2004

2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO).

Events

January

* January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 604 crashes into the Red Sea off the coast of Egypt, killing all 148 aboard, making it one of the deadliest aviation accidents in Egyptian history at the time.
* January 4 – NASA's MER-A (Spirit) spacecraft lands on the surface of Mars.
* January 6 - Construction on the tallest man-made structure to date, the Burj Khalifa begins in Dubai UAE
* January 8 – The RMS ''Queen Mary 2'', at the time the largest ocean liner ever built, is christened by its namesake's granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth II.
* January 25 – NASA's MER-B (Opportunity) spacecraft lands on the surface of Mars.

February

* February 4 – Mark Zuckerberg launches The Facebook, later renamed to Facebook, a social networking website for Harvard University students.
* February 26 – Macedonian president Boris Trajkovski is killed in a plane crash near Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
* February 29 – Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide is overthrown in a coup d'état.

March

* March 2 – A series of bombings occur in Karbala, Iraq, killing over 140 Shia Muslims commemorating the Day of Ashura.
* March 7 – The 2004 Greek legislative election is held to elect all 300 members of the Hellenic Parliament and the New Democracy party, led by Kostas Karamanlis, won 165 out of 300 seats, ending over 11 years of rule by the PASOK party.
* March 11 – Al-Qaeda bombings on Cercanías trains in Madrid, Spain, kill at least 192 people.
* March 14 – The PSOE wins the election in Spain; José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is elected Prime Minister of Spain, replacing José María Aznar.
* March 28 – Hurricane Catarina, the first ever recorded South Atlantic tropical cyclone, makes landfall in Santa Catarina, Brazil.
* March 29 – Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia are admitted to NATO, the largest expansion of the organization.

April

* April 8 – The Humanitarian Ceasefire Agreement is signed by the Sudanese government and two rebel groups, in order to put a pause on the War in Darfur.
* April 17 – Israeli helicopters fire missiles at a convoy of vehicles in the Gaza Strip, killing Hamas leader Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi.
* April 24 – Referendums on the Annan Plan for Cyprus, which proposes to reunite the island, take place in both the Greek-controlled and the Turkish-controlled parts. Although the Turkish Cypriots vote in favour, the Greek Cypriots reject the proposal.

May

* May 1 – The European Union expands by 10 new member states: Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia.
* May 12– 15 – The Eurovision Song Contest 2004 takes place in Istanbul, Turkey, and is won by Ukrainian entrant Ruslana with the song " Wild Dances".

June

* June 1 – A United Nations peacekeeping mission in Haiti begins, the United Nations Stabilisation Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH).
* June 4 – Marvin Heemeyer Destroyed 13 Buildings With the Killdozer, In Granby, Colorado. The Cause Of damage was estimated around $7 million dollars.
* June 8 – 2004 transit of Venus.
* June 12–July 4 – Portugal hosts the UEFA Euro 2004 football tournament, which is won by Greece.
* June 21 – In Mojave, California, United States, SpaceShipOne becomes the first privately funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight.
* June 28 – The U.S.-led coalition occupying Iraq, the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), transfers sovereignty to the Iraqi Interim Government.
* June 30 – Preliminary hearings begin in Iraq in the trial of president Saddam Hussein, for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

July

* July 1 – The unpiloted '' Cassini–Huygens'' spacecraft arrives at Saturn.
* July 11 – The Russian Federation stops recognizing Soviet Union passports as legal identification.

August

* August 1 – A fire in the "Ycua Bolaños-Botánico" supermarket in Asunción, Paraguay kills around 400 people.
* August 3 – NASA's unpiloted '' MESSENGER'' spacecraft is launched, with its primary mission being the study of Mercury.
*August 12 – Lee Hsien Loong is sworn in as the third Prime Minister of Singapore.
* August 13– 29 – The 2004 Summer Olympics are held in Athens, Greece.
* August 22 – Armed robbers steal Edvard Munch's ''The Scream'', '' Madonna'', and other paintings from the Munch Museum in Oslo, Norway.
* August 24 – After departing Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow, Volga-AviaExpress Flight 1303, a Tupolev Tu-134, explodes over Russia's Tula Oblast and crashes, killing all 43 people on board; minutes later, Siberia Airlines Flight 1047, a Tupolev Tu-154 departing the same airport, explodes over Rostov Oblast and crashes, killing all 46 on board. The Government of Russia declares the explosions to have been caused by female Chechen suicide bombers.
* August 29 – Michael Schumacher won his 7th and last World Championship with Scuderia Ferrari in F1

