Images of the dwarf planet Eris are taken and subsequently used in its discovery by the team of Michael E. Brown, Chad Trujillo, and David L. Rabinowitz.

In Seoul, 32 people are killed when the Seongsu Bridge collapses.

North Korea nuclear weapons program: North Korea and the United States sign an agreement that requires North Korea to stop its nuclear weapons program and agree to inspections.

Jaffna hospital massacre is carried out by Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka killing 70 ethnic Tamil patients, doctors and nurses.

In Lebanon, pro-Iranian kidnappers claim to have abducted American writer Edward Tracy (he is released in August 1991).

The metre is defined at the seventeenth General Conference on Weights and Measures as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second.

Moshe Dayan resigns from the Israeli government because of strong disagreements with Prime Minister Menachem Begin over policy towards the Arabs.

Australian civilian pilot Frederick Valentich vanishes in a Cessna 182 over the Bass Strait south of Melbourne, after reporting contact with an unidentified aircraft.

The European Patent Institute is founded.

Game 6 of the World Series is played between the Boston Red Sox and Cincinnati Reds. The game would be won on a home run off the left field foul pole at Fenway Park hit by Carlton Fisk in the bottom of the 12th inning, ending perhaps the greatest baseball game played in World Series history.

Fred Dryer of the then Los Angeles Rams becomes the first player in NFL history to score two safeties in the same game.

John Paul Getty III's ear is cut off by his kidnappers and sent to a newspaper in Rome; it doesn't arrive until November 8.

A coup d'état in Somalia brings Siad Barre to power.

Vietnam War: More than 100,000 war protesters gather in Washington, D.C.. A peaceful rally at the Lincoln Memorial is followed by a march to The Pentagon and clashes with soldiers and United States Marshals protecting the facility. Similar demonstrations occurred simultaneously in Japan and Western Europe.

Aberfan disaster: A slag heap collapses on the village of Aberfan in Wales, killing 144 people, mostly schoolchildren.

Comet Ikeya-Seki approaches perihelion, passing 450,000 kilometers from the sun.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs an executive order transferring Wernher von Braun and other German scientists from the United States Army to NASA.

In New York City, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, opens to the public.

Women's suffrage: Women are allowed to vote in France for the first time.

Argentine military officer and politician Juan Perón marries actress Evita.

The first kamikaze attack: A Japanese plane carrying a {{convert|200|kg|lb}} bomb attacks {{HMAS|Australia|D84|6}} off Leyte Island, as the Battle of Leyte Gulf began.

Adolf Hitler withdraws Nazi Germany from the League of Nations

George Melford's silent film, ''The Sheik'', starring Rudolph Valentino, premiers.

President Warren G. Harding delivers the first speech by a sitting President against lynching in the deep south.

During the First Balkan War, Kardzhali is liberated by Bulgarian forces

In the United States, a five month strike by United Mine Workers ends.

The Republic of Formosa collapses as Japanese forces invade.

Opening ceremonies for the World's Columbian Exposition are held in Chicago, though because construction was behind schedule, the exposition did not open until May 1, 1893.

Using a filament of carbonized thread, Thomas Edison tests the first practical electric incandescent light bulb (it lasted 13½ hours before burning out).

Manifest Destiny: Medicine Lodge Treaty

American Civil War: Battle of Ball's Bluff

Florence Nightingale and a staff of 38 nurses are sent to the Crimean War.

Joseph Aspdin patents Portland cement.

The Penang Free School is founded in George Town, Penang, Malaysia, by the Rev Hutchings. It is the oldest English-language school in Southeast Asia.

Napoleonic Wars: Austrian General Mack surrenders his army to the Grand Army of Napoleon at the Battle of Ulm. 30,000 prisoners are captured and 10,000 casualties inflicted on the losers.

Napoleonic Wars: Battle of Trafalgar: A British fleet led by Vice Admiral Lord Nelson defeats a combined French and Spanish fleet off the coast of Spain under Admiral Villeneuve. It signals almost the end of French maritime power and leaves Britain's navy unchallenged until the twentieth century.

In Boston Harbor, the 44-gun United States Navy frigate {{USS|Constitution}} is launched.

First display of the word "Liberty" on a flag, raised by colonists in Taunton, Massachusetts in defiance of British rule in Colonial America.

Tokugawa Ieyasu defeats the leaders of rival Japanese clans in the Battle of Sekigahara, which marks the beginning of the Tokugawa shogunate that in effect rules Japan until the mid-nineteenth century.

Ferdinand Magellan discovers a strait now known as Strait of Magellan.

Martin Luther joins the theological faculty of the University of Wittenberg.

People's Crusade: The Turkish army annihilates the People's Army of the West.