Libya: Gaddafi’s tanks and military jets open fire on rebels. Government militias counterattack, but are unable to regain control of major cities.
The exoplanet Gj1214b, orbiting the red dwarf star Gj1214 in Ophiuchus, is the first terrestrial planet to have an atmosphere analyzed. This feat was achieved with the ESO-VLT (European Southern Observatory Very Large Telescope) in early 2011. Its transit in front of the star estimated
China reinstates Confucius, after he was banned during Mao’s Cultural Revolution. A statue of him is installed in Tiananmen Square, overlooking Mao’s mausoleum, the only other figure to have been granted such an honor.
NASA’s Deep Impact probe (later renamed the EPOXI mission after its violent encounter with the first comet) completes its second cometary flyby, this time with Hartley 2. The encounter occurs at 12.3 km/s at a distance of 700 km at its closest point.
At the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari in Imola, Max Biaggi won the 2010 SBK world title. He was the first Italian rider to win the SBK world title, the first rider to win two world titles in 13 years, and the second rider
The U.S. Army ends military operations in Iraq. Air, logistical, and training support continues. Fewer than 50,000 American troops remain in Iraq for training. In seven years of war, 4,415 Americans have been killed, and 106,071 Iraqi civilians have been killed. Iraq’s fragile democracy is
One of the causes of rain and snow is discovered (in 2010…). David Sands of Montana State University discovered that the bacterium Pseudomonas syringae is the trigger for the crystallization of water droplets, which then fall as rain. Pseudomonas syringae is found on plants all
A series of Taliban attacks in central Kabul resulted in the deaths of 17 people, including several Indian volunteer doctors and an Italian intelligence agent, Pietro Antonio Colazzo. Pietro, General Abdul Rahman stated, was a courageous man and, right up until the last minute, ensured
U.S. Air Force Jumbo 747 uses its Laser Coil (Chemical Oxygen Iodine Laser) to shoot down a ballistic missile launched from a mobile base off the California coast, destroying it. The test, after the Boeing jet took off from Edwards Air Force Base in the
Around 150 Muslims were massacred in Kuru Karama in the civil war between Muslims and Christians raging in Nigeria.
Joao Zilhao and his team members discover that in southeastern Spain, 50,000 years ago, Neanderthals used red and yellow pigments and shell necklaces.
The exoplanet Gj1214b, orbiting the red dwarf star Gj1214 in Ophiuchus, is discovered. It is the first terrestrial planet discovered. Its atmosphere, composed primarily of water vapor, is later identified.
November 2009 marked the month with the lowest number of Iraqi civilian casualties since the beginning of the Iraq war in 2003.
Space Shuttle Atlantis mission STS129 completes service to the International Space Station (ISS)
Valentino Rossi wins his ninth world title in Malaysia and seventh in the 500cc class.
In Iran, a suicide attack kills dozens of high-ranking members of the Revolutionary Guards, including four generals.
Taliban attacks in Pakistan targeting police training centers and the Federal Investigation Agency in Lahore have left about thirty dead, with a dozen terrorists left stranded.
The American Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) probe photographs the landing sites of the Apollo 11, 14, 15, 16, and 17 missions, highlighting the remaining hardware and the traces of the astronauts and rovers.
Iran Elections: Ahmadinejad declares himself the winner with two-thirds of the vote evenly distributed across the country, just hours after polls closed. Months of street riots and mass arrests follow.
Khost, Afghanistan: A suicide attack kills 14 children aged between 8 and 10 and wounds 58, as they were going to collect their end-of-year exam results.
One of the masterminds of the Mumbai attacks has been arrested in Pakistan. Zakiur Rehman Lakhwi, leader of the Lashkar-e-Taiba organization, was captured along with other militants during a raid on a camp outside Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani Kashmir.
