January
01 – Cyprus and Malta adopt the Euro as their currency.
08 – New Jersey officially apologises for slavery, becoming the first Northern US state to do so.
20 – Frenchman Francis Joyon becomes the fastest person to sail solo around the world, taking 57 days, 13 hours and 34 minutes.
22 – Academy Award-nominated actor Heath Ledger tragically passes away at age 28, sending shockwaves through Hollywood just months before his iconic performance in The Dark Knight.
20 – AMC premieres Breaking Bad, introducing Walter White to the screen and establishing a masterclass in serialised, anti-hero television tragedy.
21 – Stock markets around the world plunge in a “Black Monday” amid growing fears of a Great Recession in the US, fueled by the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis.
30 – Television presenter and writer Jeremy Beadle, 59, dies suddenly from pneumonia in London.
February
03 – The New York Giants beat the New England Patriots, 17-14, in Super Bowl XLII at University of Phoenix Stadium, Glendale, Arizona, featuring Eli Manning’s famous “Helmet Catch” play.
05 – A major tornado outbreak across the Southern United States leaves at least 58 dead.
13 – Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd makes an historic apology to Indigenous Australians, especially to the “Stolen Generations” who suffered forced child removal and assimilation.
14 – A gunman opens fire in a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb County, Illinois, killing six people, including himself, and injuring 18.
17 – Kosovo declares independence from Serbia.
22 – In Britain, the Northern Rock bank is nationalised by the government.
24 – Fidel Castro retires as the President of Cuba due to ill health after nearly fifty years in power.
26 – The Global Seed Vault officially opens in Svalbard, Norway, to help preserve diversity and loss from other genebanks.
27 – An earthquake with an epicentre in Lincolnshire is felt across most of Britain, with several buildings suffering substantial damage.
28 – Former PM of Thailand Thaksin Shinawatra is arrested on corruption charges after returning to Thailand following months of exile.
March
12 – New York Governor Eliot Spitzer resigns following a highly publicised wiretap investigation, dominating tabloid headlines.
19 – British science fiction author and inventor Sir Arthur C. Clarke dies, aged 90.
30 – A Cessna 501 Citation aircraft crashes into a row of houses in Farnborough, London, killing two pilots and three passengers.
31 – The inquest into the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, hears that there is “not a shred of evidence” that the Duke of Edinburgh or MI6 ordered her death.
April
07 – The inquest into the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, records a verdict of accidental death, caused by the heavy drinking, drug abuse and speeding of her chauffeur Henri Paul, who died in the crash along with Diana and Dodi Fayed.
25 – Jazz legend and humorist Humphrey Lyttelton dies aged 86 in London.
May
01 – Conservative candidate Boris Johnson defeats the incumbent Labour mayor, Ken Livingstone, in the London mayoral election.
02 – Cyclone Nargis kills 133,000 in Myanmar.
02 – Iron Man premieres in cinemas, launching Robert Downey Jr.’s legendary career comeback and birthing the multi-billion-dollar Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU).
07 – Dmitry Medvedev is sworn in as the 3rd President of the Russian Federation. He appoints Vladimir Putin as prime minister.
10 – Philippine court acquits Imelda Marcos in a 17-year-old case of 32 counts of illegal transfer of wealth totalling $863 million in Swiss bank accounts.
12 – A magnitude-7.9 earthquake strikes China’s Sichuan province, killing nearly 90,000 and leaving millions homeless.
15 – California becomes the second US state after Massachusetts in 2004 to legalise same-sex marriage after its Supreme Court rules a previous ban unconstitutional.
17 – Portsmouth defeats Cardiff City 1 – 0 in the FA Cup Final at Wembley Stadium.
28 – The 1st Nepalese Constituent Assembly declares Nepal a republic, ending its monarchy.
June
01 – A fire at the backlot of Universal Studios in Hollywood destroys several movie icons, such as Courthouse Square, the clock tower from Back to the Future, and the King Kong exhibit on the studio tour.
04 – British TV presenter Michael Parkinson is knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
08 – A man uses a truck and dagger to kill seven people and injure 11 on the crowded Sunday pedestrian-zoned Chūōdōri street in Tokyo, Japan.
11 – Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper makes an official historic apology to Canada’s First Nations in regard to residential school abuse in which children were isolated from their homes, families and cultures for a century.
27 – Bill Gates steps down as Chairman of Microsoft to work full time for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
July
02 – Ingrid Betancourt and 14 other FARC hostages are rescued by the Colombian armed forces.
10 – Apple launches their App Store with 500 apps available at launch.
16 – Malaysian politician Anwar Ibrahim is arrested on sodomy charges in Malaysia.
21 – Bosnian Serb politician Radovan Karadžić is arrested in Serbia and indicted by the UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes during the 1995 Srebrenica massacre.
28 – The historic Grand Pier at Weston-super-Mare in Somerset, England, burns down for the second time in 80 years.
August
01 – Russian-supported forces of the self-proclaimed Republic of South Ossetia attack Georgian villages, breaking a 1992 ceasefire agreement.
03 – Actor Morgan Freeman is injured in an automobile accident near Ruleville, Mississippi, when his car flips over several times on the highway.
07 – Georgia moves troops into the Russian-supported self-proclaimed republic of South Ossetia in response to aggression.
08 – Russia launches a full-scale land, air, and sea invasion of Georgia, referring to it as a “peace enforcement” operation after Georgia responds to aggression from South Ossetia.
08 – XXIX Summer Olympic Games open in Beijing, China.
11 – Airbnb is founded by Brian Chesky, Joe Gebbia, and Nathan Blecharczyk.
12 – Nicolas Sarkozy, the President of France, negotiates a ceasefire agreement between Russia and Georgia, ending a brief war after five days of hostilities.
