Events in History
- Apr 1 China announces new laws against fentanyl-related substances to come into effect 1 May
- Apr 1 Major archaeological site announced discovered on a reef in the middle of Lake Titicaca, in Andes, dated 8th and 10th centuries AD from Tiwanaku state
- Apr 1 Methane, a gas usually made by living things, detected on Mars in 2013 by European Space Agency’s Mars Express orbiter reported in "Nature Geoscience"
- Apr 1 Saudi Arabian oil company Saudi Aramco revealed to be world's most profitable company when its earnings released - $111.1 billion in the last year
- Apr 1 US online sales overtake retail sales for the first time, with 11.813% online compared with 11.807% for general merchandise stores
- Apr 2 70 villages evacuated in Khuzesta province, Iran, after at least 45 killed in flooding after unprecedented rainfall
Event of Interest
Apr 2 Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika (82) resigns after 20 years in office after widespread protests over running for another term
- Apr 2 Canada is warming at twice the speed of the rest of the world, according to a federal report, increasing 2.3% in northern Canada
- Apr 2 Lori Lightfoot elected first female African American Mayor of Chicago
- Apr 2 NASA states it wants to send astronauts to Mars by 2033, and land on the Moon again in 2024
- Apr 3 Brunei brings into force new Sharia laws punishing gay sex and adultery with death by stoning, prompting widespread condemnation
Event of Interest
Apr 3 Ex-Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak goes on trial for the 1MDB corruption scandal in Kuala Lumpur, pleads not guilty
- Apr 4 Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel apologises for the kidnapping of thousands of mixed-race children during colonial period in Burundi, DR Congo and Rwanda
- Apr 4 US Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints pledges to roll back anti-LGBT policies, including not baptizing children of gay parents
Event of Interest
Apr 6 Exhibition of 1960s icon Mary Quant opens at London's V&A Museum [1]
- Apr 6 First ever "Marsquake" seismic event on planet Mars detected by NASA's InSight lander
- Apr 7 Rebel force the Libyan National Army under General Khalifa Haftar begins advancing on Tripoli with 21 killed and 27 injured over next few days as they try to take the capital
- Apr 7 Rwanda marks 25 years and the beginning of 100 days of mourning since the genocide that killed 800,000 people
Event of Interest
Apr 7 US President Donald Trump announces Kirstjen Nielsen, Secretary of Homeland Security is leaving her position
- Apr 8 1 in 4 Japanese adults a virgin aged 18-39 according to new research by Tokyo University
- Apr 8 14 tons of black market Pangolin scales from 36,000 animals discovered in Singapore, one of largest ever found worldwide
- Apr 8 600 million birds die each year in the US after striking tall buildings with Chicago the worst city, according to Cornell Lab of Ornithology
Anti Omar al-Bashir Protest
Apr 8 Protests in Sudan against the government of Omar al-Bashir continue with seven killed and 2,500 arrested in Khartoum
- Apr 8 Record 17ft (5.2M) invasive Burmese python pregnant with 73 eggs captured in Florida's Big Cypress National Preserve
- Apr 9 Nine prominent Hong Kong pro-democracy protesters found guilty on public nuisance charges for their part in 2014 "Umbrella Movement"
- Apr 9 Wolves have returned to the Netherlands after 140 years claim ecologists
- Apr 10 China announces move to cull more than 1 million pigs in effort to eliminate African swine fever
- Apr 10 First home delivery service by drone begins in Canberra, Australia by Wing, part of Google's Alphabet company
1st Photo of a Black Hole
Apr 10 First-ever photo of a black hole announced, taken by The Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration in 2017 in galaxy M87, 6.5 billion times the mass of earth, 55 million light-years away
- Apr 10 Four tiny sweat bees removed alive from a woman's eye in world's first operation of its kind at Fooyin University Hospital, Taiwan
- Apr 10 New species of human announced named Homo luzonensis, 3ft tall, remains dated 50-60,000 years old found in cave on island of Luzon, Philippines
- Apr 10 New York declares a public health emergency and compulsory vaccinations after a measles outbreak in Brooklyn with 285 cases
- Apr 11 EU leaders agree to a six-month extension to Brexit after UK parliament fails to reach any consensus
Event of Interest
Apr 11 Ex-Pope Benedict XVI claims Catholic sexual abuse caused in part by 1960s sexual revolution
- Apr 11 First day of voting in Indian general elections, the world's largest democracy with 900 million eligible voters in the world's largest-ever election (till 23rd May)
- Apr 11 Israel's Beresheet spacecraft, the first privately-funded mission to the moon, crashes on the moon
Sudan
Apr 11 Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir overthrown and arrested by the army in Khartoum after 29 years in power
Event of Interest
Apr 11 WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is forcibly removed from the Ecuadorian embassy in London by police and arrested on failure to appear in court on US extradition charges
- Apr 13 Australian super-horse Winx ends extraordinary career with a 3rd Queen Elizabeth Stakes win in Sydney; 33 consecutive race wins, a world record 25 Group One victories and $26.4 million prize money
- Apr 13 Body of 38-year-old Filipino woman discovered in abandoned mine starts the hunt for Cyprus's first serial killer, at least 5 other bodies later discovered
- Apr 13 World's largest plane by wingspan at 117m (385 ft), the Stratolaunch, built as a flying launch pad for satellites, takes its first flight from Mojave, California
