WHAT ALL HAPPENED JANUARY TO OCTOBER 1983
Find out what all happened January to October 1983

Pakistan successfully conducts a cold test of a nuclear weapon. (11. March 1983)

The United States Environmental Protection Agency announces its intent to buy out and evacuate the dioxin-contaminated community of Times Beach, Missouri. (23. February 1983)

The Black July anti-Tamil riots begin in Sri Lanka, killing between 400 and 3,000. Black July is generally regarded as the beginning of the Sri Lankan Civil War. (24. July 1983)

First publications of the discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS in the journal Science by Luc Montagnier. (20. May 1983)

Martial law in Poland is officially revoked. (22. July 1983)

A cinema fire in Turin, Italy, kills 64 people. (13. February 1983)

Gulf Air Flight 771 is bombed, killing all 117 people on board. (23. September 1983)

Space Shuttle Challenger makes its maiden voyage into space (STS-6). (4. April 1983)

Maze Prison escape: 38 republican prisoners, armed with 6 handguns, hijack a prison meals lorry and smash their way out of the Maze prison. It is the largest prison escape since WWII and in British history. (25. September 1983)

Pioneer 10 becomes the first man-made object to leave the central Solar System when it passes beyond the orbit of Neptune (the furthest planet from the Sun at the time). (13. June 1983)

Cold War: Samantha Smith, a U.S. schoolgirl, flies to the Soviet Union at the invitation of Secretary General Yuri Andropov. (7. July 1983)

George Brett batting for the Kansas City Royals against the New York Yankees, has a game-winning home run nullified in the "Pine Tar Incident". (24. July 1983)

Hurricane Alicia hits the Texas coast, killing 22 people and causing over US$1 billion in damage (1983 dollars). (18. August 1983)

The tallest department store in the world, Hudson's flagship store in downtown Detroit, closes due to high cost of operating. (17. January 1983)

The Soviet Union admits to shooting down Korean Air Flight KAL-007, stating that the pilots did not know it was a civilian aircraft when it violated Soviet airspace. (6. September 1983)

Soviet military officer Stanislav Petrov averts a likely worldwide nuclear war by correctly identifying a report of an incoming nuclear missile as a computer error and not an American first strike. (26. September 1983)

Israeli premier Menachem Begin resigns. (15. September 1983)

American schoolgirl Samantha Smith is invited to visit the Soviet Union by its leader Yuri Andropov after he read her letter in which she expressed fears about nuclear war. (25. April 1983)

Lebanon, Israel, and the United States sign an agreement on Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon. (17. May 1983)

The Hitler diaries are revealed as a hoax after examination by experts. (6. May 1983)