On This Day — 26 November

2025

The Wang Fuk Court fire, a catastrophic fire in Tai Po, Hong Kong, leaves at least 168 dead and 79 injured.

Wang Fuk Court fire

2021

COVID-19 pandemic: The World Health Organization identifies the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant.

COVID-19 pandemic

2019

A magnitude 6.4 earthquake strikes western Albania leaving at least 52 people dead and over 1,000 injured. This was the world's deadliest earthquake of 2019, and the deadliest to strike the country in 99 years.

2019 Albania earthquake

2018

The robotic probe Insight lands on Elysium Planitia, Mars.

Uncrewed spacecraft

2011

NATO attack in Pakistan: NATO forces in Afghanistan attack a Pakistani check post in a friendly fire incident, killing 24 soldiers and wounding 13 others.

2011 NATO attack in Pakistan

2011

The Mars Science Laboratory launches to Mars with the Curiosity Rover.

Mars Science Laboratory

2008

Mumbai attacks, a series of terrorist attacks killing approximately 175 citizens by 10 members of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan based extremist Islamist terrorist organisation.

2008 Mumbai attacks

2008

The ocean liner Queen Elizabeth 2, now out of service, docks in Dubai.

Queen Elizabeth 2

2004

Ruzhou School massacre: A man stabs and kills eight people and seriously wounds another four in a school dormitory in Ruzhou, China.

List of mass stabbing incidents (before 2010)

2004

The last Poʻouli (Black-faced honeycreeper) dies of avian malaria in the Maui Bird Conservation Center in Olinda, Hawaii, before it could breed, making the species in all probability extinct.

Poʻouli

2003

The Concorde makes its final flight, over Bristol, England.

Concorde

2000

George W. Bush is certified the winner of Florida's electoral votes by Katherine Harris, going on to win the United States presidential election, despite losing in the national popular vote.

George W. Bush

1999

The 7.5 Mw  Ambrym earthquake shakes Vanuatu and a destructive tsunami follows. Ten people were killed and forty were injured.

1999 Ambrym earthquake

1998

Tony Blair becomes the first Prime Minister of the United Kingdom to address the Oireachtas, the parliament of the Republic of Ireland.

Tony Blair

1998

The Khanna rail disaster takes 212 lives in Khanna, Ludhiana, India.

1998 Khanna rail collision

1991

National Assembly of Azerbaijan abolishes the autonomous status of Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast of Azerbaijan and renames several cities with Azeri names.

National Assembly (Azerbaijan)

1986

Iran–Contra affair: U.S. President Ronald Reagan announces the members of what will become known as the Tower Commission.

Iran–Contra affair

1986

The trial of John Demjanjuk, accused of committing war crimes as a guard at the Nazi Treblinka extermination camp, starts in Jerusalem.

John Demjanjuk

1983

Brink's-Mat robbery: In London, 6,800 gold bars worth nearly £26 million are stolen from the Brink's-Mat vault at Heathrow Airport.

Brink's-Mat robbery

1979

Pakistan International Airlines Flight 740 crashes near Taif in Mecca Province, Saudi Arabia, killing all 156 people on board.

Pakistan International Airlines Flight 740

1977

An unidentified hijacker named Vrillon, claiming to be the representative of the "Ashtar Galactic Command", takes over Britain's Southern Television for six minutes, starting at 5:12 pm.

Southern Television broadcast interruption

1970

In Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, 38 millimetres (1.5 in) of rain fall in a minute, the heaviest rainfall ever recorded.

Basse-Terre

1968

Vietnam War: United States Air Force helicopter pilot James P. Fleming rescues an Army Special Forces unit pinned down by Viet Cong fire. He is later awarded the Medal of Honor.

Vietnam War

1965

France launches Astérix, becoming the third nation to put an object in orbit using its own booster.

Astérix (satellite)

1949

The Constituent Assembly of India adopts the constitution presented by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar.

Constituent Assembly of India

1944

World War II: A German V-2 rocket hits a Woolworth's shop in New Cross, London, killing 168 people.

