Events in History
- Oct 1 A gunman kills 8 students and a teacher at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon
- Oct 1 Cargo ship El Faro goes missing with 33 crew during Hurricane Joaquin near the Bahamas
- Oct 1 Mudslide on the outskirts of Guatemala City leaves at least 131 dead and 300 missing
- Oct 3 Flash floods on the French Riviera kill at least 19 people
- Oct 3 US airstrike hits Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, killing around 19
- Oct 5 Floods in South Carolina a "1,000-year storm" result in 12 deaths and 9 dams to fail
Event of Interest
Oct 5 Governor of California Jerry Brown signs a bill giving terminally ill patients the "right to die"
- Oct 5 Nobel prize for Medicine awarded to William C. Campbell, Satoshi Ōmura (Roundworm) and Youyou Tu (Malaria)
- Oct 5 Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement announced by trade ministers of 12 countries in Atlanta
- Oct 6 Nobel prize for Physics awarded to Takaaki Kajita (Japan) and Arthur McDonald (Canada) for work on neutrinos
- Oct 7 Nobel prize in Chemistry awarded to Tomas Lindahl (Sweden), Paul Modrich (US) and Aziz Sancar (Turkey) for work on cells DNA repair
Event of Interest
Oct 7 US President Barack Obama apologises to Doctors without Borders President and the President of Afghanistan for the bombing of a hospital in Kunduz
- Oct 8 Nobel prize for Literature awarded to Belarusian journalist and author Svetlana Alexievich
- Oct 9 The Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
- Oct 10 Bombing at a peace rally in Ankara, Turkey kills at least 95, injures 200
- Oct 11 Nepal's parliament elects Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli, leader of the Nepal-Unified Marxist Leninist party, as Prime Minister
- Oct 13 Marlon James is the first Jamaican writer to win the Man Booker Prize for his novel "A Brief History of Seven Killings"
Election of Interest
Oct 19 Canadian federal elections: Justin Trudeau's Liberal Party win a majority with 184 seats
- Oct 19 US scientists from University of California find evidence life on earth may have begun 4.1 billion years ago, 300 million earlier than previously thought
- Oct 20 Migrants arriving in Greece top 500,00 for the year, according to the UN
Event of Interest
Oct 21 German Chancellor Angela Merkel says German view of Holocaust will not change, after Benjamin Netanyahu says idea came from Mufti of Jerusalem
- Oct 24 Even results in Argentine Presidential Election between Daniel Scioli and Mauricio Macrieven trigger 1st ever Presidential run off 22 Nov
- Oct 26 7.5 magnitude earthquake hits northern Pakistan and Afghanistan killing over 300
- Oct 26 World Health Organization classifies processed meat as carcinogenic
- Oct 28 Research indicating Plague dates back to the Bronze age in skeletons 5,783 years old, published by University of Copenhagen team in "Cell"
- Oct 28 World Heath Organization ranks Tuberculosis alongside HIV as world's deadliest infectious diseases, killing 1.2 million (2014)
- Oct 29 China announces the end of their one-child policy after 35 years
- Oct 29 Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) is elected Speaker of the US House of Representatives, succeeding John Boehner (R-Ohio)
- Oct 31 Russian airliner crashes killing all 224 on board in Sinai Peninsula, Egypt - Russia's worst air disaster
Deaths in History
- Oct 1 Don Edwards, American politician and civil rights champion (Rep-D-CA, 1963-94), dies at 100
- Oct 2 Brian Friel, Irish dramatist "Irish Chekhov" (Dancing at Lughnasa), dies at 86
- Oct 3 Denis Healey, English politician (Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer), dies at 98
- Oct 5 Henning Mankell, Swedish playwright and author (Wallander novels), dies of cancer at 67
- Oct 6 Árpád Göncz, Hungarian politician, 1st post-communist President (1990-2000), dies at 93
- Oct 7 Gail Zappa (née Sloatman), American business secretary and wife of musician and composer Frank Zappa, dies of lung cancer at 70
- Oct 8 Paul Prudhomme, American cajun chef (K-Paul), dies at 75
- Oct 9 Geoffrey Howe, British politician (Chancellor and Foreign Secretary under Thatcher), dies at 88
- Oct 9 Richard F. Heck, American chemist who discovered the Heck Reaction (Nobel Prize 2010), dies at 84
- Oct 10 Hilla Becher (née Wobeser), German artist, worked collaboratively with husband Bernd Becher, dies at 81
- Oct 12 George Mueller, NASA Systems Engineer (managed 1969 Moon landing), dies at 97
- Oct 13 Michael Walsh, British Army officer (Operation Musketeer), dies at 88
- Oct 14 Mathieu Kérékou, Dictator and President of Benin (1973-91, 1996-2006), dies at 82
- Oct 25 Lisa Jardine, British historian and writer, dies of cancer at 71
- Oct 29 Murphy Anderson, American comic artist (DC Comics), dies at 89
- Oct 31 Gus Savage, American politician (Rep-D-IL, 1981- 93), dies at 90
Authors
Civil Rights Activists
Inventors
Kings
Revolutionaries
Scientists