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<< | 1980 | 1981 |
1982 | 1983 |
1984 | 1985 |
1986 |
1987| 1988 |
1989
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| 01 - Fidel Castro completes
30 years in power in Cuba |
| 02 - The US and Canada sign
a comprehensive free trade agreement which eliminates tariffs and
other barriers to trade and investment |
| 04 - US Navy jets shoot
down two Libyan MiG-23 fighters 112 kilometres off the Libyan coast.
The Pentagon says they fired in self-defence |
| 07 - Emperor Hirohito of
Japan dies at age 87 from cancer of the duodenum. He is succeeded by
his son, Akihito |
| 09 - A British Midland 737
with engine difficulties crashes next to the M1 motorway between
Leicester and Nottingham. 44 people die |
| 11 - Assistant commissioner
of the Australian Federal Police, Colin Winchester, 55, is shot dead
in the driveway of his Canberra home |
| 12 - Former Ugandan leader
Idi Amin is deported from Zaire to Senegal |
| 16 - Three days of rioting
begin in Miami after an Hispanic policeman shoots and kills an
unarmed black man fleeing arrest |
| 16 - In Prague, hundreds of
riot police storm Wenceslas Square and attack demonstrators demanding
freedom |
| 17 - Five Asian children
are killed by a gunman at their Stockton, California elementary
school. The gunman injures 30 others before killing himself |
| 18 - South African
president P W Botha, aged 73, suffers a mild stroke in Cape Town |
| 20 -
George Bush sworn in
as 41st US President |
| 23 - More than 1,000 die in
USSR earthquake |
| 23 - Spanish artist
Salvador Dali dies (b. 1904) |
| 26 - Lone round-the-world
yachtswoman Kay Cottee is named 'Australian of the Year' |
| 02 - Last Soviet troops
leave Kabul. All 120,000 Soviet military personnel will have left
Afghanistan within the next ten days |
| 02 - F W de Klerk leads
South Africa after Botha resigns |
| 14 - Ayatollah Khomeini
issues a fatwa ordering the death of British writer Salman Rushdie
for alleged blasphemy in his novel Satanic Verses |
| 21 - Indian tribal leaders
gather in the Amazon town of Altimira in a campaign to stop a
hydro-electric dam project which will further deplete the Amazon
rainforest |
| 24 - A United Airlines 747
rips open over Hawaii. Nine people die in this freak accident when
they are sucked from the plane |
| 01 - Australian Pensioner
Gwendolin Mitchelhill is first victim of Sydney's 'Granny Killer'.
Six elderly women are murdered over a 13 month period at Mosman on
Sydney's North Shore |
| 07 - China declares martial
law in Tibet |
| 20 - Australian PM
Bob Hawke cries and admits marital infidelity |
| 22 - Pete Rose is accused
of betting at baseball. If convicted, it will trivialise his
nomination into the hall of fame as well as suspend him from the
league for an indefinite amount of time |
| 24 - Alaska is hit by the
supertanker Exxon Valdez oil spill - The 11 million gallon
spill is the worst in history |
| 26 - Soviet people cast
ballots in the first free national election since the October
Revolution in 1917 |
| 28 - Reformist Boris
Yeltsin wins in USSR election |
| 15 - 94 die in soccer
horror crush at Hillsborough Stadium, Sheffield, Yorkshire, during a
match between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest |
| 17 - The trade union
Solidarity is legalised in Poland |
| 18 - Chinese students begin
mass pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square, Beijing |
| 19 - An explosion kills 47
sailors aboard the battleship USS Iowa. The ship was 300 miles
north of Puerto Rico at the time |
| 25 - Lucille Ball dies of
an aortal rupture, aged 77 |
| 05 - Oliver North guilty on
three charges |
| 14 - Carlos Menem elected
as Argentina's President |
| 15 - Bond University in
Australia takes first students |
| 25 -
Mikhail Gorbachev is
elected president of USSR by the new Congress of People's Deputies
|
| 28 - Australian
entrepreneur Dick Smith completes round-the-world flight |
| 30 - Tim Anderson is charged
with the 1978 bombing of the Hilton Hotel in Sydney |
| 02 - Bill Wyman of
The Rolling Stones, 52, marries Mandy Smith, 18, after dating her for
five years |
| 03 - Ayatollah Khomeini
dies in Iran |
| 04 - Chinese troops massacre
protesters in Tiananmen Square |
| 04 - The first partially
democratic elections in Poland are held |
| 04 - 800 die in
Trans-Siberian train disaster |
| 10 - Reverend Jerry Falwell
officially disbands the Moral Majority, stating that his goal of
getting fundamentalist Christians involved in national politics has
been achieved |
| 10 - "That's All Folks!" -
Mel Blanc, the voice of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig and many
others, dies aged 81 |
| 10 - A series of nationwide
strikes by coalminers starts in the Soviet Union |
| 14 - A controversial glass
pyramid outside the Louvre, Paris, is opened |
| 19 - Of the 298 on board,
150 survive the crash of United Airlines flight 232 |
| 31 - Arab terrorists hang a
US soldier after their demands are not met |
| 08 - For the first time
since the Challenger disaster in 1987 the US launches a manned
space flight, as the Space Shuttle Columbia blasts off from
Cape Canaveral, Florida |
| 09 - Army general Colin R.
