WHAT ALL HAPPENED FEBRUARY TO JULY 1979
Find out what all happened February to July 1979

In Kabul, Setami Milli militants kidnap the American ambassador to Afghanistan, Adolph Dubs who is later killed during a gunfight between his kidnappers and police. (14. February 1979)

Margaret Thatcher becomes the first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. (4. May 1979)

Snow falls in the Sahara Desert in southern Algeria for the only time in recorded history. (18. February 1979)

The Penmanshiel Tunnel collapses during engineering works, killing two workers. (17. March 1979)

Iran becomes an Islamic republic by a 99% vote, officially overthrowing the Shah. (1. April 1979)

The first black-led government of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in 90 years takes power. (1. June 1979)

The United States House of Representatives begins broadcasting its day-to-day business via the cable television network C-SPAN. (19. March 1979)

The Sino-Vietnamese War begins. (17. February 1979)

SALT II is signed by the United States and the Soviet Union. (18. June 1979)

Convicted bank robber Patty Hearst is released from prison after her sentence is commuted by President Jimmy Carter. (1. February 1979)

Soviet probes Venera 11, Venera 12 and the American solar satellite Helios II all are hit by "off the scale" gamma rays leading to the discovery of soft gamma repeaters. (5. March 1979)

Etan Patz, who is six years old, disappears from the street just two blocks away from his home in New York City, prompting an international search for the child, and causing the U.S. President Ronald Reagan to designate May 25 as National Missing Children's Day (in 1983). (25. May 1979)

Bryan Allen wins the second Kremer prize for a man powered flight across the English Channel in the Gossamer Albatross. (12. June 1979)

Iranian Jewish businessman Habib Elghanian is executed by firing squad in Tehran, prompting the mass exodus of the once 100,000 member strong Jewish community of Iran. (9. May 1979)

Ugandan dictator Idi Amin is deposed. (11. April 1979)

U.S. President Jimmy Carter gives his so-called malaise speech, where he characterizes the greatest threat to the country as "this crisis in the growing doubt about the meaning of our own lives and in the loss of a unity of purpose for our nation" but in which he never uses the word malaise. (15. July 1979)

The Federated States of Micronesia become self-governing. (10. May 1979)

Pluto moves inside Neptune's orbit for the first time since either was discovered. (7. February 1979)

Nicaraguan president General Anastasio Somoza Debayle resigns and flees to Miami, Florida. (17. July 1979)

Konstantinos Karamanlis signs the full treaty of the accession of Greece with the European Economic Community. (28. May 1979)