Mood:
"Resilience emerges after widespread tragedy."
Events: "Indian Ocean tsunami devastates multiple countries."
Events: "Indian Ocean tsunami devastates multiple countries."
- Feb 4: Facebook Launched – Mark Harvard undergraduate student Mark Zuckerberg launches "The Facebook" from his Harvard University dorm room, initiating a massive global social media revolution.
- Mar 11: Madrid Train Bombings – Al-Qaeda-inspired Islamist terrorists detonate coordinated backpack bombs on commuter trains in Madrid, Spain, killing 191 people and injuring nearly two thousand in Europe's deadliest terrorist attack.
- May 1: EU Enlargement – Ten new nations, primarily from Central and Eastern Europe, officially join the European Union in its largest single wave of geographical and political expansion.
- Jul 1: Cassini-Huygens Enters Saturn Orbit – NASA's Cassini spacecraft successfully executes an orbital insertion maneuver, becoming the very first human-made spacecraft to orbit the ringed gas giant Saturn.
- Aug 13: Athens Summer Olympics Open – The XXVIII Summer Olympic Games officially open in Athens, Greece, returning the modern Olympic movement to its historical birthplace amidst impressive athletic competition.
- Dec 26: Indian Ocean Tsunami – A massive magnitude 9.1 undersea earthquake off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia, triggers catastrophic tsunamis across the Indian Ocean, killing over 225,000 people across 14 countries.