Powell is first black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff |
| 09 -
President Bush signs a
bill appropriating $166 billion over ten years for the bail-out of
troubled savings and loan associations. 75% of the money will be
taken from the income taxes of US citizens |
| 13 - Two hot air balloons
collide at a height of 2,000 ft over Alice Springs in Australia,
killing 13 people |
| 14 - South African
president P W Botha resigns and is succeeded by F W de Klerk, who
begins to dismantle the apartheid system |
| 20 - Revellers drown in
Thames collision |
| 23 - Hundreds of thousands
of Latvians, Lithuanians, and Estonians form a human chain to protest
against their annexation by the Soviet Union |
| 24 - 1,645 Australian
airline pilots resign en masse |
| 30 - US scientists identify
the cystic fibrosis gene |
| 31 - Princess Anne and
Captain Mark Phillips announce they have decided to separate |
| 11 - Hungary first to lift
Iron Curtain, opening its borders with Austria |
| 22 - US Composer Irving
Berlin dies of natural causes aged 101 |
| 28 - The FDA announces that
it will allow DDI (dideoxyinosine), an experimental AIDS drug, to be
prescribed to AIDS patients while it is still being tested. To date,
over 106,000 cases of AIDS have been reported in the US, and over
61,000 Americans have died of the disease |
| 28 - Exiled Ferdinand
Marcos dies in Hawaii |
| 29 - In what is the largest
single drug seizure in history, federal agents discover 20 tons of
cocaine (with a street value of $2 billion) in a warehouse in
California's San Fernando Valley |
| 17 - San Francisco
devastated by a 6.9 earthquake. Over 70 people are killed, most of
them when a double-decker freeway bridge collapses. The damage
estimate is $10 billion |
| 19 - Hungarian parliament
legalises opposition parties |
| 23 - A new Hungarian
republic is declared |
| 24 - Disgraced evangelist
Jimmy Bakker is sentenced to 45 years imprisonment and fined $700,000
for swindling his followers. The TV evangelist comes up for parole in
1999 |
| 25 - Communist party of
Yugoslavia adopts a new policy of political pluralism |
| 26 - John Major becomes
chancellor of the exchequer in the UK |
| 10 -
Berlin Wall is opened
- Now a gateway to the West |
| 21 - The British House of
Commons is televised for the first time |
| 21 - Australian
entrepreneur Christopher Skase's Quintex empire goes bankrupt |
| 24 - The Czech
administration resigns following a week of anti-government
demonstrations |
| 10 -
Berlin Wall is opened
- Now a gateway to the West |
| 21 - The British House of
Commons is televised for the first time |
| 21 - Australian
entrepreneur Christopher Skase's Quintex empire goes bankrupt |
| 24 - The Czech
administration resigns following a week of anti-government
demonstrations |
| 03 -
President Bush and
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev have their first summit meeting in
Valetta, Malta. Both presidents make statements agreeing that the
Cold War is finally over.
Communism begins to collapse throughout
Europe |
| 10 - Gustav Husak resigns
as president of Czechoslovakia |
| 20 - 24,000 US soldiers
invade Panama to overthrow and capture military dictator Manuel
Noriega. 23 Americans are killed and 323 wounded in the fighting,
which ends on January 3, 1990, with Noriega's capture |
| 22 - Nicolae Ceaucescu's
government in Romania is overthrown after a battle with security
forces |
| 23 - Another person is
injured in the US due to a pipe bomb explosion. The bombing is one of a series
of bombings linked to one person who becomes known as the
'Una-bomber' |
| 25 - Romanian dictator
Nicolae Ceaucescu executed, ending Romanian oppression |
| 28 - A killer earthquake
devastates Newcastle, NSW at 10:28am. The earthquake claims 13 lives
and injures 120, most of them inside the Newcastle Worker's Club |
| 29 - Dissident Czech writer
Vaclav Havel is elected president of Czechoslovakia |
<<
| 1980 | 1981 |
1982 | 1983 |
1984 | 1985 |
1986 |
1987| 1988 |
1989
|
|
|
Jan 07 - Emperor Hirohito of Japan dies, aged 87
Jan 20 -
George Bush
sworn
in as 41st US President
Feb 14 - Ayatollah Khomeini orders the death of British writer Salman
Rushdie for his novel Satanic Verses
Mar 01 - Australia's 'Granny Killer' claims first victim. Six elderly
women are murdered over a 13 month period on Sydney's North Shore
Mar 24 - Exxon Valdez oil spill is the worst in history
Apr 15 - 94 die in soccer horror crush at Hillsborough Stadium, Sheffield
Jun 04 - Troops massacre protesters in Tiananmen Square, China
Aug 09 - Colin R. Powell is first black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff
Oct 17 - San Francisco devastated by earthquake. Over 70 people are
killed
Nov 10 -
Berlin Wall
comes down opening a gateway to the West
Dec 28 - Killer earthquake devastates Newcastle, NSW, Australia
Meteorologists pronounce 1989 to be the warmest year on record, worldwide
Computers
across the West are hit by the "Friday the 13th" virus
Allan Border
captains Australia to first Ashes series win in 55 years
Wayne Gardner
wins first Aussie 500cc Grand Prix
'Tawriffic'
wins the Melbourne Cup
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