Global Financial Crisis. Following the Senate, the U.S. House of Representatives also approved the Paulson-Bernanke Plan (by Henry Paulson, U.S. Treasury Secretary, and Ben Bernanke, Fed Chairman). This is a $700 billion rescue plan for the financial system following the mortgage crisis ($850 billion with
Valentino Rossi crossed the finish line first at the Japanese Grand Prix and became a legend. His eighth win of the season, his eighth world title, and his sixth in the premier class. Between 500cc and MotoGP, Valentino has won 70 Grand Prix races in
The European Parliament proclaims August 23, the date of the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the “European Day of Remembrance for the Victims of the Crimes of Stalinism and Nazism.” MEPs request this in order to preserve the memory of the victims of mass deportations
Alberto Carpintieri, professor of Structural Sciences at the Polytechnic University of Turin, and Fabio Cardone, physicist, published controversial results on the observed piezonuclear fission of elements such as iron and nickel in granite or basalt compressed at high pressures, resulting in neutron emission. The research,
Analysis of images from the Mars Odyssey (in its seventh year of operations) leads to the discovery of over 200 surface salt deposits, thus pointing towards evidence of an abundance of water; all the sites are in the southern hemisphere, which is the oldest geologically.
Between 1948 and 1973, the Soviet Union, despite formally adhering to the 1946 treaty regulating whaling, killed 180,000 more whales than the formally accepted limit. The North Pacific Right Whale (Eubalena japonica), for example, was nearly exterminated and made extinct in just three years of
Davos, Switzerland. World Economic Forum. Global Financial Crisis. Signs of a global financial crisis are multiplying: Paris-based Société Générale is €4.9 billion short, and Credit Suisse is accusing rating agencies. The world’s major banks are present, but there’s not even a hint of self-criticism. The
Al Qaeda is withdrawing from central Iraq, concentrating in parts of the city of Mosul in the north.
Sweden. A suitcase containing three boxes of rolls of photographic negatives, including photographs taken by Gerda Taro (Gerda Pohorylle), Robert Capa (André Freidmann), and Chim (David Seymer), is found. It had been lost since 1939. It contains photos of the Spanish Civil War by three
In the article “Classical World Arising out of Quantum Physics under the Restriction of Coarse-Grained Measurements” Johannes Kofler and Časlav Brukner of the Fakultät für Physik, Universität Wien, describe the experiments with which they observe the gradual vanishing of quantum reality and the rise of
Nuon Chea, 82, former right-hand man of Pol Pot, is captured and will be tried by a UN tribunal.
The Russian Foton M3 probe, in collaboration with ESA, is launching a colony of tardigrades into orbit. They will be transported into the vacuum of circumterrestrial space and exposed to direct ionizing solar radiation. The vacuum will have almost no effect on them, while ionizing
NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft, 84 astronomical units from the Sun (83-85 from Earth), crosses the termination shock, or the boundary where solar wind particles pass at subsonic speeds (specifically from 400 km/s to 100 km/s in the case of Voyager 2 which crosses the boundary
Bletchley Park, central England. Thanks to the passion of volunteers and donors, the first replica of the so-called “Bombe” machines, built during World War II to decrypt Nazi Enigma messages, is turned on. The last Bombe had been dismantled 62 years earlier.
Tony Blair resigns early and hands over the post of Prime Minister to his Labour Party colleague Gordon Brown.
Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, leader of the self-proclaimed Islamic State in Iraq, was killed in a firefight in the Sunni Ghazaliya neighborhood of Baghdad.
A suicide bomber blew himself up inside the Iraqi Parliament in Baghdad, killing several people, including two parliamentarians.
Afghanistan: The Taliban kidnap La Repubblica journalist Daniele Mastrogiacomo and release him after the release of several Taliban leaders at the request of the Italian government. Mastrogiacomo’s driver is beheaded in front of him, while his interpreter will be slaughtered a few weeks later when
After years of discussions and amendments, the People’s Republic of China has approved the legalization of private property, declaring it inviolable.
