What happened in 2018

World8

• Jan 31A total lunar eclipse takes place, the 49th eclipse of Lunar Saros 124. This was referred to by the media as a 'super blue blood moon' as it was close to a supermoon, with perigee being on January 30, and a blue moon eclipse, the first since 1982.
• Mar 4Former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, are poisoned by the Novichok nerve agent in Salisbury, England. UK counter-terrorism police investigate amid speculation the Kremlin was behind the incident.
• Jul 6China–United States trade war: U.S. tariffs on US$34 billion of Chinese goods come into effect, as President Trump suggests the final total could reach $550bn. China accuses the U.S. of starting the "largest trade war in economic history" and announces immediate retaliatory tariffs.
• Jul 27The longest total lunar eclipse of the 21st century occurs, lasting 102 minutes and 57.3 seconds, but the longest total lunar eclipse of the 3rd millennium will occur on May 12, 2264, lasting 106 minutes and 13.2 seconds, over 3 minutes longer than this eclipse. It was the 38th eclipse of Lunar Saros 129, with an umbral eclipse magnitude of 1.60868. The total lunar eclipse with the greatest magnitude in the 21st century will occur on June 26, 2029, with an umbral eclipse magnitude of 1.84362.
• Sep 14Hurricane Florence makes landfall in North Carolina as a category 1 hurricane, causing record-breaking flooding, which would result in 54 fatalities and $24.2 billion (2018 USD) in damages.
• Oct 19The uncrewed European-Japanese spacecraft BepiColombo is launched on a seven-year journey to Mercury.
• Oct 26Red Dead Redemption II is released on PS4 and Xbox One. It would become the 8th best selling video game of all-time with 50,000,000+ copies sold.
• Nov 27Kerch Strait incident: Ukraine declares martial law after an armed incident in which the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) coast guard fired upon and captured three Ukrainian Navy vessels attempting to pass from the Black Sea into the Sea of Azov through the Kerch Strait.

Japan4

• JanCoincheck hackOn January 26, about 58 billion yen worth of the cryptocurrency NEM was stolen from the exchange Coincheck. A 2019 legal change renamed virtual currencies “crypto assets” and tightened rules on exchanges.
• Apr 21Nabi Tajima (1900 – 2018), the last known person born in the 19th century dies.
• Jul 6Former Aum Shinrikyo leader Shoko Asahara and six other main members of Aum Shinrikyo, who led the 1995 Tokyo subway sarin attack, are executed by hanging.
• Jul 72018 Japan floods, a torrential heavy massive rain, flash flood, landslide hit in Hiroshima, Kurashiki and Ehime Prefecture, Japan. According to Japanese government official confirmed report, 232 people were killed and 459 injured.

North America24

• Feb 6SpaceX successfully conducts its maiden flight of its most powerful rocket to date, the Falcon Heavy, from LC39A at John F. Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
• Feb 14A shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida is one of the deadliest school massacres with 17 fatalities and 17 injuries.
• Mar 9President of the United States Donald Trump accepts an invitation from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un for a meeting in May to discuss the denuclearisation of North Korea.
• Mar 14In response to gun violence in the United States, and particularly triggered by the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida, thousands of high school students across the country participate in an organized protest they called the National School Walkout.
• Apr 18NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) is launched.
• Apr 23A vehicle-ramming attack kills 10 people and injures 16 others in Toronto, Canada. A 25-year-old suspect, Alek Minassian, is arrested.
• May 5NASA's space probe InSight is launched. It landed on Mars on November 26 and uses a drill to conduct geological science.
• May 28The 2018 Stanley Cup Final are played between the Washington Capitals and the Vegas Golden Knights and won by the former.
• Jun 18year old American rapper and singer-songwriter XXXTentacion was murdered in Deerfield Beach, Florida during an armed robbery.
• Aug 12NASA launches the uncrewed Parker Solar Probe to study the Sun at close range and the solar wind.
• Oct 2The Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi is murdered inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, triggering a diplomatic crisis for Saudi Arabia.
• Oct 10Hurricane Michael makes landfall at Mexico Beach, Florida as a Category 5 hurricane with winds of 160 mph (260 km/h) and a minimum pressure of. It is the most intense hurricane to hit the mainland United States since Camille in 1969.
• Oct 27Eleven people are killed during the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting.
• Nov 5Two U.S. space probes simultaneously (and coincidentally) reach "opposite" milestones in relation to the solar heliosphere: Voyager 2 passed through the heliopause, the outer limit of the Sun's magnetic field, into interstellar space within hours of the Parker Solar Probe reaching its first perihelion, the closest point to the Sun on its initial orbit.
• Nov 26NASA's InSight probe successfully lands on the surface of Mars.