- Apr 14 11 tornadoes hit US southern states killing eight in Mississippi, Texas and Louisiana
- Apr 14 Congresswoman Ilhan Omar at center of controversy over comments about 9/11 at speech to Council on American-Islamic Relations after tweet by Donald Trump, defended by Nancy Pelosi
- Apr 14 Seychelles President Danny Faure makes first-ever live speech from a submersible pleading for better marine protection
- Apr 14 South Bend mayor Pete Buttigieg officially announces his presidential campaign in Indiana, first openly gay candidate to run for US president
- Apr 15 Measles cases jump 300% in first three months of 2019, according to World Health Organization, largest rise in Africa (700%) with 800 deaths in Madagascar
Notre Dame on Fire
Apr 15 Paris cathedral Notre Dame catches fire, toppling its spire and destroying its roof
- Apr 17 10 babies with "bubble boy disease" cured using a gene therapy made from HIV at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, according to new study
- Apr 17 Research showing pigs brains partially brought back to life at Yale University, published in "Nature"
- Apr 17 Terror alert closes schools in Denver, Colorado, due to 18 year-old woman obsessed with Columbine massacre, who is then found dead
- Apr 18 Irish Journalist Lyra McKee shot to death covering riots in Derry, Northern Ireland with dissident republican group the New IRA claiming responsibility
Event of Interest
Apr 21 Teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg speaks at a Extinction Rebellion protest in London amid city-wide climate protests where Waterloo Bridge was occupied over four days
- Apr 21 Terror attacks on churches and hotels on Easter Sunday in three Sri Lankan cities, Colombo, Negombo and Batticaloa kill at least 253 and injure hundreds
Election of Interest
Apr 21 Ukrainian comedian Volodymyr Zelensky wins the country's presidential election in a landslide
- Apr 23 At least 54 jade miners buried by a mudslide in Kachin state, Myanmar
- Apr 23 Second of two major earthquakes strikes island of Samar, Philippines, magnitude 6.3, a day after magnitude 6.1 hits Luzon Island killing at least 16 people
- Apr 23 World's first malaria vaccine, giving partial protection to children, begins in Malawi by the WHO
- Apr 25 Cyclone Kenneth strikes Mozambique with winds of 220km/h (140mph) killing at least38 people and damaging nearly 35,000 homes
- Apr 25 Microsoft becomes the third US firm to be listed with a market worth of 1 trillion, after Apple and Amazon
- Apr 25 More than 1,600 civilians were killed in US-led coalition air and land strikes on Raqqa in 2017, according to Amnesty International and monitoring group Airwars
- Apr 25 Thousands march in Khartoum, Sudan calling for civilian rule
- Apr 26 "No religion" tops survey of American religious identity for the first time at 23.1% edging out Catholics 23.0% and evangelicals 22.5%, in long-running General Social Survey
- Apr 26 Six suspected militants connected to Sri Lankan terror attacks killed along with ten others in a shootout with police in Sainthamaruthu
- Apr 26 Waorani people of Pastaza win landmark environmental case against the Ecuadorian government to protect half a million acres of their territory in the Amazon rainforest
Event of Interest
Apr 27 Pope Francis donates $500,000 for migrants stranded in Mexico trying to reach the US
- Apr 27 Shooter opens fire in a synagogue in Poway, California, killing one and injuring three
- Apr 28 Largest demonstrations since 2014 in Hong Kong over plans to change law to send suspects to mainland China for trial
Election of Interest
Apr 28 Spanish general election: no party wins a majority, Socialists under Pedro Sanchez win most with 29%
- Apr 29 Indonesia is plans to relocate its capital from Jakarta due to the city sinking, according to a government minister
- Apr 29 Islamic State releases video showing leader Bakr al-Baghdadi for first time in five years
- Apr 29 Over 300 people declared to have died through overwork in Indonesia's one-day election on April 17th, with over 2,000 fallen sick
- Apr 29 Over 700 people infected with measles in the US, highest number for 25 years
- Apr 30 New type of dementia identified and named limbic-predominant age-related TDP-43 encephalopathy (Late) after misdiagnosed as Alzheimer's disease
Divorces in History
Jeff Bezos
Apr 4 Amazon's Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Bezos agree record-breaking $35 billion divorce settlement
Deaths in History
- Apr 5 Sydney Brenner, South African biologist known for his contributions on the genetic code and molecular biology (Nobel Laureate 2002), dies at 92
- Apr 6 Ernest "Fritz" Hollings, American Democratic Senator from South Carolina (1966-2005) and Governor of South Carolina (1959-63), dies at 97
- Apr 6 Richard Green, American sexologist, lawyer, and author who advocated for gay and transexual rights, dies of oesophageal cancer at 82
- Apr 11 Frances Swem Anderson, American technologist (nuclear medicine), dies at 105
- Apr 15 Owen Kay Garriott, American electrical engineer and NASA astronaut (Skylab 3, STS 9), dies at 88
- Apr 17 Alan García, President of Peru (Peruvian Aprista Party: 1985-90, 2006-11), commits suicide by shooting himself as police try to arrest him on corruption charges at 69
Lorraine Warren (1927-2019)
Apr 18 American paranormal investigator (Amityville haunting), dies in her sleep at 92
- Apr 18 Lyra McKee, Northern Irish journalist, shot by the New IRA in a terrorist attack at 29
- Apr 25 Manuel Lujan Jr., American politician (Rep-R-NM, 1969-89), dies at 90
- Apr 26 David McNee, Scottish law enforcement officer (City of Glasgow/Strathclyde Police Chief Constable, 1971-77; Metropolitan Police Commissioner, 1977-82), dies at 94
Authors
Civil Rights Activists
Inventors
Kings
Revolutionaries
Scientists