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This day in history

This day in history: 26 November

Events, births and deaths on this date, ordered by how many people look them up.

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Born on this day · Died on this day259 · 111

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Key facts

423 historical events, births and deaths are listed for 26 November.
Entries come from Wikipedia’s day pages and are ordered by page views.
2025: The Wang Fuk Court fire, a catastrophic fire in Tai Po, Hong Kong, leaves at least 168 dead and 79 injured.

Holidays and observances

Christian feast days: Alypius the Stylite

Christian feast days: Basolus (Basle)

Christian feast days: Bellinus of Padua

Christian feast days: Blessed Gaetana Sterni

Christian feast days: Conrad of Constance

Christian feast days: Ethelwine of Athelney

Christian feast days: Isaac Watts (Episcopal Church (USA))

Christian feast days: John Berchmans

Christian feast days: November 26 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)

Christian feast days: Pope Siricius

Christian feast days: Sylvester Gozzolini

Constitution Day (Abkhazia, Georgia)

Events

2025The Wang Fuk Court fire, a catastrophic fire in Tai Po, Hong Kong, leaves at least 168 dead and 79 injured.

2021COVID-19 pandemic: The World Health Organization identifies the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant.

2019A magnitude 6.4 earthquake strikes western Albania leaving at least 52 people dead and over 1,000 injured. This was the world's deadliest earthquake of 2019, and the deadliest to strike the country in 99 years.

2018The robotic probe Insight lands on Elysium Planitia, Mars.

2011NATO attack in Pakistan: NATO forces in Afghanistan attack a Pakistani check post in a friendly fire incident, killing 24 soldiers and wounding 13 others.

2011The Mars Science Laboratory launches to Mars with the Curiosity Rover.

2008Mumbai attacks, a series of coordinated terrorist attacks took place in Mumbai killing 166 citizens by 10 terrorists of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan based extremist Islamist terrorist organisation.

2008The ocean liner Queen Elizabeth 2, now out of service, docks in Dubai.

2004Ruzhou School massacre: A man stabs and kills eight people and seriously wounds another four in a school dormitory in Ruzhou, China.

2004The last Poʻouli (Black-faced honeycreeper) dies of avian malaria in the Maui Bird Conservation Center in Olinda, Hawaii, before it could breed, making the species in all probability extinct.

2003The Concorde makes its final flight, over Bristol, England.

2000George W. Bush is certified the winner of Florida's electoral votes by Katherine Harris, going on to win the United States presidential election, despite losing in the national popular vote.

1999The 7.5 Mw Ambrym earthquake shakes Vanuatu and a destructive tsunami follows. Ten people were killed and forty were injured.

1998The Khanna rail disaster takes 212 lives in Khanna, Ludhiana, India.

1998Tony Blair becomes the first Prime Minister of the United Kingdom to address the Oireachtas, the parliament of the Republic of Ireland.

1991National Assembly of Azerbaijan abolishes the autonomous status of Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast of Azerbaijan and renames several cities with Azeri names.

1986Iran–Contra affair: U.S. President Ronald Reagan announces the members of what will become known as the Tower Commission.

1986The trial of John Demjanjuk, accused of committing war crimes as a guard at the Nazi Treblinka extermination camp, starts in Jerusalem.

1983Brink's-Mat robbery: In London, 6,800 gold bars worth nearly £26 million are stolen from the Brink's-Mat vault at Heathrow Airport.

1979Pakistan International Airlines Flight 740 crashes near Taif in Mecca Province, Saudi Arabia, killing all 156 people on board.

1977An unidentified hijacker named Vrillon, claiming to be the representative of the "Ashtar Galactic Command", takes over Britain's Southern Television for six minutes, starting at 5:12 pm.

1970In Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, 38 millimetres (1.5 in) of rain fall in a minute, the heaviest rainfall ever recorded.

1968Vietnam War: United States Air Force helicopter pilot James P. Fleming rescues an Army Special Forces unit pinned down by Viet Cong fire. He is later awarded the Medal of Honor.

1965France launches Astérix, becoming the third nation to put an object in orbit using its own booster.

1950Korean War: Communist Chinese troops launch a massive counterattack (Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River and Battle of Chosin Reservoir) against United Nations and South Korean forces.

1949The Constituent Assembly of India adopts the constitution presented by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar.

1944World War II: A German V-2 rocket hits a Woolworth's shop in New Cross, London, killing 168 people.

1944World War II: Germany begins V-1 and V-2 attacks on Antwerp, Belgium.

1943World War II: HMT Rohna is sunk by the Luftwaffe in an air attack in the Mediterranean north of Béjaïa, Algeria.

1942A riot involving infantrymen, military police, and local law enforcement officers occurs in Phoenix, Arizona, United States, leading to three deaths.

1942Casablanca, the movie starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, premieres in New York City.

1942World War II: Yugoslav Partisans convene the first meeting of the Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia at Bihać in northwestern Bosnia.

1941World War II: The Hull note is given to the Japanese ambassador, demanding that Japan withdraw from China and French Indochina, in return for which the United States would lift economic sanctions. On the same day, Japan's 1st Air Fleet depa

1939Shelling of Mainila: The Soviet Army orchestrates an incident which is used to justify the start of the Winter War with Finland four days later.

