October 17, 1995: Bomb rips through Paris train

Bomb rips through Paris train

1995 - A bomb tore through an underground commuter train as it sped through central Paris during morning rush hour, injuring 29 people in what appeared to be the latest in a wave of attacks by Algerian militants. Five of the 29 were seriously wounded including two who had a foot or leg blown off and suffered severe burns. One victim’s leg was amputated in the gloomy rail tunnel by emergency workers. Others were treated at makeshift hospitals set up on the train platform and the nearby Orsay Museum. The bomb went off in a train going at 60km/h between the Orsay Museum and Saint-Michel stations on the RER regional express network, ripping a hole in the side of the carriage. Emergency workers and passengers said some riders panicked as smoke swept through.

October 17

1912 - Turkey declares war on Bulgaria and Serbia.

1913 - Serbs invade Albania.

1918 - Republic of Yugoslavia is formally established.

1933 - Albert Einstein arrives in the United States as a refugee from Nazi Germany.

1945 - Colonel Juan Peron stages coup in Buenos Aires and becomes absolute dictator of Argentina.

1957 - French author Albert Camus is awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

1966 - Central Peru is shaken by an earthquake, which kills 92 people.

1979 - Mother Teresa wins Nobel Peace Prize for her work with the destitute in Calcutta, India.

1989 - Loma Prieta earthquake strikes San Francisco, California, 273 people are killed and 650 injured.

1994 - Jordan and Israel sign a historic peace treaty in Amman.

1998 - A pipeline explodes in Nigeria when villagers try to siphon off oil. At least 700 die.

2000 - Dubai Marina gets first taste of water.

2001 - Israel’s Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi is shot dead in the first-ever assassination of a serving cabinet minister.

2005 - China celebrates the successful landing of the country’s second manned space flight as a boost to its status as a space power.

2006 - Bahrain’s Latifa Al Gaood becomes the first woman in the Gulf to win a parliamentary general election.

2009 - Chile opens its embassy in Abu Dhabi.

2010 - Farah Saeed becomes the first female Emirati to join Etihad Airways as a cabin crew member.

2014 - India successfully test-fires its first domestically built nuclear-capable long-range cruise missile Nirbhay.