WHAT ALL HAPPENED FEBRUARY TO JUNE 1979
Find out what all happened February to June 1979

Independence of Saint Lucia from the United Kingdom. (22. February 1979)

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

Airey Neave, a British Member of Parliament, is killed by a car bomb as he exits the Palace of Westminster. The Irish National Liberation Army claims responsibility. (30. March 1979)

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

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

The New Jewel Movement, headed by Maurice Bishop, ousts Prime Minister Eric Gairy in a nearly bloodless coup d'etat in Grenada. (13. March 1979)

A coolant leak at the Three Mile Island's Unit 2 nuclear reactor outside Harrisburg, Pennsylvania leads to the core overheating and a partial melt down. (28. March 1979)

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

In China, a Hawker Siddeley Trident crashes into a factory near Beijing, killing at least 200. (14. March 1979)

Don Dunstan resigns as Premier of South Australia, ending a decade of sweeping social liberalisation. (15. February 1979)

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

Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings takes power in Ghana after a military coup in which General Fred Akuffo is overthrown. (4. June 1979)

President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of Pakistan is executed. (4. April 1979)

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

ABC News correspondent Bill Stewart is shot dead by a Nicaraguan soldier under the regime of Anastasio Somoza Debayle. The murder is caught on tape and sparks an international outcry against the regime. (20. June 1979)

The first fully functional space shuttle orbiter, Columbia, is delivered to the John F. Kennedy Space Center to be prepared for its first launch. (25. March 1979)

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