Aloha Airlines, a bankrupt airline, permanently ends passenger service

In Fallujah, Iraq, 4 American private military contractors working for Blackwater USA, are killed after being ambushed and their bodies mutilated.

Netscape releases the code base of its browser under an open-source license agreement; the project is given the code name Mozilla and is eventually spun off into the non-profit Mozilla Foundation.

Human evolution: The journal ''Nature'' reports the finding in Ethiopia of the first complete ''Australopithecus afarensis'' skull.

The {{USS|Missouri|BB-63|6}}, the last active United States Navy battleship, is decommissioned in Long Beach, California.

The Islamic Constitutional Movement, or Hadas, is established in Kuwait.

Georgian independence referendum, 1991: nearly 99 percent of the voters support the country's independence from the Soviet Union.

200,000 protestors take to the streets of London to protest against the newly introduced Poll Tax.

Six metropolitan county councils are abolished in England.

A Mexicana Boeing 727 en route to Puerto Vallarta erupts in flames and crashes in the mountains northwest of Mexico City, killing 166.

The first WrestleMania, the biggest wrestling event from the WWE (then the WWF), takes place in Madison Square Garden in New York

The Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific railroad operates its final train after being ordered to liquidate its assets because of bankruptcy and debts owed to creditors.

The last British soldier leaves the Maltese Islands. Malta declares its Freedom Day (Jum il-Helsien).

Nine terrorists from the Japanese Red Army hijack Japan Airlines Flight 351 at Tokyo International Airport, wielding samurai swords and carrying a bomb.

Explorer 1 re-enters the Earth's atmosphere after 12 years in orbit.

President Lyndon B. Johnson announces he will not run for re-election.

The Soviet Union launches Luna 10 which later becomes the first space probe to enter orbit around the Moon.

An Iberia Airlines Convair 440 crashes into the sea on approach to Tangier, killing 47 of 51 occupants.

The Brazilian military government, under the aegis of general Castello Branco, begins.

The 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, crosses the border into India and is granted political asylum.

Elections to the Territorial Assembly of the French colony Upper Volta are held. After the elections PDU and MDV form a government.

Remington Rand delivers the first UNIVAC I computer to the United States Census Bureau.

The Dominion of Newfoundland joins the Canadian Confederation and becomes the 10th Province of Canada.

The first election is held in Greece after World War II.

World War II: Japanese forces invade Christmas Island, then a British possession.

The Civilian Conservation Corps is established with the mission of relieving rampant unemployment.

An earthquake destroys Managua, Nicaragua, killing 2,000.

The Motion Pictures Production Code is instituted, imposing strict guidelines on the treatment of sex, crime, religion and violence in film, in the U.S., for the next thirty eight years.

The Royal Australian Air Force is formed.

Daylight saving time goes into effect in the United States for the first time.

Massacre of ethnic Azerbaijanis was committed by allied armed groups of Armenian Revolutionary Federation and Bolsheviks. Nearly 12,000 Azerbaijani Muslims were killed. The day is observed in Azerbaijan as ''Day of Azerbaijani Genocide''

The United States takes possession of the Danish West Indies after paying $25 million to Denmark, and renames the territory the United States Virgin Islands.

Construction is completed on the RMS ''Titanic''.

Six North Staffordshire Pottery towns federate to form modern Stoke-on-Trent

Serbia accepts Austrian control over Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States (later National Collegiate Athletic Association) is established to set rules for amateur sports in the United States.

Richard Pearse allegedly makes a powered flight in an early aircraft.

The Eiffel Tower is inaugurated.

The United Kingdom establishes a protectorate over Bechuanaland.

The family with samurai antecedents that responded to the Saigo army in Ōita Nakatsu, rebels.

The Spanish Navy bombs the harbor of Valparaíso, Chile.

Commodore Matthew Perry signs the Treaty of Kanagawa with the Japanese government, opening the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate to American trade.

The massacre of the population of the Greek island of Chios by soldiers of the Ottoman Empire following a rebellion attempt, depicted by the French artist Eugène Delacroix.

American Revolutionary War: The Kingdom of Great Britain orders the port of Boston, Massachusetts closed pursuant to the Boston Port Act.

A sermon on "The Nature of the Kingdom of Christ" by Benjamin Hoadly, the Bishop of Bangor, provokes the Bangorian Controversy.

Queen Isabella of Castille issues the Alhambra decree, ordering her 150,000 Jewish subjects to convert to Christianity or face expulsion.

Bernard of Clairvaux preaches his famous sermon in a field at Vézelay, urging the necessity of a Second Crusade. Louis VII is present, and joins the Crusade.

After divorcing his wife Minervina, Constantine marries Fausta, the daughter of the retired Roman Emperor Maximian.