March 8, 1991: Air Europe goes bankrupt, halts all flights

1991 - Britain’s largest independent airline, Air Europe Ltd, suspended all its flights and applied for administrative receivership, leaving about 25,000 tourists abroad in need of alternative flights home. “We regret to announce that due to the company’s uncertain situation, the company has determined that all services will be suspended until further notice...an application is being made to the High Court for the appointment of an administrative receiver,” managing director Rod Lynch said. Air Europe is part of the International Leisure Group, (ILG), which owns the Intasun and Club 18-30 holiday firms. The group has been badly hit by the Gulf war’s effect on tourism. The airline had operated some 700 flights a week from British airports, employing 2,000 people. It also has stakes in a number of other independent European carriers. Air Europe carried more than 3.5 million passengers a year and was due to operate 29 aircraft this summer.

1865 A canal project to connect Amsterdam with the North Sea begins in the Netherlands.

1917 Riots and strikes break out in St Petersburg, marking start of Russian Revolution.

1920 Denmark and Cuba join the League of Nations.

1921 Spanish prime minister Eduardo Dato is assassinated in Madrid by an anarchist.

1950 Marshal Voroshilov announces the existence of the Soviet atomic bomb.

1954 US and Japan sign mutual defence agreement.

1957 Egypt reopens the Suez Canal following Suez Crisis.

1965 1st US combat troops lands in South Vietnam.

1970 Cyprus President Archbishop Makarios III escapes assassination as terrorists shoot down his helicopter.

1973 In a referendum, the people of Northern Ireland vote to remain within the United Kingdom.

1974 Charles de Gaulle Airport is opened in Paris, France.

1985 A car bomb explodes outside a mosque in a densely populated area in Beirut, killing 56.

1988 Emirates Golf Club is inaugurated in Dubai.

1990 West German parliament adopts resolution calling on united Germany to honour Poland’s western border.

1991 Forty foreign journalists and two US servicemen captured by Iraqi soldiers are turned over to Red Cross officials in Baghdad.

1992 Police divers pull 127 bodies from the sea after a ferry carrying visitors to a Buddhist shrine collides with an oil tanker in the Gulf of Thailand.

1994 A packed commuter train crashes on a sharp curve near Durban, South Africa, killing at least 63 people.

1996 China fires three ballistic missiles into waters off Taiwan’s main ports.

2002 The Mont Blanc tunnel linking France and Italy is re-opens three years after a horrific fire killed 39 people.

2004 Rawya Bint Saud Al Busaidi becomes first woman minister to join the Oman cabinet.

2005 Chechen leader Aslan Maskhadov is killed by Russian troops fighting.

2007 International Atomic Energy Agency governors approve cuts in technical aid to Iran.

2008 Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica dissolves Serbia’s government and calls for fresh elections.

2010 A 6.0 magnitude earthquake strike eastern Turkey and killing 51 people.

2014 A Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 disappears with 239 people, which was flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.