3 May

2023

Nine students and a security guard are killed in the Belgrade school shooting, the first attack of its kind in Serbia.

Belgrade school shooting

2023

Ethnic violence breaks out between the Meitei and the Kuki Zo people in the state of Manipur.

2023–2026 Manipur conflict

2021

Twenty-six people are killed and ninety-eight are injured after an elevated section of the Mexico City Metro collapses.

Mexico City Metro

2016

Eighty-eight thousand people are evacuated from their homes in Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada as a wildfire rips through the community, destroying approximately 2,400 homes and buildings.

Fort McMurray

2015

Two gunmen launch an attempted attack on an anti-Islam event in Garland, Texas, which was held in response to the Charlie Hebdo shooting.

2015 Curtis Culwell Center attack

2007

The three-year-old British girl Madeleine McCann disappears in Praia da Luz, Portugal, starting "the most heavily reported missing-person case in modern history".

Disappearance of Madeleine McCann

2006

Armavia Flight 967 crashes into the Black Sea near Sochi International Airport in Sochi, Russia, killing 113 people.

Armavia Flight 967

2001

The United States loses its seat on the U.N. Human Rights Commission for the first time since the commission was formed in 1947.

United Nations Commission on Human Rights

2000

The sport of geocaching begins, with the first cache placed and the coordinates from a GPS posted on Usenet.

Geocaching

1999

The southwestern portion of Oklahoma City is devastated by an F5 tornado, killing forty-five people, injuring 665, and causing $1 billion in damage. The tornado is one of 66 from the 1999 Oklahoma tornado outbreak. This tornado also produces the highest wind speed ever recorded, measured at 484 ± 32 kilometres per hour (301 ± 20 mph). In meteorology, the term "May 3" is synonymous with the F5 tornado.

Oklahoma City

1999

Infiltration of Pakistani soldiers on Indian side results in the Kargil War.

Kargil War

1987

A crash by Bobby Allison at the Talladega Superspeedway, Alabama fencing at the start-finish line would lead NASCAR to develop the restrictor plate for the following season both at Daytona International Speedway and Talladega.

Bobby Allison

1986

Twenty-one people are killed and forty-one are injured after a bomb explodes on Air Lanka Flight 512 at Colombo airport in Sri Lanka.

Air Lanka Flight 512

1979

The Conservative Party wins the United Kingdom general election. The following day, Margaret Thatcher becomes the first female British Prime Minister.

Conservative Party (UK)

1978

The first unsolicited bulk commercial email (which would later become known as "spam") is sent by a Digital Equipment Corporation marketing representative to every ARPANET address on the west coast of the United States.

Email

1971

Erich Honecker becomes First Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany, remaining in power until 1989.

Erich Honecker

1968

Eighty-five people are killed when Braniff International Airways Flight 352 crashes near Dawson, Texas.

Braniff International Airways Flight 352

1963

The police force in Birmingham, Alabama switches tactics and responds with violent force to stop the "Birmingham campaign" protesters. Images of the violent suppression are transmitted worldwide, bringing new-found attention to the civil rights movement.

Birmingham, Alabama

1957

Walter O'Malley, the owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers, agrees to move the team from Brooklyn to Los Angeles.

Walter O'Malley

1953

Two men are rescued from a semitrailer that crashed over the side of the Pit River Bridge before it fell into the Sacramento River. Amateur photographer Virginia Schau photographs "Rescue on Pit River Bridge", the first and only winning submission for the Pulitzer Prize for Photography to have been taken by a woman.

Semi-trailer