On This Day — 23 September

2024

Israel launches airstrikes against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, killing more than 490 people.

Israel

2022

Voting begins in the five-day sham annexation referendums in Russian-occupied Ukraine, leading to Russian annexation of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.

Election

2020

A grand jury in Kentucky declines to indict three police officers for the shooting death of Breonna Taylor in a drug raid gone wrong, leading to nationwide protests in the U.S.

Grand jury

2019

Twenty people die on the first of two days of rioting in Papua and West Papua over an alleged racist incident.

2019 Papua protests

2013

Twenty-five people are killed after Typhoon Usagi passes Hong Kong and China.

Typhoon Usagi (2013)

2010

Teresa Lewis becomes the first woman to be executed by the U.S. state of Virginia since 1912, and the first woman in the state to be executed by lethal injection.

Teresa Lewis

2008

Matti Saari kills ten people at a school in Finland before committing suicide.

Kauhajoki school shooting

2004

Over 3,000 people die in Haiti after Hurricane Jeanne produces massive flooding and mudslides.

Haiti

1999

Qantas Flight 1 overruns a runway in Bangkok during a storm, causing minor injuries to some passengers.

Qantas Flight 1

1983

Gulf Air Flight 771 is destroyed by a bomb, killing all 112 people on board.

Gulf Air Flight 771

1973

Argentine general election: Juan Perón returns to power in Argentina.

September 1973 Argentine presidential election

1967

Seven people die, 46 people are injured, and more than 150 boats capsize when a squall hits Lake Michigan during Michigan's first coho salmon sport fishing season.

1967 coho salmon fishing disaster

1964

Typhoon Wilda, one of the strongest typhoons to ever strike Japan, makes landfall, causing at least 30 fatalities and sinking at least 64 ships.

Typhoon Wilda (1964)

1962

Flying Tiger Line Flight 923, a Lockheed L-1049H Super Constellation registered as N6923C, ditches into the Atlantic Ocean killing 28 out the 76 occupants onboard. The remaining 48 were rescued six hours later.

Flying Tiger Line Flight 923

1961

U.S. President John F. Kennedy nominates African American civil rights lawyer Thurgood Marshall to the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, although pro-segregation Southern senators manage to delay his confirmation until September 11, 1962.

John F. Kennedy

1957

Little Rock schools integration crisis: President Dwight D. Eisenhower sends the 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock, Arkansas, and federalizes the Arkansas National Guard, ordering both to support the integration of Little Rock Central High School.

Little Rock Nine

1956

A tropical storm originating in the eastern Pacific Ocean passes into the Gulf of Mexico and is upgraded and named Hurricane Flossy just hours before striking the Gulf Coast and causing 15 deaths and an estimated USD$24.8 million in damages.

Tropical cyclone

1955

An all-white jury in Mississippi finds Roy Bryant and J. W. Milam not guilty in the torture-murder of 14-year-old African American boy Emmett Till.

Mississippi

1952

After being accused of financial improprieties, Senator Richard Nixon delivers his "Checkers speech" nationwide on television and radio, defending his actions and successfully salvaging his nomination as the Republican candidate for Vice President.

Richard Nixon

1951

George VI, king of the United Kingdom, has his left lung removed in an operation after a malignant tumour was found.

George VI

1947

A magnitude 6.9 earthquake strikes South Khorasan in Iran, killing over 500 people.

1947 Dustabad earthquake

1942

World War II: The Matanikau action on Guadalcanal begins: U.S. Marines attack Japanese units along the Matanikau River.

World War II

1932

Saudi National Day: Crown Prince (later king) Faisal of Saudi Arabia, on behalf of Ibn Saud, proclaims the unification of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the current iteration of the Third Saudi State.

Saudi National Day

1920

The Louisiana hurricane dissipates over Kansas after forcing around 4,500 people to evacuate and causing $1.45 million in damages.

1920 Louisiana hurricane

1918

World War I: The Battle of Haifa takes place in present-day Israel, part of the Ottoman Empire at that time.

World War I

1913

The United Mine Workers of America launch a strike which eventually escalated into the Colorado Coalfield War.

United Mine Workers of America

1905

Norway and Sweden sign the Karlstad Treaty, peacefully dissolving the Union between the two countries.

Dissolution of the union between Norway and Sweden

1899

Philippine-American War: the American Asiatic Squadron destroys a Filipino battery at the Battle of Olongapo.

Philippine–American War

1884

On the night of 23–24 September, the steamship Arctique runs aground near Cape Virgenes leading to the discovery of nearby placer gold, beginning the Tierra del Fuego gold rush.

Cape Virgenes

1879

The Macedo-Romanian Cultural Society is founded.

Macedo-Romanian Cultural Society

1868

The Grito de Lares occurs in Puerto Rico against Spanish rule.

Grito de Lares

1846

Astronomers Urbain Le Verrier, John Couch Adams and Johann Gottfried Galle collaborate on the discovery of Neptune.

Urbain Le Verrier

1821

Tripolitsa, Greece, is captured by Greek rebels during the Greek War of Independence.

Siege of Tripolitsa

1803

Second Anglo-Maratha War: The Battle of Assaye is fought between the British East India Company and the Maratha Empire in India.

Second Anglo-Maratha War

1779

American Revolutionary War: John Paul Jones, naval commander of the United States, on board the USS Bonhomme Richard, wins the Battle of Flamborough Head.

American Revolutionary War

1642

First English Civil War: The Battle of Powick Bridge, the first engagement between the primary field armies of the Royalists and the Parliamentarians, ends in a Royalist victory.

First English Civil War

1561

King Philip II of Spain issues cedula, ordering a halt to colonizing efforts in Florida.

Philip II of Spain

1459

The Battle of Blore Heath, the first major battle of the English Wars of the Roses, is won by the Yorkists.

Battle of Blore Heath

1409

The Battle of Kherlen is the second significant victory over Ming dynasty China by the Mongols since 1368.

Battle of Kherlen

1338

The Battle of Arnemuiden, in which a French force defeats the English, is the first naval battle of the Hundred Years' War and the first naval battle in which gunpowder artillery is used.

Battle of Arnemuiden

1122

Pope Callixtus II and Holy Roman Emperor Henry V agree to the Concordat of Worms to put an end to the Investiture Controversy.

Pope Callixtus II

38

Drusilla, Caligula's sister who died in June, with whom the emperor is said to have an incestuous relationship, is deified.

AD 38