Yesterday was !
On this day in...
See what historic events that happened for yesterdays date. Click on a year to learn more.
2023
2023 – An avalanche strikes Nyingchi, Tibet, killing 28 people.
2017
2017 – The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 is announced to be suspended.
2016
2016 – President Barack Obama announces the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
2013
2013 – Shahzad Luqman is murdered by members of Golden Dawn in Petralona, Athens, leading the creation of new measures to combat race-based attacks in Greece.
2013
2013 – Former cyclist Lance Armstrong confesses to his doping in an airing of Oprah's Next Chapter.
2010
2010 – Rioting begins between Muslim and Christian groups in Jos, Nigeria, results in at least 200 deaths.
2008
2008 – British Airways Flight 38 crashes short of the runway at Heathrow Airport, injuring 47.
2007
2007 – The Doomsday Clock is set to five minutes to midnight in response to North Korea's nuclear testing.
2002
2002 – Mount Nyiragongo erupts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, displacing an estimated 400,000 people.
1998
1998 – Clinton–Lewinsky scandal: Matt Drudge breaks the story of the Bill Clinton–Monica Lewinsky affair on his Drudge Report website.
1997
1997 – Cape Canaveral Air Force Station: A Delta II carrying the GPS IIR-1 satellite explodes 13 seconds after launch, dropping 250 tons of burning rocket remains around the launch pad.
1996
1996 – The Czech Republic applies for membership in the European Union.
1995
1995 – The 6.9 Mw Great Hanshin earthquake shakes the southern Hyōgo Prefecture with a maximum Shindo of VII, leaving 5,502–6,434 people dead, and 251,301–310,000 displaced.
1994
1994 – The 6.7 Mw Northridge earthquake shakes the Greater Los Angeles Area with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent), leaving 57 people dead and more than 8,700 injured.
1992
1992 – During a visit to South Korea, Japanese Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa apologizes for forcing Korean women into sexual slavery during World War II.
1991
1991 – Crown Prince Harald of Norway becomes King Harald V, following the death of his father, King Olav V.
1991
1991 – Gulf War: Operation Desert Storm begins early in the morning as aircraft strike positions across Iraq, it is also the first major combat sortie for the F-117. LCDR Scott Speicher's F/A-18C Hornet from VFA-81 is shot down by a Mig-25 and is the first American casualty of the War. Iraq fires eight Scud missiles into Israel in an unsuccessful bid to provoke Israeli retaliation.
1981
1981 – President of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos lifts martial law eight years and five months after declaring it.
1977
1977 – Capital punishment in the United States resumes after a ten-year hiatus, as convicted murderer Gary Gilmore is executed by firing squad in Utah.
1969
1969 – Black Panther Party members Bunchy Carter and John Huggins are killed during a meeting in Campbell Hall on the campus of UCLA.
1966
1966 – Palomares incident: A B-52 bomber collides with a KC-135 Stratotanker over Spain, killing seven airmen, and dropping three 70-kiloton nuclear bombs near the town of Palomares and another one into the sea.
1961
1961 – Former Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba is murdered in circumstances suggesting the support and complicity of the governments of Belgium and the United States.
1961
1961 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivers a televised farewell address to the nation three days before leaving office, in which he warns against the accumulation of power by the "military–industrial complex" as well as the dangers of massive spending, especially deficit spending.
1950
1950 – United Nations Security Council Resolution 79 relating to arms control is adopted.
1950
1950 – The Great Brink's Robbery: Eleven thieves steal more than $2 million from an armored car company's offices in Boston.
1948
1948 – The Renville Agreement between the Netherlands and Indonesia is ratified.
1946
1946 – The UN Security Council holds its first session.
1945
1945 – Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg is taken into Soviet custody while in Hungary; he is never publicly seen again.
1945
1945 – The SS-Totenkopfverbände begin the evacuation of the Auschwitz concentration camp as the Red Army closes in.
1945
1945 – World War II: The Vistula–Oder Offensive forces German troops out of Warsaw.
1944
1944 – World War II: Allied forces launch the first of four assaults on Monte Cassino with the intention of breaking through the Winter Line and seizing Rome, an effort that would ultimately take four months and cost 105,000 Allied casualties.
1943
1943 – World War II: Greek submarine Papanikolis captures the 200-ton sailing vessel Agios Stefanos and mans her with part of her crew.
1941
1941 – Franco-Thai War: Vichy French forces inflict a decisive defeat over the Royal Thai Navy.
1920
1920 – Alcohol Prohibition begins in the United States as the Volstead Act goes into effect.
1918
1918 – Finnish Civil War: The first serious battles take place between the Red Guards and the White Guard.
1917
1917 – The United States pays Denmark $25 million for the Virgin Islands.
1915
1915 – Russia defeats Ottoman Turkey in the Battle of Sarikamish during the Caucasus Campaign of World War I.
1912
1912 – British polar explorer Captain Robert Falcon Scott reaches the South Pole, one month after Roald Amundsen.
1904
1904 – Anton Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard receives its premiere performance at the Moscow Art Theatre.
1903
1903 – El Yunque National Forest in Puerto Rico becomes part of the United States National Forest System as the Luquillo Forest Reserve.
1899
1899 – The United States takes possession of Wake Island in the Pacific Ocean.
1893
1893 – Lorrin A. Thurston, along with the Citizens' Committee of Public Safety, led the Overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii and the government of Queen Liliʻuokalani.
1885
1885 – A British force defeats a large Dervish army at the Battle of Abu Klea in the Sudan.
1873
1873 – A group of Modoc warriors defeats the United States Army in the First Battle of the Stronghold, part of the Modoc War.
1852
1852 – The United Kingdom signs the Sand River Convention with the South African Republic.
1811
1811 – Mexican War of Independence: In the Battle of Calderón Bridge, a heavily outnumbered Spanish force of 6,000 troops defeats nearly 100,000 Mexican revolutionaries.
1799
1799 – Maltese patriot Dun Mikiel Xerri, along with a number of other patriots, is executed.
1781
1781 – American Revolutionary War: Battle of Cowpens: Continental troops under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan defeat British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton at the battle in South Carolina.
1773
1773 – Captain James Cook leads the first expedition to sail south of the Antarctic Circle.
1649
1649 – The Second Ormonde Peace creates an alliance between the Irish Royalists and Confederates during the War of the Three Kingdoms. The coalition was then decisively defeated during the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland.
1648
1648 – England's Long Parliament passes the "Vote of No Addresses", breaking off negotiations with King Charles I and thereby setting the scene for the second phase of the English Civil War.
1641
1641 – Reapers' War: The Junta de Braços (parliamentary assembly) of the Principality of Catalonia accepts the proposal of establishment of the Catalan Republic under French protection.
1608
1608 – Emperor Susenyos I of Ethiopia surprises an Oromo army at Ebenat; his army reportedly kills 12,000 Oromo at the cost of 400 of his men.
1595
1595 – During the French Wars of Religion, Henry IV of France declares war on Spain.
1562
1562 – France grants religious toleration to the Huguenots in the Edict of Saint-Germain.
1524
1524 – Giovanni da Verrazzano sets sail westward from Madeira to find a sea route to the Pacific Ocean.
1377
1377 – Pope Gregory XI reaches Rome, after deciding to move the Papacy back to Rome from Avignon.
1362
1362 – Saint Marcellus' flood kills at least 25,000 people on the shores of the North Sea.
38 B
38 BC – Octavian divorces his wife Scribonia and marries Livia Drusilla, ending the fragile peace between the Second Triumvirate and Sextus Pompey.