On This Day — 24 March

2000s

📅

2026

OpenAI announces that their flagship Sora app and API are shutting down.

OpenAI

2024

The 2024 Senegalese presidential election is held following anti-government protests.

2024 Senegalese presidential election

2023

An EF4 tornado strikes the towns of Rolling Fork and Silver City, Mississippi, causing mass destruction.

2023 Rolling Fork tornado

2018

Syrian civil war: The Turkish Armed Forces (TAF) and Syrian National Army (SNA) take full control of Afrin District, marking the end of the Afrin offensive.

Syrian civil war

2018

Students across the United States stage the March for Our Lives demanding gun control in response to the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting.

United States

2015

Germanwings Flight 9525 crashes in the French Alps in an apparent pilot mass murder-suicide, killing all 150 people on board.

Germanwings Flight 9525

2008

Bhutan officially becomes a democracy, with its first ever general election.

Bhutan

1900s

1999

Kosovo War: NATO begins attacks on Yugoslavia without United Nations Security Council (UNSC) approval, marking the first time NATO has attacked a sovereign country.

Kosovo War

1999

A lorry carrying margarine and flour catches fire inside the Mont Blanc Tunnel, creating an inferno that kills 39 people.

Mont Blanc Tunnel fire

📅

1998

Mitchell Johnson and Andrew Golden, aged 11 and 13 respectively, open fire upon teachers and students at Westside Middle School in Jonesboro, Arkansas; five people are killed and ten are wounded.

1998 Westside Middle School shooting

1998

A tornado sweeps through Dantan in India, killing 250 people and injuring 3,000 others.

Tornado

📅

1998

Dr. Rüdiger Marmulla performs the first computer-assisted Bone Segment Navigation at the University of Regensburg, Germany.

Rüdiger Marmulla

1992

Space Shuttle Atlantis launches on STS-45.

Space Shuttle Atlantis

📅

1990

Indian intervention in the Sri Lankan Civil War ends with the last ship of Indian Peace Keeping Force leaving Sri Lanka.

Indian intervention in the Sri Lankan civil war

1989

In Prince William Sound in Alaska, the Exxon Valdez spills 240,000 barrels (38,000 m3) of crude oil after running aground.

Prince William Sound

1986

The Loscoe gas explosion leads to new UK laws on landfill gas migration and gas protection on landfill sites.

Loscoe

1982

Bangladeshi President Abdus Sattar is deposed in a bloodless coup led by Army Chief Lieutenant general Hussain Muhammad Ershad, who suspends the Constitution and imposes martial law.

Abdus Sattar (president)

1980

El Salvadorian Archbishop Óscar Romero is assassinated while celebrating Mass in San Salvador.

El Salvador

1977

Morarji Desai becomes the prime minister of India, the first prime minister not to belong to Indian National Congress.

Morarji Desai

1976

In Argentina, the armed forces overthrow the constitutional government of President Isabel Perón and start a seven-year dictatorial period self-styled the National Reorganization Process.

Argentina

📅

1972

Direct rule is imposed on Northern Ireland by the Government of the United Kingdom under Edward Heath.

Direct rule (Northern Ireland)

1949

Hanns Albin Rauter, a chief SS and Police Leader in the Netherlands, is convicted and executed for crimes against humanity.

Hanns Albin Rauter

📅

1946

A British Cabinet Mission arrives in India to discuss and plan for the transfer of power from the British Raj to Indian leadership.

1946 Cabinet Mission to India

1944

German troops massacre 335 Italian civilians in Rome.

Nazi Germany

1944

World War II: In an event later dramatized in the movie The Great Escape, 76 Allied prisoners of war begin breaking out of the German camp Stalag Luft III.

World War II

📅

1939

The 1939 Liechtenstein putsch takes place; approximately 40 members of the VBDL starting from Nendeln march towards Vaduz with the intention of overthrowing the government and provoking Liechtenstein's annexation into Germany.

1939 Liechtenstein putsch

1934

The Tydings–McDuffie Act is passed by the United States Congress, allowing the Philippines to become a self-governing commonwealth.

Tydings–McDuffie Act

1927

Nanking Incident: Foreign warships bombard Nanjing, China, in defence of the foreign citizens within the city.

Nanking incident of 1927

📅

1922

The McMahon killings take place in Belfast. Six Catholic civilians are shot dead, two others wounded and a female family member assaulted. Police were suspected as being responsible, but no one was prosecuted.

McMahon killings

1921

The 1921 Women's Olympiad begins in Monte Carlo, becoming the first international women's sports event.

1921 Women's Olympiad

1900

Mayor of New York City Robert Anderson Van Wyck breaks ground for a new underground "Rapid Transit Railroad" that would link Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Mayor of New York City

1900

Carnegie Steel Company is formed in New Jersey; its capitalization of $160 million is the largest to date.

Carnegie Steel Company

1800s

1882

Robert Koch announces the discovery of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium responsible for tuberculosis.

Robert Koch

1878

The British frigate HMS Eurydice sinks, killing more than 300.

HMS Eurydice (1843)

📅

1870

A Chilean prospecting party led by José Díaz Gana discovers the silver ores of Caracoles in the Bolivian portion of Atacama Desert, leading to the last of the Chilean silver rushes and a diplomatic dispute over its taxation between Chile and Bolivia.

Caracoles

1869

The last of Tītokowaru's forces surrender to the New Zealand government, ending his uprising.

Tītokowaru

1860

Sakuradamon Incident: Japanese chief minister (Tairō) Ii Naosuke is assassinated by rōnin samurai outside the Sakurada Gate of Edo Castle.

Sakuradamon Incident (1860)

1854

President José Gregorio Monagas abolishes slavery in Venezuela.

President of Venezuela

1832

In Hiram, Ohio, a group of men beat and tar and feather Mormon leader Joseph Smith.

Hiram, Ohio

1829

The Parliament of the United Kingdom passes the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829, allowing Catholics to serve in Parliament.

Parliament of the United Kingdom

Before 1800

1794

In Kraków, Tadeusz Kościuszko announces a general uprising against Imperial Russia and the Kingdom of Prussia, and assumes the powers of the Commander in Chief of all of the Polish forces.

Kraków

1765

Great Britain passes the Quartering Act, which requires the Thirteen Colonies to house British troops.

Kingdom of Great Britain

1721

Johann Sebastian Bach dedicates six concertos to Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg-Schwedt, now commonly called the Brandenburg Concertos, BWV 1046–1051.

Johann Sebastian Bach

1720

Count Frederick of Hesse-Kassel is elected King of Sweden by the Riksdag of the Estates, after his consort Ulrika Eleonora abdicated the throne on 29 February.

Frederick I of Sweden

1663

The Province of Carolina is granted by charter to eight Lords Proprietor in reward for their assistance in restoring Charles II of England to the throne.

Province of Carolina