Event of Interest
Dec 3 Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela is extradited to the United States
Blue Skies
Dec 7 Diana DeGarmo releases her debut album, "Blue Skies"
Usher, Keys, Keith Win
Dec 8 15th Billboard Music Awards: Usher, Alicia Keys, and Toby Keith win
- Dec 8 Cuzco Declaration is signed in Cuzco, Peru, establishing the Union of South American Nations
Olsen Pledges Maternity Leave
Dec 9 Mary-Kate Olsen pledges that woman sewing garments for her company in Bangladesh will be afforded legal maternity leave
Ballon d'Or
Dec 13 Ballon d'Or: Milan's Ukrainian striker Andriy Shevchenko is named best football player in Europe ahead of Deco (Porto/FC Barcelona) and Barcelona midfielder Ronaldinho
Pinochet House Arrest
Dec 13 Former Chilean dictator, General Augusto Pinochet is put under house arrest, after being sued under accusations over 9 kidnapping actions and manslaughter. The house arrest is lifted the same day on appeal.
- Dec 14 The Millau viaduct, the highest bridge in the world, designed by architect Norman FOster and engineer Michel Virlogeux, near Millau, France is officially opened
Million Dollar Baby
Dec 15 "Million Dollar Baby", directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Hilary Swank and Morgan Freeman is released (Best Picture 2005)
- Dec 16 NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft is the 1st to cross the termination shock, where solar and interstellar winds merge
- Dec 19 World's largest indoor water park Tropical Islands Resort, opens in the Aerium, an old airship hanger, in the world's largest free-standing hall, south of Berlin, Germany
- Dec 23 Macquarie Island in the Southern Ocean is hit by an 8.1 magnitude earthquake.
- Dec 25 Cassini orbiter releases Huygens probe which successfully landed on Saturn's moon Titan on January 14, 2005.
Boxing Day Tsunami
Dec 26 9.3 magnitude earthquake creates a tsunami causing devastation in Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, the Maldives and edges of the Indian Ocean, killing 230,000 people
- Dec 27 Radiation from an explosion on the magnetar SGR 1806-20 reaches Earth. It is the brightest extrasolar event known to have been witnessed on the planet.
- Dec 30 A fire in the República Cromagnon nightclub in Buenos Aires, Argentina kills 194.
- Dec 31 Official opening of Taipei 101, then the tallest skyscraper in the world, at a height of 509 metres (1,670 feet)
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