September

* September 1 – Beslan school siege: Chechen rebels take 1,128 people, mostly children, hostage at a school in Beslan, Russia. The crisis ends when Russian security forces storm the building, resulting in more than 330 people being killed.
* September 9 – A car bomb of the Jemaah Islamiyah explodes at the Australian embassy in Jakarta, Indonesia, killing 9 people.
* September – At Mazara del Vallo in Sicily, 3-year-old Denise Pipitone is declared missing; the case is reopened in 2021.

October

* October 8 – Suicide bombers detonate two bombs at the Red Sea resort of Taba, Egypt, killing 34 people and injuring 171, mostly Israeli tourists.
* October 9 – 2004 Australian federal election: John Howard's Liberal/ National Coalition Government is re-elected with an increased majority, defeating the Labor Party led by Mark Latham.
* October 19 – A team of explorers reach the bottom of Krubera Cave, the world's deepest cave, with a depth of 2,080 meters (6,824 feet).
* October 20 – Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is sworn in as the 6th President of Indonesia, becoming the first directly elected president in Indonesia.
* October 27 – The Boston Red Sox win the World Series for the sixth time after completing a sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals. It was their first championship since 1918.
* October 29 – European heads of state sign in Rome the Treaty and Final Act, establishing the first European Constitution.

November

* November 2 – 2004 United States presidential election: George W. Bush is re-elected President of the United States, defeating his Democratic challenger John Kerry.
* November 5 – The Incredibles is released in the US.
* November 13 – The European Space Agency probe SMART-1 arrives at the Moon, becoming the first European satellite to fly to the Moon and orbit it.
* November 16 – NASA's hypersonic ''Scramjet'' breaks a record by reaching a velocity of about 7,000 mph ( Mach 9.6) in an unpiloted experimental flight.
* November 22 – The Orange Revolution begins, following a disputed presidential election in Ukraine where Viktor Yanukovych won against Viktor Yushchenko amid accusations of electoral fraud. A revote results in Yushchenko being declared the winner.

December

* December 8 – Former Pantera guitarist Dimebag Darrell is murdered on stage, at the Alrosa Villa, in Columbus, Ohio.
* December 14 – The world's tallest bridge, the Millau Viaduct over the Tarn in the Massif Central mountains, France, is officially opened.
* December 21 – Iraqi insurgents attack a U.S. military base in the city of Mosul, killing 22 people.
* December 26 – The 9.1–9.3 Indian Ocean earthquake shakes northern Sumatra with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (''Violent''). One of the largest observed tsunamis follows, affecting coastal areas of Thailand, India, Sri Lanka, Somalia, the Maldives, Malaysia, Myanmar, Bangladesh, and Indonesia, killing over 200,000 people.
* December 27 – Astrophysicists from the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching near Munich measure the strongest burst from a magnetar. At 21:30:26 UT Earth is hit by a huge wave front of gamma and X-rays. It is the strongest flux of high-energetic gamma radiation measured so far.
* December 30 – A fire in the República Cromañón nightclub in Buenos Aires, Argentina kills 194.
* December 31 – Taipei 101, at the time the tallest skyscraper in the world, standing at a height of , officially opens.

Date unknown

* Metrocable (Medellín) Line K opens, the first modern urban transit cable car.
* The term Semantic social networks is coined independently by Stephen Downes and Marco Neumann.

