Today in history
the Atlantic alone. The 6,400-km journey took 180 days.
In 1969, secretary Mary Jo Kopechne died when a car driven by U.S. Senator Ted Kennedy plunged off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, Mass.
In 1976, Romanian Nadia Comaneci, performing on the uneven bars at the Montreal Olympics, scored the first perfect 10 in Olympic gymnastic history.
In 1984, 21 people were killed by a gunman at a Mcdonald's restaurant in San Ysidro, Calif.
In 1986, the world got its first look at the remains of the “Titanic” as videotapes of the British luxury liner were released by researchers from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. The “Titanic” sank April 14, 1912, with the loss of 1,513 lives after the ship struck an iceberg about 600 kilometres off the coast of Newfoundland.
In 1990, Alphonsus Penney, Newfoundland's Catholic archbishop, offered his resignation after a church-sponsored report accused church officials of ignoring and covering up sexual abuse by priests in the province.
In 1998, South African President Nelson Mandela married longtime companion Graca Machel, 52, on his 80th birthday.
In 2003, David Kelly, a British government scientist and former United Nations weapons inspector, was found dead near his home in Oxfordshire, in an apparent suicide. He was the anonymous source behind BBC reports that accused the British government of “sexing up” an intelligence report on Iraqi weapons capability that was used as major justification for the Iraq invasion.
In 2010, Annie Welsh, who as a toddler survived the Dec. 6, 1917 Halifax Explosion and came to be known as Ashpan Annie, died at a Halifax seniors residence. She was 95. Her mother and brother died when the blast ripped through their Barrington Street home and she was thrown under the kitchen stove. Her father was a soldier overseas. Relief efforts were hampered by a major snowstorm, but she survived because the ashes in the ashpan kept her warm for 26 hours until soldiers rescued her.
In 2013, Detroit, the once-mighty symbol of the U.S.'S manufacturing strength, became the biggest U.S. city ever to file for bankruptcy - the result of a long, slow decline in population and auto manufacturing. (In December, a judge ruled the city was eligible to shed its $18 billion in long-term liabilities.)
In 2014, the CFL returned to Ottawa for the first time since November 2005, and the Redblacks defeated the Toronto Argonauts in their home opener, 18-17 on a last minute field goal.