The Prodi government is defeated in the Senate on foreign policy (funding troops in Afghanistan and expanding the NATO base in Vicenza), with the votes of two senators from the Communist Refoundation Party and Giulio Andreotti being decisive; Romano Prodi resigns his mandate to President
In a raid in various Italian cities, 15 members of the Red Brigades were arrested, including some CGIL trade unionists.
MacWorld in San Francisco, California. Steve Jobs presents Apple’s new product: the iPhone. By the end of 2010, Apple will have sold 90 million iPhones, taking half of the profits generated by the mobile phone market, where it had previously been completely absent.
A medium-range ballistic missile launched from the Xichang Space Center carrying a Chinese anti-satellite weapon has shot down (on the third attempt) an old Chinese meteorological satellite at an altitude of 800 km: the polar satellite Feng Yun 1C (FY-1C).
Saddam Hussein was executed by hanging in Baghdad; the execution took place after a lengthy trial in which he was ultimately found guilty of killing 148 Shiites in Dujail in 1982; other trials remained pending, including one regarding the gassing of thousands of Kurds in
Mullah Muhammad Osmani, Taliban guerrilla leader in southern Afghanistan, was killed in an air raid while traveling by car.
UN authorizes regional peacekeeping force for southern Somalia, but Islamic courts refuse
The KGB used polonium to assassinate former spy Litvinenko, although thallium was initially considered, which was instead used by the KGB to poison another Russian dissident, Nikolai Khokhlov, in 1957.
Lebanese Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel, a Christian, was killed by a shot to the head fired with a silenced pistol by a mysterious hitman in the Jdeide area, east of Beirut; Gemayel (34 years old), is the son of former President Amin and nephew of
Momtasir Al Jabouri, leader of Ansar Al Sunna, an organization active in kidnappings and beheadings, was captured 30 km north of Baghdad.
Oriana Fallaci dies in Florence, according to President Napolitano: “A world-renowned journalist, a passionate protagonist of lively cultural battles, admirable in her strenuous fight against the evil (‘the alien’) that had struck her.”
Space Shuttle Atlantis delivers to the ISS a giant solar panel that will provide a third more power, resuming construction of the space station.
Al Zarkawi (or Al-Zarqawi) and six lieutenants were killed near Baquba, north of Baghdad, by two 220kg bombs dropped by two F16s; in the following days, dozens of other local commanders were arrested in the Baquba area.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police arrest 15 Islamic terrorists in possession of explosives and plans to blow up the Toronto Stock Exchange, take control of national public television and the parliament building in Ottawa, and then behead the prime minister on live TV.
In Samarra, a terrorist attack almost completely demolished the Golden Mosque, a historic Shiite mosque; the event sparked violent protests, hundreds of deaths, and dozens of other mosques burned across Iraq.
NASA’s StarDust successfully returned to Utah with its precious cargo of cometary material and some particles of extrasolar material; this was the first recovery of extraterrestrial material since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972.
The Giove A satellite, the first of the European Galileo satellite constellation (the European alternative to the American GPS and the Russian Glonass), is launched into orbit by the Russian Soyuz carrier from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Iraqis, with a 66% voter turnout and 78% “yes” votes, vote and approve the new Constitution that defines the Iraqi state as “independent, republican, democratic and federal.”
In Nalchik, in Kabardino-Balkaria in Russia on the Chechen border, a group of 100 Islamic guerrillas attacked the local barracks, after a long firefight almost all of them were killed, around ten victims among civilians and military personnel
Californian scientists successfully repair the spines of mice with stem cells.
In Baghdad, near the Kadhimiya mosque, on the occasion of the celebration of the martyrdom of Imam Moussa al-Khadhem, around a thousand people lost their lives in the stampede caused by some mortar rounds fired into the crowd by a group linked to Al Qaeda.
Hurricane Katrina hits New Orleans, flooding 80% of the city, reaching 6 meters in some places, leaving thousands dead, and evacuating the city.
In Italy, three kamikaze recruiters to be sent to Iraq were acquitted at trial because their activity should not be classified as terrorism but as resistance.