WHAT ALL HAPPENED MAY TO OCTOBER 1983
Find out what all happened May to October 1983

After an emergency landing because of an in-flight fire, twenty-three passengers aboard Air Canada Flight 797 are killed when a flashover occurs as the plane's doors open. Because of this incident, numerous new safety regulations are put in place. (2. June 1983)

A North Korean Ilyushin Il-62M jet en route to Conakry Airport in Guinea crashes into the Fouta Djallon mountains in Guinea-Bissau, killing all 23 people on board. (1. July 1983)

Lebanon Civil War: The U.S. Marines barracks in Beirut is hit by a truck bomb, killing 241 U.S. military personnel. A French army barracks in Lebanon is also hit that same morning, killing 58 troops. (23. October 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)

Saint Kitts and Nevis joins the United Nations. (23. September 1983)

The metre is defined at the seventeenth General Conference on Weights and Measures as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. (21. October 1983)

The USSR vetoes a United Nations Security Council Resolution deploring the Soviet shooting down of a Korean civilian jetliner on September 1. (12. September 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)

Cold War: Korean Air Flight 007 is shot down by a Soviet Union jet fighter when the commercial aircraft enters Soviet airspace. All 269 on board die, including Congressman Lawrence McDonald. (1. September 1983)

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

Operation Urgent Fury: The United States and its Caribbean allies invade Grenada, six days after Prime Minister Maurice Bishop and several of his supporters are executed in a coup d'état. (25. October 1983)

Israeli premier Menachem Begin resigns. (15. September 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)

Orly Airport attack is launched by Armenian militant organisation ASALA at the Paris-Orly Airport in Paris; it leaves 8 people dead and 55 injured. (15. July 1983)

Gimli Glider: Air Canada Flight 143 runs out of fuel and makes a deadstick landing at Gimli, Manitoba. (23. July 1983)

Black July: 37 Tamil political prisoners at the Welikada high security prison in Colombo are massacred by the fellow Sinhalese prisoners. (25. July 1983)

The Church Street bombing in the South African capital Pretoria. The bombing killed 19 and wounded 217. (20. May 1983)

Black July: 18 Tamil political prisoners at the Welikada high security prison in Colombo are massacred by Sinhalese prisoners, the second such massacre in two days. (27. July 1983)

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