Scientists from the Event Horizon Telescope project released the first image of the black hole at the center of the galaxy M87.
Source10 April 488
A Saturday in history
Weekday
Saturday
Season
Spring (N. Hemisphere)
Century
5th century
Records
401
2019
2009Fijian President Ratu Josefa Iloilo announced that he had suspended the constitution and assumed all governance in the country after it was ruled that the government of Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama was illegal.
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1992First Nagorno-Karabakh War: Dozens of Armenian civilians were massacred in the village of Maraga by Azerbaijani forces.
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1973In the deadliest aviation accident in Swiss history, Invicta International Airlines Flight 435 crashed into a hillside near Hochwald, killing 108 people of 145 on board.
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1970In the midst of business disagreements with his bandmates, Paul McCartney announced his departure from the Beatles.
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1963The U.S. Navy nuclear submarine USS Thresher (SSN-593) sank with all hands lost during deep-diving tests in the North Atlantic Ocean.
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1944The Holocaust: Slovak Jewish prisoners Rudolf Vrba and Alfréd Wetzler escaped from Auschwitz, later publishing a report that became one of the earliest and most detailed descriptions of the camp's mass killings.
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1925The Great Gatsby (cover pictured), a novel by American author F. Scott Fitzgerald, was first published by Scribner's.
Source- 1866
The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was founded in New York City by Henry Bergh.
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1858Big Ben, the bell in the Palace of Westminster's clock tower in London, was cast after the original bell cracked during testing.
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1815Mount Tambora (pictured) in Indonesia began the most powerful volcanic eruption in recorded history, killing at least 71,000 people and affecting temperatures worldwide.
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1809Napoleonic Wars: The War of the Fifth Coalition began with the Austrian invasion of Bavaria, then a client state of France.
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1741War of the Austrian Succession: Prussian forces defeated Austrian troops at the Battle of Mollwitz in present-day Małujowice, Poland, cementing Frederick II's authority over the newly conquered territory of Silesia.
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1724Bach led the first performance of his cantata Erfreut euch, ihr Herzen, his first cantata composed for Easter in Leipzig.
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Photo archive
24 historic images from this day — tap to open the gallery.
What was life like?
Prices, jobs, food, music and everyday routine — the world as it felt to live in.
Sources & fact check
Every claim is traced to primary sources, archives, universities and the press — with an explicit confidence rating. Dossiers are generated once and cached permanently.