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Europe22

• Jan 12The first round of voting in the 2018 Czech presidential election is held.
• Jan 26The second round of voting of the 2018 Czech presidential election is held and incumbent president Miloš Zeman is reelected.
• Jan 282018 Finnish presidential election: Incumbent president Sauli Niinistö is reelected on the first round of voting.
• Jan 28The first round of voting of the 2018 Cypriot presidential election is held.
• Feb 4The second round of voting of the 2018 Cypriot presidential election is held and incumbent president Nicos Anastasiades is reelected.
• Mar 23An Islamic terrorist attack in Carcassonne and Trèbes, France, kills five people, including the perpetrator.
• Mar 26More than 100 Russian diplomats are expelled by more than 20 countries in the wake of the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal.
• Apr 15The 2018 Montenegrin presidential election is held and the Democratic Party of Socialists of Montenegro candidate, former prime minister and former president Milo Đukanović is elected on the first round of voting.
• May 19The wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle was held at St George's Chapel, Windsor, with an estimated global audience of 1.9 billion.
• Jul 26Heavy wildfires in Greece leave 102 dead and more than a hundred buildings destroyed.
• Aug 10Protests against the government of Romania, prime-minister Viorica Dăncilă and PSD leader and corrupt businessman Liviu Dragnea take place in Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca and other major Romanian cities. In Bucharest, the protests take a violent shape and, in the course of a few hours, over 400 people are injured, including civilians not taking part in the protests and police units, and more than a thousand people suffer effects from tear gas and hand grenades thrown by the Romanian Jandarmerie units deployed and backed by the PSD-ruled government.
• Aug 2015 year old Swedish pupil Greta Thunberg starts to stay out of school in an attempt to give attention to the climate change issue.
• Oct 17A school shooting and bomb attack in Kerch, Crimea, kills 20 people and injures 70 others.
• Oct 27Michael D. Higgins is re-elected President of Ireland after receiving 822,566 first preference votes in the 2018 Irish presidential election.
• Dec 1France experiences its worst civil unrest since the protests of 1968 due to the yellow vests movement. Protests in Paris morph into riots, with hundreds of people injured and thousands arrested; over 100 cars are burned, the Arc de Triomphe is vandalized and numerous other tourist sites are closed, both in the capital and elsewhere in the country.

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USSR / Russia7

• Feb 18Kizlyar church shooting: a man carrying a knife and a double-barreled shotgun opens fire on a crowd at an Orthodox church in Kizlyar, Dagestan, killing five women and injuring several other people; the perpetrator is shot and killed by police.
• Mar 62018 Russian Air Force Antonov An-26 crash: An Antonov An-26 transport aircraft operated by the Russian Air Force crashes on approach to Khmeimim air base in Syria, killing all 39 people on board. All of them were servicemen of the Russian Armed Forces, including Major-General Vladimir Yeremeyev.
• Mar 18In the Russian presidential election, Vladimir Putin is elected for a fourth term.
• Mar 252018 Kemerovo fire: At least 60 people are killed and 79 others injured in a fire at the Winter Cherry shopping mall and entertainment complex in Kemerovo, Russia.
• Jun 14The 2018 FIFA World Cup is held in Russia and is won by France.
• Aug 12The five littoral states – Russia, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Iran and Turkmenistan – sign the Convention on the legal status of the Caspian Sea, ending the 20-year long dispute over the Caspian Sea's legal status.
• Dec 312018 Magnitogorsk building collapse: An apartment block in Magnitogorsk, Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, partially collapses, killing 39 people and injuring 17 more. According to the official investigation the collapse was caused by a gas explosion.

Asia14

• Feb 9The 2018 Winter Olympics are held in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
• Mar 12Flight BS211 crashes and bursts into flames at Tribhuvan International Airport, Nepal, killing 51 of the 71 people aboard. The 20 surviving passengers were seriously injured from the impact and the fire.
• Mar 28North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong Un meets Chinese paramount leader Xi Jinping, leaving the country for the first time since assuming office in 2011.
• Jun 12The 2018 North Korea–United States summit is held in Singapore. It is the first summit between a sitting United States President and a North Korean leader.
• Jul 10Twelve boys and their football coach are successfully rescued from the flooded Tham Luang Nang Non cave in Thailand, following a 17-day ordeal that gained worldwide attention. One person, a law enforcement officer is killed.
• Jul 23The Saddle Dam D in Paksong, Laos collapses leaving up to 1,100 people missing.
• Aug 5A magnitude 6.9 earthquake struck the island of Lombok, Indonesia, killing 563 people and injuring more than a thousand people.
• Aug 10Heavy rainfall causes severe floods in the Indian state of Kerala. It is the worst flood to hit the state in a century.
• Sep 14Typhoon Mangkhut impacts the Philippines, Taiwan, Hong Kong and China, resulting in more than 60 fatalities.
• Sep 28A magnitude 7.5 earthquake hits Sulawesi, Indonesia, causing a tsunami that kills at least 4,340 people and injures more than 10,679 others.
• Oct 19At least 59 people are killed and at least 100 injured when a train runs through a crowd at a Hindu festival in Punjab, India.
• Oct 23The Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macau Bridge, the world's longest sea crossing bridge, is opened by Chinese Paramount leader Xi Jinping.
• Oct 29Lion Air Flight 610 crashes off the coast of Java, killing all 189 people on board.
• Dec 22An eruption from Krakatoa causes a tsunami that hits the Sunda Strait, Indonesia, killing at least 430 people and injuring nearly 1,500.