Births

* January 4 — Peyton Kennedy, Canadian actress
* January 6 — Roméo Lavia, Belgian footballer
* January 7 – Sofia Wylie, American actress and dancer
* January 15 – Grace VanderWaal, American singer-songwriter
* January 19 — Mohamed Ali Cho, French-English footballer
* January 21 – Princess Ingrid Alexandra of Norway
* January 28 – Shafali Verma, Indian woman cricketer
* February 19 – Millie Bobby Brown, English actress and producer
* March 13 – Coco Gauff, American tennis player
* March 28 – Anna Shcherbakova, Russian figure skater
* April 9 – TommyInnit, English YouTuber and Twitch streamer
* May 1 – Charli D'Amelio, American dancer and social media personality
* May 15 — Gabriel Slonina, American-Polish soccer player
* May 22 — Peyton Elizabeth Lee, American actress
* June 4 — Mackenzie Ziegler, American singer, dancer and actress
* August 5 — Gavi, Spanish footballer
* October 3 – Noah Schnapp, Canadian- American actor
* October 6 – Bronny James, American basketball player
* October 10 – Zain Al Rafeea, Syrian-born actor
* October 12 – Darci Lynne, American ventriloquist
* November 20 — Youssoufa Moukoko, German footballer

Deaths

January

* January 4 – Joan Aiken, English writer (b. 1924)
* January 5 – Charles Dumas, American Olympic high jumper (b. 1937)
* January 6 – Pierre Charles, 5th Prime Minister of Dominica (b. 1954)
* January 7 – Ingrid Thulin, Swedish actress (b. 1926)
* January 9 – Norberto Bobbio, Italian philosopher (b. 1909)
* January 13 – Harold Shipman, British serial killer (b. 1946)
* January 14 – Uta Hagen, American actress (b. 1919)
* January 16 – Kalevi Sorsa, Finnish politician, 34th Prime Minister of Finland (b. 1930)
* January 17 – Czesław Niemen, Polish singer-songwriter (b. 1939)
*January 18 – Galina Korchuganova, Russian-born Soviet test pilot and aerobatics champion (b. 1935)
* January 22 – Ann Miller, American dancer and actress (b. 1923)
* January 23 – Helmut Newton, German-Australian photographer (b. 1920)
* January 24 – Leônidas, Brazilian footballer (b. 1913)
* January 25
** Fanny Blankers-Koen, Dutch athlete (b. 1918)
** Miklós Fehér, Hungarian footballer (b. 1979)
* January 30 – Suraiya, Indian actress and playback singer (b. 1929)

February

* February 8 – Cem Karaca, Turkish rock musician (b. 1945)
* February 11 – Shirley Strickland, Australian Olympic athlete (b. 1925)
* February 14 – Marco Pantani, Italian cyclist (b. 1970)
* February 17 – José López Portillo, 51st President of Mexico (b. 1920)
* February 21 – John Charles, Welsh footballer (b. 1931)
* February 24 – John Randolph, American actor (b. 1915)
* February 26 – Boris Trajkovski, 2nd president of the Republic of Macedonia (b. 1956)
* February 27 – Paul Sweezy, American economist and editor (b. 1910)
* February 28 – Daniel J. Boorstin, American historian and Librarian of Congress (b. 1914)
* February 29 – Harold Bernard St. John, 3rd Prime Minister of Barbados (b. 1931)

March

* March 2 – Mercedes McCambridge, American actress (b. 1916)
* March 4 – Claude Nougaro, French singer (b. 1929)
* March 5 – Carlos Julio Arosemena Monroy, 31st President of Ecuador (b. 1919)
* March 7 – Paul Winfield, American actor (b. 1939)
* March 8 – Muhammad Zaidan (Abu Abbas), founder of the Palestine Liberation Front (b. 1948)
* March 15 – John Pople, English chemist and Nobel laureate (b. 1925)
* March 18 – Abdujalil Samadov, 4th Prime Minister of Tajikistan (b. 1949)
* March 20 – Juliana, Queen regnant of the Netherlands (b. 1909)
* March 22 – Ahmed Yassin, Palestinian co-founder of Hamas (b. 1937)
* March 26 – Jan Sterling, American actress (b. 1921)
* March 29 – Peter Ustinov, English actor and director (b. 1921)
* March 30 – Alistair Cooke

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