August 31, 1988: Delta airlines jet crashes in Texas

Other important events

1918 - Bolshevik troops attack British Embassy in Petrograd, Russia.

1957 - Malaysia gains independence from Britain.

1969 - Boxer Rocky Marciano dies in a plane crash in Iowa at age 45.

1990 - East and West Germany sign a treaty to join legal and political systems.

1991 - Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan declare independence.

1993 - Venezuela president Carlos Perez flees.

1994 - Irish Republican Army declares an open-ended ceasefire in its 24-year campaign against British rule of Northern Ireland.

1997 - Princess Diana dies in a high-speed Paris car crash.

2005 - Some 1,000 Iraqi Shiite pilgrims die in a stampede over a Baghdad bridge.

2010 - American forces end seven years of combat operations in Iraq.

2016 - Placido Domingo inaugurates Dubai Opera, the first opera house in Downtown.

2017 - Around 27,400 Rohingya Muslims cross into Bangladesh, fleeing violence in Myanmar.