancing in a Berlin dance club, to front the act." In Europe, the band's album didn't indicate that Morvan and Pilatus had done the singing, but when the record was released in the United States, it did.

After the evidence piled up that Morvan and Pilatus weren't the singers on the album and had lip-synched all their performances, they were forced to return their Grammy. To add injury to insult, people who'd bought the album or attended concerts sued to get their money back.
13. "Oops. You think maybe we should change the requirements?" Marie Curie is on the short list for most awesome scientist of all time. She won a shared Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903, and a second, for Chemistry, in 1911. Not only does that make her the first woman to win a Prize, but she's also the first person to win two in different scientific disciplines. One would think that she'd have been a member of every prestigious scientific community available, but she wasn't. Specifically, she was excluded from the French Academy of the Sciences. Why?

Answer: She was a woman.

Yeah, it wasn't until 1962 that the Academy accepted a woman. Talk about a glass ceiling. I can just imagine Madame Curie saying "Just what the heck do I have to DO?" As with a lot of other early researchers in radioactivity, Ms. Curie died of the effects of radiation.

Interestingly, her lab notes and books are also radioactive and kept in lead containers. If you want to look at them, you have to wear a protective suit, according to "A Short History of Nearly Everything."
14. "Oops. Maybe I should have looked at the publication date..." You know how it is - you're a struggling artist, and suddenly you turn on the TV or radio, and some so-and-so is making a bunch of money by copying your work. Sometimes, this is an inadvertent use (oops!) and everyone reaches an agreement. Sometimes you have to sue the thieving so-and-so. Of course, sometimes the so-and-so's the one with the original idea, and the plaintiff is just trying to make a quick buck. Which one of these works was held to be original with the rich so-and-so? (In other words, the person who claimed they'd been ripped off LOST.)

Answer: "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," by J.K. Rowling

Okay, no one actually sued over "How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life". But, based on my reading of the facts, more than one author had grounds for a lawsuit. "My Sweet Lord" used the tune for "He's So Fine" and "Ice Ice Baby" used the bass line from "Under Pressure." Neither George Harrison nor Vanilla Ice & DJ Earthquake gave credit or obtained permission before releasing their songs. J.K. Rowling has won several lawsuits accusing her of plagiarism, but the chief one was brought by a woman named Nancy Stouffer, who lost partially because she added things to the work Rowling allegedly plagiarized.
15. "Oops. Butterfingers..." During the Manhattan Project (the Allies' effort to make an atomic bomb in World War II), the scientists weren't sure about some things. One of those things was whether the explosion would ignite the atmosphere and incinerate all life on Earth. (They were pretty sure it wouldn't, but Edward Teller offered to take bets on whether it would.) But on August 21, 1945, Harry K. Daghlian, Jr. died as a result of a rather significant mistake. What was it?

Answer: He accidentally created a critical mass.

Here's the situation: Dr. Daghlian is alone in the lab, building a neutron reflector around a plutonium core. The reflector has the effect of lowering the amount of plutonium you need to create a critical mass, so it's kinda dangerous. It's even more dangerous because Dr. Daghlian is building his reflector by stacking 9.2 lb tungsten carbide bricks one at a time around the core. Suddenly, an instrument tells him that the brick he's about to put on the pile will cause the core to go critical and blow the whole area to kingdom come. Dr. Daghlian panics and drops the brick on top of the core.

He has to manually remove the bricks. He burns his hand all to heck and dies twenty-five days later from radiation poisoning. Brave, but "oops" definitely didn't cover it.
Source: Author Correspondguy

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor trident before going online.
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