1908 – At Masjed
Soleyman (مسجد
سليمان) in southwest Persia, the first
major commercial oil strike in the Middle
East is made. The rights to the resource are quickly
acquired by the United Kingdom.
1917 – A powerful
F4tornado rips
Mattoon,
Illinois apart, killing 101 people and injuring 689.
It is the world's longest-lasting tornado, lasting for over 7 hours
and traveling 293 miles.
1969 – Apollo
program: Apollo 10 returns to Earth after a successful eight-day test of all the
components needed for the forthcoming first manned moon landing.
1983 – A strong 7.7
magnitude earthquake strikes Japan, triggering
a tsunami that kills at least 104 people,
injures thousands. Many people go missing and thousands of
buildings are destroyed.
2003 – Only three days
after a previous record, Sherpa Lakpa
Gelu climbs Mount
Everest in 10 hours 56 minutes.The tourism ministry
of Nepal confirms
this record in July that year.
2004 – The New York Times publishes an
admission of journalistic failings, claiming that its flawed
reporting and lack of skepticism towards sources during the buildup
to the 2003 war in Iraq helped
promote the belief that Iraq possessed large stockpiles of weapons of mass
destruction.