17 – A light aircraft approaching Coventry in Britain collides with a microlight aircraft, killing all five people on board the two aircraft.
18 – President of Pakistan Pervez Musharraf resigns due to pressure from the opposition.
20 – Spanair Flight 5022 from Madrid to Gran Canaria skids off the runway and crashes at Barajas Airport, killing 146 people in the crash and eight more afterwards. Only 18 people survive.
24 – XXIX Summer Olympic Games close at the Beijing National Stadium.
27 – US Senator Barack Obama becomes the first African American to be nominated by a major political party for President of the United States, by the Democratic Party.
29 – Republican Presidential nominee John McCain selects Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, igniting an unprecedented media whirlwind.
September
07 – The US Government takes control of the two largest mortgage financing companies in America – Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
10 – The Large Hadron Collider, the world’s most powerful particle accelerator, runs its first test operation at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland.
15 – American financial giant Lehman Brothers files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, triggering the absolute worst peak of the Global Financial Crisis.
20 – A suicide truck bomb explosion destroys the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan, killing at least 54 and injuring 266.
21 – The last two remaining independent investment banks on Wall Street – Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley – become bank holding companies as a result of the subprime mortgage crisis.
21 – South Africa’s President Thabo Mbeki resigns from office, effective 25 September.
21 – Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert resigns.
23 – The HTC Dream – the first smartphone powered by Android – is launched.
25 – China launches its third human spaceflight, the spacecraft Shenzhou 7.
27 – Astronaut Zhai Zhigang becomes the first Chinese person to perform a spacewalk while flying on Shenzhou 7.
28 – The Florida Marlins beat the New York Mets 4-2 at the last game played at Shea Stadium in New York before its demolition.
28 – SpaceX Falcon 1 becomes the world’s first privately developed space launch vehicle to successfully make orbit.
29 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average falls 777.68 points in the largest single-day point loss, following the bankruptcies of Lehman Brothers and Washington Mutual.
October
03 – Former NFL star OJ Simpson is found guilty of kidnapping and armed robbery.
03 – A $700 billion bailout bill for the US financial system is signed by President George W Bush.
07 – Music streaming service Spotify is launched by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon.
13 – HM Treasury infuses £37 billion ($64 billion, €47 billion) of new capital-bailout into Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc, Lloyds TSB and HBOS Plc, to avert a financial sector collapse in the UK.
17 – Iran attempts to create the world’s largest sandwich (1,500 meters) but fails when crowds eat it before it can be measured.
18 – An episode of The Russell Brand Show airs on BBC Radio, featuring a series of prank telephone calls to the actor Andrew Sachs by Brand and comedian Jonathan Ross, leading to large numbers of complaints.
22 – India launches its first unmanned lunar mission, Chandrayaan-1.
22 – Google Play – the official app store for the Android operating system – is launched.
24 – Many of the world’s stock exchanges experience the worst decline in their history, with drops of around 10% in most indices on a day dubbed “Bloody Friday”.
24 – Iceland receives a £1.3 billion bailout package from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the first European country to require an emergency loan as a result of the financial crisis.
28 – 500,000 mortgage holders in the UK are left in negative equity after house prices drop 15% since the previous summer.
29 – Delta Air Lines merges with Northwest Airlines, creating the world’s largest airline and reducing the number of US legacy carriers to five.
November
02 – British McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton becomes the youngest ever Formula One motor racing World Champion.
04 – Barack Obama defeats Republican candidate John McCain and is elected the first African-American President of the United States.
11 – RMS Queen Elizabeth 2 (QE2) sets sail from Southampton, England on her final voyage to Dubai.
14 – The Eurozone officially slips into recession for the first time since its creation in 1999, pushed down by recessions in Germany and Italy.
14 – Hong Kong becomes the second Asian economy to tip into recession, its exports hit by weakening global demand.
16 – Actor and On The Buses star Reg Varney dies, aged 92.
17 – Japan, the world’s second-biggest economy, slides into its first recession in seven years.
26 – 29 – Pakistani terrorists attack several sites in Mumbai, India, leading to the deaths of nearly 200 people. One terrorist, Ajmal Kasab, is captured alive and executed in 2012.
27 – XL Airways Germany Flight 888T – an Airbus A320 due to be redelivered to Air New Zealand – stalls and crashes over the Mediterranean Sea, resulting in the deaths of 7 people.
December
01 – The US National Bureau of Economic Research announces that the American economy has been in recession since December 2007.
05 – Former NFL star O.J. Simpson is sentenced to 33 years in prison for kidnapping and a Las Vegas armed robbery.
05 – Human remains previously found in 1991 are finally identified by Russian and American scientists as those of Tsar Nicholas II.
06 – The police shooting of 15-year-old Alexandros Grigoropulos leads to riots across Greece.
11 – American financier Bernie Madoff is arrested and charged with securities fraud in a $50 billion Ponzi scheme.
14 – President George W Bush makes his fourth and final trip to Iraq as president and is almost struck by two shoes thrown at him by Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi during a farewell conference in Baghdad.
18 – Woolworths announces that its 807 UK stores will close by 5 January 2009, putting some 27,000 people out of work.
19 – British furniture retailer MFI ceases trading, closing all 111 furniture stores and leaving its 1,400 workforce redundant. The retailer had been in business since 1964.
27 – Israel invades the Gaza Strip in response to rockets being fired into Israeli territory by Hamas. Their opening airstrike hits 100 targets in 220 seconds, killing around 250 people.
Also this year . . .
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- XXIX Summer Olympics take place in Beijing, China.
- Dayana Mendoza (Venezuela) is crowned Miss Universe.
- Google Chrome is released.