1981 - At least 114 people were killed and 180 injured when two massive steel and concrete walkways collapsed during a dance programme in a luxury hotel in Kansas City, Missouri. Witnesses said a walkway four floors up, packed with spectators, broke up and crashed onto another walkway crowded with dancing couples. Both structures then fell on more than 500 people in the ground floor ballroom. A huge mound of rubble blocked the main entrance to the 40-storey Hyatt Regency Hotel, forcing the survivors to scramble for emergency exists. The walkways, about 45 metres long and six metres wide, spanned the lobby, north to south, on the second and third floors. The third-floor walkway collapsed first, breaking off at both ends.
Other important events
1762 - Peter III, Czar of Russia, is assassinated a week after he abdicates the throne.
1868 - The city of Edo is replaced by Tokyo City as Japan’s capital.
1890 - Cecil Rhodes becomes premier of Cape Colony in Africa.
1894 - Italian forces take Kassale, Sudan, from the Dervishes.
1936 - Spanish Civil War starts as General Francisco Franco leads the army in revolt against the government.
1951 - Baudouin I becomes King of Belgium after his father Léopold III abdicated.
1955 - Disneyland, the first Disney amusement park, opens its gates in Anaheim, California.
1968 - Baath Party overthrows the Iraqi government.
1973 - Afghanistan is proclaimed a republic, following palace coup that ends 40-year rule of King Mohammad Zaher Shah.
1975 - US astronauts and Soviet cosmonauts in Apollo and Soyuz spacecraft link up while in orbit and join hands.
1987 - France breaks diplomatic relations with Iran.
1990 - German Chancellor Helmut Kohl announces elections for a united German parliament.
1991 - US and Soviet Union reach the final agreement on a Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (Start).
1994 - Brazil wins the fourth football World Cup in the United States.
1996 - A TWA jumbo jet explodes over the Atlantic shortly after takeoff, killing 228 people aboard.
2000 - Bashar Al Assad is sworn is as President of Syria.
2006 - A two-metre-high tsunami crashes into beach resorts and fishing villages on Java island, killing more than 300 people.
2008 - RAK Airways announces the acquisition of 60 per cent stake of the defunct Congo Airlines.
2012 - Marissa Mayer is a new and first woman CEO of Yahoo!
2013 - At least 25 children and a cook died after eating a contaminated midday meal at a school in Patna, India.
2014 - Malaysian Airlines MH17, a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, crashes, killing all 295 on board.
2015 - Formula One driver Jules Bianchi dies nine months after a crash at the Japanese Grand Prix.
