Historical Events in 2022

Events 1 - 200 of 838

• Jan 1 Chicago Bulls forward DeMar DeRozen becomes first player in NBA history to hit buzzer-beaters on consecutive days; hits 3-pointers to beat Washington Wizards, 120-119 and previous night Indiana Pacers, 108-106

• Jan 2 Israel becomes one of the first countries to offer a fourth vaccine dose against COVID-19 amid an Omicron surge
• Jan 2 Sudan’s Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok resigns in a televised address amid political deadlock after a rejection of his deal with the military by pro-democracy forces

• Jan 3 America records one million new COVID-19 cases for the first time, Omicron accounting for an estimated 95% of these [1]
• Jan 3 Apple becomes the first US company to be worth $3 trillion in value, after tripling its price in under four years [1]

• Jan 3 Scotsman Peter Wright wins his second PDC World Darts Championship; beats Michael Smith of England, 7-5 at the Alexandra Palace in London
• Jan 4 Canadian government announces US$31.5 billion settlement to fix and compensate for Indigenous child welfare system, largest in its history [1]
• Jan 4 Toyota becomes the first foreign automaker to top US sales, beating GM in 2021, partly due to supply issues [1]
• Jan 5 Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards pardons Homer Plessy for buying whites-only train ticket in 1892 (resulted in U.S. Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson 1896) [1]
• Jan 5 State of emergency declared across Kazakhstan amid unrest and protests against fuel price rises, 164 killed in three days

• Jan 7 First successful transplant of a pig's heart into a human when genetically modified pig's heart inserted into a 53-year-old man in Baltimore, Maryland [1]
• Jan 7 Three men convicted of murdering black jogger Ahmaud Arbery in Feb 2020, sentenced to life in prison in a Georgia court
• Jan 8 Dan Campbell's Detroit Lions finish the season with a 9–8 record, achieving their first winning season since 2017
• Jan 8 The United Kingdom passes 150,000 COVID-19 deaths, the first country in Europe and the seventh globally [1]
• Jan 9 At least 200 people killed and 10,000 displaced by armed bandits in the northwestern Nigerian state of Zamfara, after military raids on their hideouts, amid a continuing struggle for order in the region [1]
• Jan 9 Dan Campbell finishes his first season as head coach of the Detroit Lions with a 3–13–1 record
• Jan 9 Fire in a Bronx, New York, residential high rise kills 17 and injures 63
• Jan 10 Crytocurrency Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, now one of the world's richest billionaires, with net worth of $96 billion according to Bloomberg

• Jan 10 US reports 1.34 million new COVID-19 infections, a global record, with Omicron variant accounting for an estimated 95% of cases [1]
• Jan 11 Quebec announces it will impose a healthcare tax on unvaccinated adults who are accounting for 50% of ICU cases (scrapped Feb 2022) [1]
• Jan 11 WHO warns more than half of Europe could catch COVID-19 within weeks, warning of a "west-to-east tidal wave" [1]

• Jan 13 Australian equals hottest temperature on record of 50.7C (123.26F) in Onslow, Western Australia
• Jan 13 Britain's Prince Andrew stripped of his military titles and royal patronages by Buckingham Palace, amid continuing sexual assault allegations

