HISTORY AT A GLANCE
TODAY is Thursday, March 9, the 68th day of 2017. There are 297 days left in the year. Highlights in history on this date:
1916 – Mexican Revolution: Pancho Villa leads nearly 500 Mexican raiders in an attack against the border town of Columbus, New Mexico. 1944 – World War II: Japanese troops counter-attack American forces on Hill 700 in Bougainville in a battle that would last five days. 1944 – World War II: Soviet Army planes attack Tallinn,
Estonia. 1945 – The Bombing of Tokyo by the United States Army Air Forces begin, one of the most destructive bombing raids in history. 1945 – World War II: A coup d’état by Japanese forces in
French Indochina removes the French from power. 1946 – Bolton Wanderers stadium disaster at Burnden Park,
Bolton, England, kills 33 and injures hundreds more. 1956 – Soviet forces suppress mass demonstrations in the Georgian SSR, reacting to Nikita Khrushchev’s deStalinization policy. 1957 – A magnitude 8.3 earthquake in the Andreanof Islands, Alaska triggers a Pacific-wide tsunami causing extensive damage to Hawaii and Oahu. 1959 – The Barbie doll makes its debut at the American
International Toy Fair in New York. 1960 – Dr. Belding Hibbard Scribner implants for the first time a shunt he invented into a patient, which allows the patient to receive hemodialysis on a regular basis. 1961 – Sputnik 9 successfully launches, carrying a human dummy nicknamed Ivan Ivanovich, and demonstrating that Soviet Union was ready to begin human spaceflight. 1976 – Forty-two people die in the 1976 Cavalese cable car
disaster, the worst cable-car accident to date. 1977 – The Hanafi Siege: In a thirty-nine-hour standoff, armed Hanafi Muslims seize three Washington, D.C., buildings, killing two and taking 149 hostage. 1991 – Massive demonstrations are held against Slobodan
Miloševic in Belgrade. 1997 – Comet Hale–Bopp: Observers in China, Mongolia and eastern Siberia are treated to a rare double feature as an eclipse permits Hale-Bopp to be seen during the day. 2011 – Space Shuttle Discovery makes its final landing after
39 flights. 2012 – First winter ascent of Gasherbrum I by Adam Bielecki
and Janusz Golab. 2015 – Two helicopters collided near Villa Castelli, Argentina
killing 10 people.