On This Day — 18 January

2000s

2026

At least 45 people are killed and 292 others injured after two trains collide in Adamuz in the worst railway disaster in over a decade in Spain.

2026 Adamuz rail disaster

2025

The popular social media app, TikTok, is banned in the United States, after the passing of PAFACA.

TikTok

2023

A helicopter crash in Ukraine leaves 14 people dead, including the country's Interior Minister, Denys Monastyrsky.

2023 Brovary helicopter crash

📅

2019

An oil pipeline explosion near Tlahuelilpan, Hidalgo, Mexico, kills 137 people.

Tlahuelilpan pipeline explosion

2018

A bus catches fire on the Samara–Shymkent road in Yrgyz District, Aktobe, Kazakhstan. The fire kills 52 passengers, with three passengers and two drivers escaping.

Samara

2012

More than 115,000 websites engage in an online protest against the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act in the US.[citation needed] The websites involved viewed the laws as infringing on the right to free speech and many of them temporarily shut down in protest.

Protests against SOPA and PIPA

2008

The Euphronios Krater is unveiled in Rome after being returned to Italy by the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Euphronios Krater

2007

The strongest storm in the United Kingdom in 17 years kills 14 people and Germany sees the worst storm since 1999 with 13 deaths. Cyclone Kyrill causes at least 44 deaths across 20 countries in Western Europe.

1999

2005

The Airbus A380, the world's largest commercial jet, is unveiled at a ceremony in Toulouse, France

Airbus A380

2003

A bushfire kills four people and destroys more than 500 homes in Canberra, Australia.

2003 Canberra bushfires

2002

The Sierra Leone Civil War is declared over.

Sierra Leone Civil War

1900s

1993

Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is officially observed for the first time in all 50 US states.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day

1990

Washington, D.C., Mayor Marion Barry is arrested for drug possession in an FBI sting.

Marion Barry

1988

China Southwest Airlines Flight 4146 crashes near Chongqing Baishiyi Airport, killing all 98 passengers and 10 crew members.

China Southwest Airlines Flight 4146

📅

1986

An Aerovías Sud Aviation Caravelle crashes on approach to Mundo Maya International Airport in Flores, Petén, Guatemala, killing all 94 people on board.

Aerovías

1983

The International Olympic Committee restores Jim Thorpe's Olympic medals to his family.

International Olympic Committee

1981

Phil Smith and Phil Mayfield parachute off a Houston skyscraper, becoming the first two people to BASE jump from objects in all four categories: buildings, antennae, spans (bridges), and earth (cliffs).

BASE jumping

1978

The European Court of Human Rights finds the United Kingdom's government guilty of mistreating prisoners in Northern Ireland, but not guilty of torture.

European Court of Human Rights

1977

Scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announce they have identified a previously unknown bacterium as the cause of the mysterious Legionnaires' disease.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

1977

Australia's worst rail disaster occurs at Granville, Sydney, killing 83.

Granville rail disaster

1977

SFR Yugoslavia's Prime minister, Džemal Bijedić, his wife and six others are killed in a plane crash in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

1976

Lebanese Christian militias kill at least 1,000 in Karantina, Beirut.

Christianity in Lebanon

1974

A Disengagement of Forces agreement is signed between the Israeli and Egyptian governments, ending conflict on the Egyptian front of the Yom Kippur War.

Israel

1972

Members of the Mukti Bahini lay down their arms to the government of the newly independent Bangladesh, a month after winning the war against the occupying Pakistan Army.

Mukti Bahini

1969

United Airlines Flight 266 crashes into Santa Monica Bay killing all 32 passengers and six crew members.

United Air Lines Flight 266

1967

Albert DeSalvo, the "Boston Strangler", is convicted of numerous crimes and is sentenced to life imprisonment.

Albert DeSalvo

1960

Capital Airlines Flight 20 crashes into a farm in Charles City County, Virginia, killing all 50 aboard, the third fatal Capital Airlines crash in as many years.

Capital Airlines Flight 20

1958

Willie O'Ree, the first Black Canadian National Hockey League player, makes his NHL debut with the Boston Bruins.

Willie O'Ree

1945

World War II: Liberation of Kraków, Poland by the Red Army.

Kraków

1943

Warsaw Ghetto Uprising: The first uprising of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.

Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

1941

World War II: British troops launch a general counter-offensive against Italian East Africa.

World War II

1932

Alt Llobregat insurrection breaks out in Central Catalonia, Spain.

Alt Llobregat insurrection

1919

World War I: The Paris Peace Conference opens in Versailles, France.

World War I

1919

Ignacy Jan Paderewski becomes Prime Minister of the newly independent Poland.

Ignacy Jan Paderewski

1915

Japan issues the "Twenty-One Demands" to the Republic of China in a bid to increase its power in East Asia.

Twenty-One Demands

1913

First Balkan War: A Greek flotilla defeats the Ottoman Navy in the Naval Battle of Lemnos, securing the islands of the Northern Aegean Sea for Greece.

First Balkan War

1911

Eugene B. Ely lands on the deck of the USS Pennsylvania anchored in San Francisco Bay, the first time an aircraft landed on a ship.

Eugene Burton Ely

1800s

1896

An X-ray generating machine is exhibited for the first time by H. L. Smith.

X-ray

1886

Modern field hockey is born with the formation of The Hockey Association in England.

Field hockey

1871

Wilhelm I of Germany is proclaimed Kaiser Wilhelm in the Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles (France) towards the end of the Franco-Prussian War. Wilhelm already had the title of German Emperor since the constitution of 1 January 1871, but he had hesitated to accept the title.

Wilhelm I