2001 - A blast deep in a Romanian coal pit killed 14 miners and injured two others in the worst accident in the ailing local mining industry in 15 years. A statement from Hunedoara prefecture said 14 miners, aged between 20 and 43 years, died in the blast caused by a gas leak 350 metres underground in the Jiu Valley, Romania’s richest coal basin. The accident occurred at 3.25am near the small town of Vulcan, 400km west of Bucharest, in the heart of a mining area known for poor working conditions and for the militancy of the labour force. Two other miners were injured, with one suffering severe burns. He was transported to a better-equipped hospital in the western city of Timisoara. Officials said a total of 16 coal miners were working at the level where the blast occurred.
Other important events
1914 - German army occupies city of Liege Belgium.
1926 - The first British Grand Prix motor race is held at Brooklands in Surrey.
1941 - Indian poet, writer and Nobel Prize winner Rabindranath Tagore dies at the age of 80.
1944 - The world’s first programme-controlled calculator is presented to Harvard University in Boston.
1945 - Soviet Union declares war on Japan, seven days before the Japanese surrender in the Second World War.
1960 - The Ivory Coast becomes independent of France.
1980 - Thirteen people are executed for their alleged role in exiled Premier Bakhtiar’s plot to overthrow Ayatollah Khomeini.
1987 - Former Lebanese president Camille Chamoun dies of heart attack.
1990 - US sends troops and warplanes to Saudi Arabia to protect it against Iraq invasion.
1991 - Croatian government accepts a federal peace plan in Yugoslavia and says it will not be first to break a ceasefire.
1996 - Flash floods in Spain race through a Pyrenees Mountain camp jammed with hundreds of vacationers, at least 67 people die.
1998 - Two car bombs tear into American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, killing 224 people.
2000 - Dubai Airport Road underpass is opened to public.
2002 - Alvaro Uribe is sworn in as President of Colombia.
2004 - Nigel Roder beats six rivals by public acclaim to become England’s first official jester for more than 350 years.
2008 - Syria authorities release Arif Dalila, an economist, after seven years in jail.
2010 - UAE wins the Under-23 Gulf Cup football tournament against Kuwait, 1-0 in Doha.
2011 - Capt Salem Al Mazroui is murdered in his home in Houston, Texas after two robbers forced their way in their house.
2013 - A massive early morning fire destroys the arrival halls of Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi.
2014 - Two Khmer Rouge leaders Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan, are sentences to life after being found guilty of crimes against humanity.