V-2 rocket

1944

World War II: Germany begins V-1 and V-2 attacks on Antwerp, Belgium.

Nazi Germany

1943

World War II: HMT Rohna is sunk by the Luftwaffe in an air attack in the Mediterranean north of Béjaïa, Algeria.

HMT Rohna

1942

World War II: Yugoslav Partisans convene the first meeting of the Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia at Bihać in northwestern Bosnia.

Yugoslav Partisans

1942

Casablanca, the movie starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, premieres in New York City.

Casablanca (film)

1942

A riot involving infantrymen, military police, and local law enforcement officers occurs in Phoenix, Arizona, United States, leading to three deaths.

1942 Phoenix Thanksgiving Day riot

1941

World War II: The Hull note is given to the Japanese ambassador, demanding that Japan withdraw from China and French Indochina, in return for which the United States would lift economic sanctions. On the same day, Japan's 1st Air Fleet departs Hitokappu Bay for Hawaii.

World War II

1939

Shelling of Mainila: The Soviet Army orchestrates an incident which is used to justify the start of the Winter War with Finland four days later.

Shelling of Mainila

1924

The Mongolian People's Republic is officially established after a new constitution, passed by the first State Great Khural, abolishes the monarchy.

Mongolian People's Republic

1922

Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon become the first people to enter the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun in over 3,000 years.

Howard Carter

1922

The Toll of the Sea debuts as the first general release film to use two-tone Technicolor. (The Gulf Between was the first film to do so, but it was not widely distributed.)

The Toll of the Sea

1920

Ukrainian War of Independence: The Red Army launches a surprise attack against the Makhnovshchina.

Ukrainian War of Independence

1918

The Montenegrin Podgorica Assembly votes for a "union of the people", declaring assimilation into the Kingdom of Serbia.

Podgorica Assembly

1917

The Manchester Guardian publishes the 1916 secret Sykes-Picot Agreement between the United Kingdom and France.

The Guardian

1917

The National Hockey League is formed, with the Montreal Canadiens, Montreal Wanderers, Ottawa Senators, Quebec Bulldogs, and Toronto Arenas as its first teams.

National Hockey League

1914

HMS Bulwark is destroyed by a large internal explosion with the loss of 741 men while at anchor near Sheerness.

HMS Bulwark (1899)

1865

Battle of Papudo: A Spanish navy schooner is defeated by a Chilean corvette north of Valparaíso, Chile.

Battle of Papudo

1863

United States President Abraham Lincoln proclaims November 26 as a national Thanksgiving Day, to be celebrated annually on the final Thursday of November. Following the Franksgiving controversy from 1939 to 1941, it has been observed on the fourth Thursday in 1942 and subsequent years.

Abraham Lincoln

1852

An earthquake as high as magnitude 8.8 rocks the Banda Sea, triggering a tsunami and killing at least 60 in the Dutch East Indies.

1852 Banda Sea earthquake

1812

The Battle of Berezina begins during Napoleon's retreat from Russia.

Battle of Berezina

1805

Official opening of Thomas Telford's Pontcysyllte Aqueduct.

Thomas Telford

1789

A national Thanksgiving Day is observed in the United States as proclaimed by President George Washington at the request of Congress.

Thanksgiving (United States)

1778

In the Hawaiian Islands, Captain James Cook becomes the first European to visit Maui.

Hawaiian Islands

1476

Vlad the Impaler defeats Basarab Laiota with the help of Stephen the Great and Stephen V Báthory and becomes the ruler of Wallachia for the third time.

Vlad the Impaler

1346

Having been elected German king at Rhens on 11 July 1346, Charles IV is crowned King of Germany by bishop Walram of Cologne in Bonn.

List of monarchs of Germany

1161

Battle of Caishi: A Song dynasty fleet fights a naval engagement with Jin dynasty ships on the Yangtze river during the Jin–Song Wars.

Battle of Caishi

783

The Asturian queen Adosinda is held at a monastery to prevent her nephew from retaking the throne from Mauregatus.

Kingdom of Asturias