• Jan 13 Landmark conviction of former Syrian intelligence officer Anwar Raslan for state-sponsored crimes against humanity in Koblenz, Germany [1]
• Jan 15 Oil spill at La Pampilla refinery off Peruvian coast after waves from the Tongan eruption cause almost 12,000 barrels to leak into the sea [1]
• Jan 15 Underwater volcano Hunga-Tonga Hunga-Ha'apai violently erupts with 20km ash plume, sending tsunami over nearby Tonga, with shock waves heard in New Zealand [1]
• Jan 18 Boston Bruins retire Willie O'Ree's #22 jersey, on the 64th anniversary of his becoming the NHL's first Black player [1]
• Jan 18 France records a record 464,769 new COVID-19 cases with other European countries also registering record numbers amid Omicron's spread [1]
• Jan 18 Indonesia's parliament approves bill to relocate its capital to Borneo and announces new city's name will be Nusantara, (meaning archipelago) [1]
• Jan 18 Microsoft says it is buying Activision Blizzard, publisher of online games "Call of Duty", "World of Warcraft" and "Candy Crush" for $70 billion - biggest-ever gaming and tech takeover [1]
• Jan 19 5G cellphone service launches in the US with airlines claiming it could interfere with airplane technologies
• Jan 19 Major report on antimicrobial resistance shows 4.95m deaths worldwide associated with drug-resistant bacteria, making untreatable infections now a leading cause of death [1]
• Jan 19 UK PM Boris Johnson eases Omicron COVID-19 restrictions, saying the current wave of infections has peaked
• Jan 20 19-year-old aviator Zara Rutherford becomes the youngest woman to fly solo around the world landing at Kortrijk-Wevelgem Airport, Belgium [1]
• Jan 21 Yemen detention centre in Saada held by rebel Houthis bombed killing more than 70 people [1]
• Jan 23 Buffalo wide receiver Gabriel Davis scores an NFL playoff record 4 TDs in the Bills' epic 42-36 overtime loss to the Kansas City Chiefs in their divisional-round playoff at Arrowhead Stadium
• Jan 24 19 die in a fight and a fire at a nightclub in Sorong city, West Papua, Indonesia [1]
• Jan 24 At least 34 people killed and 65,000 left homeless after two different tropical storms batter Madagascar and Mozambique with Madagascar's capital Antananarivo particularly affected [1]
• Jan 24 Coup in Burkina Faso as military announce on TV they have overthrown President Roch Kaboré after his failure to stem an Islamic insurgency [1]
• Jan 25 Australian government buys the copyright to the Aboriginal flag designed by artist Harold Thomas for A$20 million (US$14m) [1]
• Jan 25 People smuggling boat reported to have capsized in the Florida Straits with the loss of 38 lives
• Jan 25 Philadelphia Flyers defenseman Keith Yandle becomes NHL's new "Iron Man" with his 965th consecutive regular-season game, breaking Doug Jarvis's all-time record, in a 4-3 loss at the New York Islanders [1]

• Jan 26 US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer announces his retirement

• Jan 30 Kurdish-led militia and American forces regain control of Sinaa prison in Hasaka, Syria, after a week-log assault by ISIS fighters, with the loss of 500 lives [1]
• Jan 30 Portugal's ruling Socialist party headed by Prime Minister António Costwin wins an unexpected outright majority in country's snap election
• Jan 31 British government report finds "a failure of leadership" led to parties taking place in Downing Street when UK under strict lockdown, amid a police investigation [1]
• Jan 31 Online word puzzle Wordle bought for “low seven figure sum” by The New York Times
• Feb 1 60 people killed in attack by militants on Plaine Savo camp for displaced persons in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo [1]

• Feb 1 Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering, 'Nobel Prize for Engineering' awarded to Masato Sagawa for inventing the neodymium-iron-boron (Nd-Fe-B) magnet [1]
• Feb 2 More than one million Afghans have fled the country for Iran since October due to the country's economic crisis, according to immigration authorities threatening a new migrant crisis [1]
• Feb 3 Austria brings into force its vaccine mandate for all, first country in Europe to do so
• Feb 3 ISIS leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi blows himself and his family up during a raid by US Special Forces in Syria [1]
• Feb 4 Cyclone Batsirai strikes Madagascar less than a month after Cyclone Ana, causing widespread damage, killing at least 92 people and displacing 91,000 [1]
• Feb 4 XXIV Olympic Winter Games open in Beijing, China
• Feb 5 Body of five-year old Moroccan boy Rayan Oram retrieved from the well he fell down four days previously after huge rescue effort [1]
• Feb 5 Sanaz Toossi's play "English" premieres off-Broadway at Atlantic Theater Company's Linda Gross Theater (Pulitzer Prize for Drama 2023) [1]
• Feb 5 Six days before his 50th birthday, 11-time world surfing champion Kelly Slater wins his 8th Pipeline title beating 22-year old Hawaiian Seth Moniz in the final
• Feb 6 Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson declares a state of emergency over a trucker protest against a covid vaccination mandate on the US-Canada border [1]

