Browse events, births, deaths and holidays on May 16 throughout history.
In the late evening hours of May 16, 2025, a large and deadly nocturnal EF4 tornado moved through the western Cumberland Plateau, impacting the Kentucky cities of Somerset and Lon…
A devastating EF4 tornado kills nineteen people in Southeast Kentucky, hitting the towns of Somerset and London
On 16 May 2014, two improvised explosive devices were detonated simultaneously in the Gikomba market in Nairobi, Kenya, killing at least 12 people and injuring 70. The first blast…
Twelve people are killed in two explosions in the Gikomba market area of Nairobi, Kenya
STS-134 was the penultimate mission of NASA's Space Shuttle program and the 25th and last spaceflight of Space Shuttle Endeavour. This flight delivered the Alpha Magnetic Spectrom…
STS-134 (ISS assembly flight ULF6), launched from the Kennedy Space Center on the 25th and final flight for Space Shuttl
Kuwait, officially the State of Kuwait, is a country in West Asia. With a coastline of approximately 500 km (311 mi), it is situated at the head of the Persian Gulf in the northea…
Kuwait permits women's suffrage in a 35–23 National Assembly vote
Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to t…
In Morocco, 33 civilians are killed and more than 100 people are injured in the Casablanca terrorist attacks
Mobutu Sese Seko Nkuku Ngbendu wa za Banga, often shortened to Mobutu Sese Seko or Mobutu and also known by his initials MSS, was a Congolese politician and military officer who w…
Mobutu Sese Seko, the President of Zaire, flees the country
Elizabeth II was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until her death in 2022. She was queen regnant of 32 sovereign states during her li…
Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom addresses a joint session of the United States Congress
The surgeon general of the United States is the operational head of the United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps (PHSCC) and thus a leading spokesperson on matters o…
A report by the Surgeon General of the United States C
Junko Tabei was a Japanese mountaineer, author and teacher. She was the first woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest and ascend the Seven Summits, climbing the highest peak o…
Junko Tabei from Japan becomes the first woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest
Josip Broz, commonly known as Tito, was a Yugoslav communist revolutionary and politician who led Yugoslavia as prime minister from 1943 to 1963 and as president from 1953 until h…
Josip Broz Tito is elected president for life of Yugoslavia
The Antonov An-24 is a 44-seat twin turboprop regional airliner designed in 1957 in the Soviet Union by the Antonov Design Bureau. Later variants saw other uses, such as military …
An Antonov An-24 crashes into a kindergarten building in Svetlogorsk, killing 35
The Venera program was a series of space probes developed by the Soviet Union between 1961 and 1984 to gather information about the planet Venus. A total of eighteen probes were s…
Venera program: Venera 5, a Soviet space probe, lands on Venus
The Communist Party of China (CPC), commonly known as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921,…
The Chinese Communist Party issues the "May 16 Notice", marking the beginning of the Cultural Revolution
Park Chung Hee was a South Korean politician and army officer who served as the third president of South Korea from 1962 after he seized power in the May 16 coup of 1961 until his…
Park Chung Hee leads a coup d'état to overthrow the Second Republic of South Korea
Theodore Harold Maiman was an American engineer and physicist who is widely credited with the invention of the laser. Maiman's laser led to the subsequent development of many othe…
Theodore Maiman operates the first optical laser (a ruby laser), at Hughes Research Laboratories in Malibu, California
The Tritons’ Fountain is a fountain located in Floriana, Malta. It consists of three bronze Tritons holding up a large basin, balanced on a concentric base built out of concrete a…
The Tritons' Fountain in Valletta, Malta is turned on for the first time
The Kengir uprising was a prisoner rebellion that occurred in Kengir (Steplag), a Soviet MVD special camp for political prisoners, during May and June 1954. Its duration and inten…
Beginning of the Kengir uprising in the Gulag
A transatlantic flight (TATL) is the flight of an aircraft across the Atlantic Ocean from Europe, Africa, South Asia, or the Middle East to North America, South America, or vice v…
The first regularly scheduled transatlantic flights begin between Idlewild Airport (now John F Kennedy International Air
The Levant Crisis, also known as the Damascus Crisis, the Syrian Crisis, or the Levant Confrontation, was a military confrontation that took place between British and French force…
Beginning of the Levant Crisis between Britain and France in Syria
The Holocaust, known in Hebrew as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered a…
The Holocaust: The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising ends