Huge Antarctic ice shelf collapses
2002 - An Antarctic ice shelf has collapsed and broken up into thousands of icebergs, US experts said in a new alarm over global warming. An area of 3,250 square km of the Larsen B ice shelf, off the Antarctic Peninsula’s eastern coast, shattered over a 35-day period, the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre said. It would portend increased flows of glacial ice from Antarctica and a rise in global sea levels, endangering low-lying land areas. The University of Colorado-based centre said the Larsen B, a 720-billion-tonne block of ice, could be as old as 12,000 years. “The shattered ice formed a plume of thousands of icebergs adrift in the Weddell Sea,” the NSIDC said. “This is the largest single event in a series of retreats by ice shelves in the Peninsula over the last 30 years.”
March 19
1877 - The Ottoman Parliament opens in Istanbul.
1932 - Sydney Harbor Bridge in Australia officially opens.
1944 - Nazi German soldiers occupy Hungary.
1945 - Japanese kamikaze attacks the USS Franklin off Japan’s coast, killing 800 people.
1971 - At least 160 people perish in landslides north of Sao Paulo, Brazil.
1977 - Marien Ngouabi, President of the Republic of Congo, is assassinated.
1990 - Latvia’s political opposition claims victory in the republic’s first free elections in 50 years.
1991 - Begum Khaleda Zia is named Prime Minister of Bangladesh.
1993 - Georgia shoots down a Russian warplane.
1994 - Cambodian government seizes control of Pailin, the Khmer Rouge’s main stronghold.
1996 - At least 150 people are killed in a deadly fire which sweeps through a packed disco in Manila, Philippines.
1998 - A Boeing 727 jet operated by Afghanistan’s national airline Ariana crashes near Kabul, killing all 22 people on board.
2003 - Mahmoud Abbas is appointed Palestinian Prime Minister.
2007 - New UAE regulation allows banks to finance and manage real estate projects.
2010 - Bahraini minister Mansour Bin Rajab is arrested on charges of money laundering.
2011 - Operation Odyssey Dawn begins to protect civilians with air strikes against forces loyal to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
2016 - A flydubai jet from Dubai to southern Russia crashes on its second attempt to land at Rostov-on-Don airport, killing all 62 people aboard.
