Browse events, births, deaths and holidays on September 20 throughout history.
The September 2019 climate strikes, also known as the Global Week for Future, were a series of international strikes and protests to demand action be taken to address climate chan…
Roughly four million people, mostly students, demonstrate across the world to address climate change. Sixteen-year-old…
MV Nyerere was a Tanzanian ferry that capsized on 20 September 2018 while travelling between the islands of Ukerewe and Ukara on Lake Victoria. The Tanzanian government have decla…
At least 161 people die after a ferry capsizes close to the pier on Ukara Island in Lake Victoria, Tanzania.
Hurricane Maria was an extremely powerful and catastrophic tropical cyclone that affected the northeastern Caribbean in September 2017, particularly in the U.S. territory of Puert…
Hurricane Maria makes landfall in Puerto Rico as a powerful Category 4 hurricane, resulting in 2,975 deaths,…
"Don't ask, don't tell" (DADT) was the official United States policy on military service of homosexual people for a period of over 17 years, starting in the mid-1990s. Instituted …
The United States military ends its "don't ask, don't tell" policy, allowing gay men and women to serve openly for the…
The Islamabad Marriott Hotel bombing occurred on the night of 20 September 2008, when a dumper truck filled with explosives was detonated in front of the Marriott Hotel in the Pak…
A dump truck full of explosives detonates in front of the Marriott hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan, killing 54 people and…
The Jena Six were six black teenagers in Jena, Louisiana, United States, convicted in the 2006 beating of Justin Barker, a white student at the local Jena High School, which they …
Between 15,000 and 20,000 protesters march on Jena, Louisiana, United States, in support of six black youths who had…
On Saturday September 20, 2003 civil unrest broke out in Malé, the capital city of the Maldives. This unrest was provoked by the death of Hassan Evan Naseem at Maafushi Prison – l…
Civil unrest in the Maldives breaks out after a prisoner is killed by guards.
The war on terror, officially the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), is a global military campaign initiated by the United States in response to the September 11 attacks in 2001. A g…
In an address to a joint session of Congress and the American people, U.S. President George W. Bush declares a "war on…
On Wednesday 20 September 2000, the Real Irish Republican Army (RIRA) carried out an attack on MI6's SIS Building headquarters in Vauxhall, Lambeth, London. A Russian-built RPG-22…
The United Kingdom's MI6 Secret Intelligence Service building is attacked by individuals using a Russian-built RPG-22…
South Ossetia, formally known as the State of Alania since 2017, or originally the Republic of South Ossetia, is a partially recognised state in the South Caucasus. It has an offi…
South Ossetia declares its independence from Georgia.
USAir Flight 5050 was a passenger flight that crashed on takeoff from LaGuardia Airport in Queens, New York. As the Boeing 737-400 took off from LaGuardia's runway 31, the plane d…
USAir Flight 5050 crashes into Bowery Bay during a rejected takeoff from LaGuardia Airport, killing two people.
On September 20, 1984, the Shi'a Islamic militant group Hezbollah, with support and direction from the Islamic Republic of Iran, carried out a suicide car bombing targeting the US…
A suicide bomber in a car attacks the U.S. embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing twenty-two people.
The 1982 NFL season was the 63rd regular season of the National Football League. A 57-day-long players' strike reduced the 1982 season from a 16-game schedule per team to an abbre…
NFL season: American football players in the National Football League begin a 57-day strike.
Operation Caban, also known as the 1979 Central African coup d’état, was a bloodless military operation by the French intelligence service SDECE in September 1979 to depose Emper…
A French-supported coup d'état in the Central African Empire overthrows Emperor Bokassa I.
Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of Mainland Southeast Asia. With an area of about 331,000 square kilometres and a po…
Vietnam is admitted to the United Nations.
In tennis, "Battle of the Sexes" describes various exhibition matches played between a man and a woman, or a doubles match between two men and two women in one case. The term is m…
Billie Jean King beats Bobby Riggs in the Battle of the Sexes tennis match at the Houston Astrodome.
James Joseph Croce was an American folk and rock singer-songwriter. Between 1966 and 1973, he released five studio albums and numerous singles. During this period, Croce took a se…
Singer Jim Croce, songwriter and musician Maury Muehleisen and four others die when their light aircraft crashes…
Hurricane Irene–Olivia was the first actively tracked tropical cyclone to move into the eastern Pacific Ocean from the Atlantic basin. It originated as a tropical depression on Se…
Having weakened after making landfall in Nicaragua the previous day, Hurricane Irene regains enough strength to be…
Queen Elizabeth 2 (QE2) is a retired British ocean liner. Built by John Brown & Company on the River Clyde in Scotland for the Cunard Line, the ship was operated as a transatlanti…
The Cunard Liner Queen Elizabeth 2 is launched in Clydebank, Scotland.
The Battle of Burki was a battle between the Indian and Pakistan Army during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 at Burki, a village that lies 11 km south-east of Lahore, Pakistan near…
Following the Battle of Burki, the Indian Army captures Dograi in during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965.