Middle East6

• Jan 20Turkey, led by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, announces the beginning of a military offensive to capture a portion of northern Syria from Kurdish forces, amidst the ongoing Kurdish–Turkish conflict.
• Apr 8Syrian Civil War: At least 70 people are reported to have died and hundreds suffering injuries after a chlorine chemical attack in Douma, the last rebel-held town in Syria's Eastern Ghouta.
• Apr 18Cinemas open in Saudi Arabia for the first time since 1983 with the American film Black Panther chosen as the first to be screened.
• Jun 24Early general elections was held in Turkey to elect the president of Turkey and all 600 members of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, Turkey's unicameral legislature. Justice and Development Party candidate, incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is reelected and the Justice and Development Party, led by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan comes out as the largest party winning 295 out of 600 seats.
• Sep 17Syrian Civil War: While the Israeli Air Force conduct missile strikes that hit targets in western Syria, a Russian Il-20 reconnaissance plane is shot down by a Syrian surface-to-air missile, killing all 15 Russian servicemen on board. Russia blamed Israel's military for the accident because the Israeli jets that conducted the strikes allegedly used the Russian plane as cover to allow them to approach their targets without being hit by Syrian fire.
• Sep 22An attack at a military parade kills 30 people (including 5 attackers) and injures 70 more in Ahvaz, Iran.

Latin America12

• Feb 42018 Costa Rican general election: The first round of voting of the presidential election and legislative election are held.
• Mar 28At least 78 people die in a fire in the police headquarters of Valencia, Venezuela.
• Apr 12018 Costa Rican general election: The second round of voting for the presidential election is held and Citizens' Action Party candidate Carlos Alvarado Quesada is elected president.
• May 18Cubana de Aviación Flight 972 crashed shortly after take-off near José Martí International Airport in Havana, Cuba, killing 112 people and leaving only one survivor.
• May 20The 2018 Venezuelan presidential election was held with incumbent President Nicolás Maduro reelected with 67.8% of the vote and the lowest turnout in Venezuela's modern democratic history since the 1958 coup d'état. The elections were denounced as a "sham" by several Latin American countries, the United States, Canada, the Organization of American States and the European Union.
• May 27The first round of voting of the 2018 Colombian presidential election is held.
• Jun 3At least 109 people are killed and hundreds wounded by the eruption of Volcán de Fuego, Guatemala's deadliest volcanic eruption in over a century.
• Jun 16Seventeen people die in Caracas, Venezuela following the El Paraíso stampede after a tear gas canister is detonated in a crowded club.
• Jun 17The second round of voting of the 2018 Colombian presidential election is held and Iván Duque is elected.
• Jul 1The 2018 Mexican general election is held to elect the president of Mexico, all 128 members of the Senate of the Republic and all 500 members of the Chamber of Deputies.The presidential candidate of the Juntos Haremos Historia coalition, Andrés Manuel López Obrador is elected president and the Juntos Haremos Historia coalition wins a majority of 69 out of 128 out of seats in the Senate and 312 out of 500 seats in the Chamber of Deputies.
• Jul 31Aeroméxico Connect Flight 2431 crashed on takeoff from Durango International Airport. Shortly after becoming airborne, the plane encountered sudden wind shear caused by a microburst. The plane rapidly lost speed and altitude and impacted the runway, detaching the engines and skidding to a halt about 1,000 feet (300 m) beyond the runway. The plane caught fire and was destroyed. All 103 people on board survived, but 39 passengers and crew members were injured.
• Oct 28The right-wing Jair Bolsonaro is elected as the next President of Brazil, with 55% of the vote.

Africa4

• Apr 11257 people are killed after an Ilyushin Il-76 belonging to the Algerian Air Force crashes near Algiers.
• Aug 1The 2018 Kivu Ebola outbreak begins in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It becomes the second-deadliest outbreak of the Ebola virus on November 29, surpassed only by the 2013 West African Ebola virus epidemic.
• Sep 20The MV Nyerere capsizes on Lake Victoria, killing at least 228 passengers.
• Dec 17Scandinavian tourists Louisa Vesterager Jespersen and Maren Ueland are murdered by Islamic terrorists in the foothills of Mount Toubkal near to the village of Imlil in Morocco. At least one victim is beheaded with the murders recorded on video and posted on social media. In a previous video the perpetrators pledge allegiance to ISIS.