A year without summer; the longest day, RFK assassinated; deadly uprising in India and Germany’s worst post-war serial killer
1652 Bernert Willemsz Wijlant is born at the Cape two months after Jan van Riebeek’s arrival in the Cape. His birth is the fledgling settlement’s first.
1816 Some 10 inches of snowfall is recorded in New England, America, part of a ‘year without a summer’ following the eruption of Mount Tambora, in Indonesia, the year before. The effects were felt worldwide as crops failed across Asia and up to 90 000 people are known to have died of famine. It was the second-coldest year in the Northern Hemisphere since 1400.
1912 Novarupta erupts in Alaska – the largest volcanic eruption of the 20th century.
1944 The ‘Longest Day’ begins as thousands of Allied troops storm Normandy’s beaches, accompanied by mass drops of paratroopers behind enemy lines, beginning the invasion of Europe. The Allies secured a foothold on all beaches, but at a cost. From there they break out into Normandy proper as fierce German resistance falters. D-Day stands out as one of the pivotal moments in modern history.
1968 Tragedy again rocks the Kennedy family, as Senator Robert F Kennedy, a candidate in the US presidential elections and brother of assassinated President John F Kennedy, dies of his wounds after he was shot by Sirhan Sirhan in Los Angeles the night before. Sirhan later said he believed that Kennedy was behind the oppression of Palestinians.
1972 An explosion at the world’s largest coal mine in Wankie, Rhodesia, kills 427 miners.
1984 1 200 die in the Sikh ‘Golden Temple’ uprising in India
2002 An asteroid of about 10m in diameter explodes over the Mediterranean Sea between Greece and Libya. It was more powerful than the Nagasaki atomic bomb, but most people weren’t even aware of it.
2012 The Solar Impulse completes the world’s first intercontinental flight powered by the sun.
2017 Syrian Democratic Forces launch an offensive to take Raqqa from Islamic State.
2019 German serial killer and nurse Niels Högel is jailed for a second life sentence for the murder of 85 more people (he had already been convicted of six killings). He is Germany’s worst post-war serial killer.