1924The Mongolian People's Republic is officially established after a new constitution, passed by the first State Great Khural, abolishes the monarchy.

1922Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon become the first people to enter the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun in over 3,000 years.

1922The Toll of the Sea debuts as the first general release film to use two-tone Technicolor. (The Gulf Between was the first film to do so, but it was not widely distributed.)

1920Ukrainian War of Independence: The Red Army launches a surprise attack against the Makhnovshchina.

1918The Montenegrin Podgorica Assembly votes for a "union of the people", declaring assimilation into the Kingdom of Serbia.

1917The Manchester Guardian publishes the 1916 secret Sykes-Picot Agreement between the United Kingdom and France.

Born on this day

2001Pau Víctor, Spanish footballer

2000Lamecha Girma, Ethiopian athlete

1999Jacob Shaffelburg, Canadian soccer player

1999Jaycee Horn, American football player

1999Jung Wooyoung, South Korean singer and dancer

1999Olivia O'Brien, American singer-songwriter

1998Shivam Mavi, Indian cricketer

1997Aaron Wan-Bissaka, English-Congolese footballer

1997Aubrey Joseph, American actor

1997Jennie Wåhlin, Swedish curler

1996Brandon Carlo, American ice hockey player

1996Louane, French singer and actress

1996Malik Beasley, American basketball player

1996Marc Roca, Spanish footballer

1995James Guy, English swimmer

1992Anuel AA, Puerto Rican rapper and singer

1991Corey Knebel, American baseball player

1991Manolo Gabbiadini, Italian footballer

1990Avery Bradley, American basketball player

1990Chip, English rapper

1990Danny Welbeck, English footballer

1990Gabriel Paulista, Brazilian footballer

1990Rita Ora, Kosovan-English singer-songwriter and actress

1989Angeline Quinto, Filipina singer and actress

1989Junior Stanislas, English footballer

1988Blake Harnage, American singer-songwriter and guitarist

1988Yumi Kobayashi, Japanese model and actress

1987Georgios Tzavellas, Greek footballer

1987Kat DeLuna, American singer, songwriter and dancer

1986Alberto Sgarbi, Italian rugby player

1986Bauke Mollema, Dutch cyclist

1986Konstadinos Filippidis, Greek pole vaulter

1985Matt Carpenter, American baseball player

1984Antonio Puerta, Spanish footballer (died 2007)

1983Chris Hughes, American publisher and businessman, co-founded Facebook

1983Emiri Katō, Japanese voice actress and singer

1983Matt Garza, American baseball player

1982Keith Ballard, American ice hockey player

1982Luther Head, American basketball player

1981Gina Kingsbury, Canadian ice hockey player

Died on this day

2024Jim Abrahams, American film director and writer (born 1944)

2022Vikram Gokhale, Indian actor and director (born 1945)

2021Stephen Sondheim, American composer and lyricist (born 1930)

2018Stephen Hillenburg, American animator, voice actor, and marine science educator (born 1961)

2016Fritz Weaver, American actor (born 1926)

2015Amir Aczel, Israeli-American mathematician, historian, and academic (born 1950)

2015Guy Lewis, American basketball player and coach (born 1922)

2014Gilles Tremblay, Canadian ice hockey player and sportscaster (born 1938)

2014Mary Hinkson, American dancer and choreographer (born 1925)

2014Peter Underwood, English parapsychologist and author (born 1932)

2013Arik Einstein, Israeli singer-songwriter (born 1939)

2013Jane Kean, American actress and singer (born 1923)

2013Saul Leiter, American photographer and painter (born 1923)

2013Tony Musante, American actor and screenwriter (born 1936)

2012Celso Advento Castillo, Filipino actor, director, and screenwriter (born 1943)

2012Joseph Murray, American surgeon and soldier, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1919)

2012M. C. Nambudiripad, Indian author and translator (born 1919)

2012Peter Marsh, Australian table tennis player (born 1948)

2011Manon Cleary, American painter and academic (born 1942)

2010Leroy Drumm, American songwriter (born 1936)

2007Herb McKenley, Jamaican sprinter (born 1922)

2007Mel Tolkin, Russian-Canadian screenwriter and producer (born 1913)

2007Silvestre S. Herrera, Mexican-American sergeant, Medal of Honor recipient (born 1917)

2006Dave Cockrum, American author and illustrator (born 1943)

2006Isaac Gálvez, Spanish cyclist (born 1975)

2006Mário Cesariny de Vasconcelos, Portuguese painter and poet (born 1923)

2006Raúl Velasco, Mexican television host and producer (born 1933)

2005Mark Craney, American drummer (born 1952)

2005Stan Berenstain, American author and illustrator, co-created the Berenstain Bears (born 1923)

2005Takanori Arisawa, Japanese composer and conductor (born 1951)

Quote of the day

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.”

Will Durant, on Aristotle

Questions people ask

Where do the entries come from?

From Wikipedia’s on-this-day pages for this language, updated once a day and ordered by how often each article is read.

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