• Feb 7 European security facing its most dangerous moment since the Cold War, amid fears of a Russian invasion of Ukraine, according to EU foreign policy chief [1]

• Feb 8 Austrian alpine skier Matthias Mayer narrowly retains his Olympic Super-G title from American Ryan Cochran-Siegle at the Beijing Winter Games; Mayer's 3rd Olympic gold medal
• Feb 8 Horn of Africa with 13 million people now facing humanitarian crisis amid drought where the rainy season has failed three years in a row, according to UN World Food Program [1]
• Feb 9 Nearly four million bottles of beer destroyed in large crackdown on alcohol in northern Nigerian state of Kano, where alcohol prohibited under Sharia law [1]
• Feb 11 Australia lists the koala as endangered for the first time in Queensland, New South Wales and ACT after a steep decline in numbers [1]
• Feb 12 French forces say they have killed 40 fighters in air attacks in Burkina Faso linked to deadly attacks on Benin border [1]
• Feb 13 Canadian police arrest truckers who have protested a vaccine mandate for blocking Ambassador's Bridge, between Detroit and Windsor, for a week at the busiest land border crossing in North America [1]
• Feb 13 Marte Olsbu Røiseland of Norway wins the women's biathlon pursuit for her third gold medal of the Beijing Winter Olympics (women's sprint & mixed relay)
• Feb 13 Quentin Fillon Maillet of France adds the biathlon pursuit to his individual gold medal at the Beijing Winter Olympics

• Feb 13 Super Bowl LVI, SoFi Stadium, Inglewood, CA: Los Angeles Rams beat Cincinnati Bengals, 23-20; MVP: Cooper Kupp, LA Rams, WR
• Feb 14 The megadrought affecting the American Southwest is now considered the worst for 1,200 years according to scientists [1]
• Feb 15 Floods and landslides after the heaviest rain in a century in Petrópolis, Brazil, leaves 146 people dead with 191 missing [1]
• Feb 15 In the only podium sweep of the Beijing Winter Olympics, Germany takes all 3 medals in the 2-man bobsleigh; Francesco Friedrich and Thorsten Margis win gold

