2001 - Thousands of soldiers and rescue workers began cleaning up Taipei’s mud-caked and waterlogged streets after Typhoon Nari dumped record amounts of rain on Taiwan and killed at least 79 people. At least 21 people were missing and 139 injured after Nari turned roads in the capital into torrents of water that flowed past second storey windows in Taipei’s worst-ever flooding. The victims were buried under landslides or electrocuted by downed power lines in the north of the island, the government’s disaster response centre said. The Central Weather Bureau said Taipei was hit with record rainfall of 425mm in a single day. The damage to Taipei’s mass rapid transit (MRT) system was at several billion Taiwan dollars. Flood waters inundated several MRT stations.
Other important events
1759 - The French formally surrender Quebec to the British.
1810 - Chile declares independence.
1851 - The New York Times newspaper publishes its first issue.
1860 - Italian troops under Count Camillo Cavour defeat Papal forces at Castelfidardo.
1927 - The Columbia Phonograph Broadcasting System (later CBS) debuts in the United States with a network of 16 radio stations.
1932 - King Ibn Saud unifies the dual kingdom of the Hejaz and Najd under the name of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
1947 - The US National Security Act, unifying the Navy, Army and newly-formed Air Force, goes into effect.
1955 - Hurricane Hilda strikes in the central and northern Gulf coast area of Mexico, killing 166 people.
1961 - UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold dies in a mysterious plane crash in Africa.
1973 - East Germany, West Germany and the Bahamas are admitted to the United Nations.
1982 - Hundreds of Palestinians are massacred in the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila.
1983 - British adventurer George Meegan finishes a six-year walk from the southernmost tip of South America to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, covering 30,605 kilometres.
1984 - American Joe Kittinger, ending the first solo balloon-crossing of the Atlantic, crash-lands near Savona in northern Italy.
1986 - French military attache Colonel Christian Goutierre is shot dead in east Beirut.
1997 - Suspected militants attack a tourist bus in downtown Cairo, Egypt, killing 10 people.
2006 - The world’s first female space tourist Anousheh Ansari blasts off into orbit with two professional astronauts.
2008 - Somchai Wongsawat is inaugurated as Thailand’s Prime Minister.
2010 - Quadruple amputee Philippe Croizon swims the English channel in 13-and-a-half hours.
2013 - A double-decker bus collides with a passenger train in Ottawa, Canada, ripping off the front of the bus and killing six people.
2015 - Taliban gunmen attack Pakistan air force base in Badaber near Peshawar, killing 42 people.