• Feb 16 Johannes Høsflot Klæbo teams with Erik Valnes to win the men's team sprint for Norway and clinch the cross country freestyle sprint double at the Beijing Winter Olympics
• Feb 17 28,000 women apply for 30 jobs driving trains after they are advertised for women in Saudi Arabia for the first time [1]
• Feb 18 Johannes Thingnes Bø of Norway wins his 4th biathlon gold medal of the Beijing Winter Olympics when he takes out the men's mass start
• Feb 18 Scientific study says the sudden drop in emissions due to COVID-19 shutdowns caused the record rainfall in eastern China in 2020 that killed hundreds [1]
• Feb 18 Storm Eunice [Zeynep/Nora] moves across Europe and the UK with gusts of 120mph, killing at least 17, cutting off power to millions [1]
• Feb 19 Alexander Bolshunov, representing Russian Olympic Committee, wins men's 50k freestyle cross country gold in Beijing to become only 2nd man to achieve 30k/50k double at a Winter Olympics
• Feb 20 64th Daytona 500: On owner Roger Penske's 85th birthday, 23 year-old rookie Austin Cindric works his way through numerous crashes over the closing laps to win from Bubba Wallace
• Feb 20 Britain's 95-year-old Queen Elizabeth II tests positive for COVID-19
• Feb 20 Ethiopia's Grand Renaissance Dam (Gerd), Africa's controversial and biggest-ever hydroelectric project on the Blue Nile, begins generating electricity [1]
• Feb 20 Hannah Green of Australia becomes first woman to win a mix-gender golf tournament over 72 holes; closes with 5-under 66 for a 4-stroke win in TPS Murray River on the PGA Tour of Australasia
• Feb 20 Therese Johaug of Norway wins women's 30 kilometre freestyle cross-country for the individual golden trifecta (10k, 15k, 30k) at the Beijing Winter Olympics; her fourth career Olympic gold medal
• Feb 20 XXIV Olympic Winter Games close in Beijing, China; Norway finishes with record 16 gold medals
• Feb 21 60 people die in an explosion at an unregulated gold mine near Gaoua, Burkina Faso [1]
• Feb 21 Australia's international border reopens to vaccinated tourists after 704 days, nearly two years [1]
• Feb 21 Colombia's Constitutional Court, its highest court, decriminalizes abortion [1]
• Feb 21 Russian leader Vladimir Putin recognises Russia-backed separatists in two Ukrainian regions, ordering in troops for "peacekeeping functions" [1]
• Feb 22 Three white men convicted of killing black jogger Ahmaud Arbery found guilty of federal hate crimes, in Georgia [1]
• Feb 22 US President Joe Biden announces new sanctions against Russia, saying its latest moves in Ukraine amount to "the beginning of a Russian invasion" [1]
• Feb 22 US Women soccer players settle their lawsuit with US soccer federation for $24 million and a promise to equalise pay [1]
• Feb 24 Russian leader Vladimir Putin announces the start of a three day “special military operation” in Ukraine to "demilitarize" the country. Moments before Russia launched a full-scale pre-dawn and unprovoked invasion by land, air and sea, with bombings in several cities. [1]
• Feb 24 Zahir Zakir Jaffer sentenced to death in Islamabad, Pakistan for the rape, murder and beheading of Noor Muqaddam after she refused to marry him, highlighting violence towards women in the country [1]
• Feb 26 'Rain bomb' due to a slow-moving low pressure trough begins major flooding in south-east Queensland, Australia, leaving at least seven people dead [1]
• Feb 26 Scientists publish findings into "lost" continent Balkanatolia, that linked southern Europe with Asia, providing passageway for animal migrations 35 to 38 million years ago [1]
• Feb 27 Countries sanction Russia for its invasion of Ukraine; EU closes its airspace to Russian planes, Russian banks excluded from worldwide Swift payment system, Sweden sends arms to Ukraine
• Feb 27 EU warns Russian invasion of Ukraine means Europe facing major humanitarian crisis, 18 million Ukrainians displaced with four million refugees fleeing the country
• Feb 28 Russia shells the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, while a 40 mile Russian military convoy approaches capital city of Kyiv
• Feb 28 UN Landmark climate change report warns climate change outpacing human efforts to adapt, with best-case scenario rise of 1.5C, 14% of species face "very high risk of extinction" [1]
• Mar 1 Cargo ship carrying 4,000 luxury Volkswagen Group cars sinks off the Portuguese Azores archipelago, two weeks after it caught fire [1]

• Mar 1 US President Joe Biden, in his State of the Union address, says Vladimir Putin has "badly miscalculated" by invading Ukraine [1]
• Mar 2 UN states agree to create legally binding plastic pollution treaty (tbc 2024) after talks in Nairobi, Kenya - hailed most significant environmental deal since 2015 Paris climate accord [1]
• Mar 3 Russian forces seize the Ukrainian Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, the largest in Europe
• Mar 4 Four-ton rocket debris crashes into the far side of the moon, unconfirmed booster from China's Chang'e 5-T1 mission in first unintentional collision with the moon [1]
• Mar 4 Suspected suicide bomb attack on a shia mosque in Pakistani city of Peshawar kills at least 56 and injures 190 [1]

• Mar 7 Global death toll from Covid-19 passes 6 million according to Johns Hopkins figures, with 57% of the world's population fully vaccinated [1]
• Mar 7 UN refugee agency says Russian invasion of Ukraine has now led to 1.7 million people fleeing the country, civilian deaths recorded at 406 with 801 injured [1]
• Mar 8 Florida Senate passes controversial "Parental Rights in Education bill, known as the "Don't Say Gay" bill, restricting teachers from discussing gender identity [1]
• Mar 8 President Joe Biden announces the US is banning Russian oil imports with UK phasing out imports by the end of the year

• Mar 8 Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon formally apologises to the 4,000 Scots, mostly women, accused of witchcraft between 1563 and 1736 [1]
• Mar 8 Sydney has wettest start to the year since records began, recording 822 millimetres of rain amid widespread flooding [1]
• Mar 8 UK band Glass Animals' song "Heat Waves" sets new record of 59 weeks for longest time to reach No. 1 on US Billboard Top 100 [1]

• Mar 9 Russian airstrikes on Ukrainian city of Mariupol hit a hospital, killing at least three people, as attempts to create a humanitarian corridor out of the city fail [1]

• Mar 10 After a 99-day lockout, Major League Baseball and MLB Players Association reach a new collective bargaining agreement; MLB teams set to play full 162 game season in 2022
• Mar 10 True global death toll from COVID-19 estimated at 18.2 million in new study by Washington University [1]

• Mar 12 Saudi Arabia executes 81 convicted criminals, the country's largest known mass execution in modern times [1]

• Mar 13 After a 40-day retirement, record breaking quarterback Tom Brady announces he will play at least one more season in the NFL with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers
• Mar 14 Civilians able to leave heavily bombed Ukranian city of Mariupol for the first time, amid dead toll of 2,500 in the city and a humanitarian crisis [1]

• Mar 14 Omicron causes the largest outbreak of COVID-19 in China since Wuhan 2020 with 26 million people under lockdown in Changchun and Shenzhen [1]
• Mar 15 Architectures' Pritzker Prize awarded to Francis Kéré from Burkina Faso [1]
• Mar 15 Hong Kong amid its worst COVID-19 outbreak records over 4,000 deaths in a few months, largely due to low vaccination, as Omicron hits, forcing it to abandon its covid-zero policy,
• Mar 16 After 20 seasons as Fox's NFL lead broadcast team, Joe Buck and Troy Aikman join ESPN as new lead commentators of Monday Night Football
• Mar 16 British-Iranians Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori return to the UK after being detained for five and six years on spying charges [1]
• Mar 16 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addresses US Congress remotely pleading for further aid against the Russian invasion [1]
• Mar 16 US Federal Reserve raises interest rates for the first time since 2018 by a quarter of a point to help ease rising price inflation [1]
• Mar 17 Claude Giroux, NHL Philadelphia Flyers longest-serving captain, becomes only 2nd player in franchise history to play 1,000th game for the team, joining Bobby Clarke

• Mar 20 Intense fighting in Ukrainian city of Mariupol continues as Russian forces encircle the city, trapping 300,000 people [1]
• Mar 21 178 wildfires have burnt more than 108,000 acres across southwest Texas according to local fire officials with 23 still active [1]
• Mar 21 China Eastern Airlines jetliner crashes in mountains in Guangxi region, China, with 132 people on board
• Mar 21 Ketanji Brown Jackson's Supreme Court confirmation hearings begin in Washington D.C.

• Mar 22 Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards declares a state of emergency after tornadoes tear through New Orleans suburbs, killing at least one person [1]
• Mar 22 Microplastics found in human blood for first time through new research conducted at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands [1]
• Mar 23 Abel Prize, mathematics' Nobel equivalent, awarded to American Dennis Sullivan for his work on topography [1]
• Mar 23 After 114 consecutive weeks as world #1 female tennis player, 25-year-old Australian Ash Barty makes shock retirement announcement; cites contentment with all she achieved in the sport
• Mar 23 Brian Houston, Australian founder of megachurch Hillsong, resigns after an internal investigation finds he breached their code of conduct with two women
• Mar 23 US Secretary of State Antony Blinken formally declares that members of Russia armed forces have committed war crimes in Ukraine [1]
• Mar 25 Sydney forward Lance "Buddy" Franklin kicks 4 goals to become only 6th player in VFL/AFL history to kick 1,000 career goals; Swans overrun Geelong, 107-77 at the SCG

• Mar 26 US President Joe Biden says of Russian President Vladimir Putin, “For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power" in unscripted remarks in Poland [1]
• Mar 27 94th Academy Awards: "CODA" wins best film, best director Jane Campion, best actress Jessica Chastain, best actor Will Smith who also controversially slaps host Chris Rock live on stage [1]
• Mar 27 China announces Shanghai will be locked down in two stages over nine days affecting 25 million people to carry out COVID-19 testing [1]

• Mar 27 El Salvador's parliament declares a state of emergency after 62 gang killings in one day [1]
• Mar 28 Actor Will Smith issues an apology on Instagram to Oscars host Chris Rock for slapping him live on stage during the ceremony [1]

• Mar 29 BA.2 version of Omicron is now the dominant form of COVID-19 in America according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention [1]
• Mar 29 In a major victory for Ukraine, Russia announces it is withdrawing its badly mauled forces from around Ukraine's capital, Kyiv
• Mar 29 New study of Pluto finds evidence of cryovolcanoes and ice lava from NASA's New Horizons footage 2015 [1]
• Mar 29 US FDA authorizes a second Pfizer or Moderna booster shot for people over 50 or immunocompromised [1]
• Mar 29 US President Joe Biden signs the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act into law, making lynching a federal hate crime after over 200 attempts to pass similar legislation since 1900 [1]

• Mar 30 Computer's Turing Award won by American programmer Jack Dongarra, whose work paved the way for supercomputers [1]

• Mar 31 First truly complete sequence of a human genome published by Telomere-to-Telomere (T2T) consortium, after breakthroughs in new technology (previously just over 90% coded) [1]
• Mar 31 US announces it will release 1 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve for six months to drive down prices [1]
• Apr 1 Sri Lanka's President Gotabaya Rajapaksa declares a nationwide public emergency after violent protests amid the country's worst economic crisis since independence [1]
• Apr 2 Ukraine liberates the entire Kyiv region from retreating Russian forces

• Apr 3 Chevron Championship Women's Golf, Mission Hills CC: American Jennifer Kupcho wins her first LPGA tournament by 2 strokes over Jessica Korda

• Apr 3 The Taliban government bans cultivation of opium in Afghanistan, with consequences for world supply as it produces 80% [1]
• Apr 4 Economist Rodrigo Chaves elected President of Costa Rica defeating current president José María Figueres [1]
• Apr 4 Eon Musk buys 9.2% of Twitter stock, making him the company's largest shareholder [1]
• Apr 4 Ukrainian government begins a war crimes investigation after 410 civilians found killed after the withdrawal of Russian forces from around Kyiv [1]
• Apr 5 Shanghai lockdown extended to cover the whole city as COVID-19 cases increase, as China remains one of the last to employ a "zero-Covid" system [1]
• Apr 5 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky urges UN Security Council to act against Russia, accusing Russian military of the worst war crimes since WWII, including execution, rape and torture of civilians [1]
• Apr 6 Hermits Peak fire, New Mexico's largest wildfire starts in Mora County, as a supposedly controlled burn off by US Forest Service, goes onto displace 100 people, burn 341,000 acres, 62 million trees [1]
• Apr 6 Military Tribunal in Ouagadougou convicts former Burkina Faso President Blaise Compaoré in absentia, of the 1987 killing of his predecessor Thomas Sankara [1]
• Apr 6 Scientists claim to have found dinosaur remains killed on the actual day a giant asteroid struck earth 66 million years ago beginning their extinction, at Tanis fossil site, North Dakota [1]
• Apr 7 Ketanji Brown Jackson becomes the first black woman to be confirmed by the US Senate to the Supreme Court in 53-47 vote [1]

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