Wikipedia:Main Page history/2017 December 6

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From today's featured article

The Halifax Explosion was a maritime disaster in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, on the morning of 6 December 1917. SS Mont-Blanc, a French cargo ship laden with high explosives bound for Bordeaux, France, collided with the Norwegian vessel SS Imo in the Narrows, at the north-west tip of Halifax Harbour. When a fire on board the French ship ignited her cargo, around 2,000 people were killed by the blast, debris, fires and collapsed buildings, and an estimated 9,000 others were injured. Nearly all structures within an 800-metre (half-mile) radius, including the entire community of Richmond, were obliterated. A pressure wave snapped trees, bent iron rails, demolished buildings, grounded vessels, and scattered fragments of Mont-Blanc for kilometres. A tsunami created by the blast wiped out the community of Mi'kmaq First Nations people who had lived in the Tufts Cove area for generations. The blast was the largest man-made explosion prior to the development of nuclear weapons, releasing the equivalent energy of roughly 2.9 kilotons of TNT (12,000 GJ). There are several memorials to the victims of the explosion in the North End of Halifax. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Paul Bonhomme, competing in 2007

... that the British aerobatics pilot Paul Bonhomme (pictured) has won the Red Bull Air Race World Championship a record three times?
... that Alice Ouédraogo runs the International Labour Organization's HIV/AIDS programme?
... that the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad built the Bergen Tunnels due to congestion in the competing Erie Railroad's tunnels?
... that early Canadian broadcaster Claire Wallace was known for her reporting stunts, including climbing a Mexican volcano and joining a deep-sea diving expedition?
... that two similarly named Burmese chronicles, Mon Yazawin and Mon Yazawin by Shwe Naw, are about the Mon-speaking kingdom of Hanthawaddy?
... that Vi Lyles is the first African-American woman to be Mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina?
... that Universal Paperclips is an incremental game where the goal is to convert the entire universe into paperclips?
... that Harold Strachan has painted pictures, written books, made bombs, served two prison sentences, and completed an ultramarathon?

In the news

Cyclone Ockhi

The International Olympic Committee bans Russia from competing at the 2018 Winter Olympics, following investigation into doping at the 2014 Games.
Cyclone Ockhi (satellite image pictured) strikes India and Sri Lanka, killing at least 39 people and leaving hundreds of others missing.
Former President of Yemen Ali Abdullah Saleh is killed amidst the ongoing conflict in Sana'a.
Former Bosnian Croat army general Slobodan Praljak dies from intentionally drinking poison after the ICTY upholds his conviction for war crimes.
In sumo, yokozuna Harumafuji Kōhei retires amidst investigations into an assault on fellow wrestler Takanoiwa Yoshimori.

On this day...

December 6: Mawlid (Shia Islam, 2017); Independence Day in Finland (1917)

Vanguard rocket explosion

1060 – Béla I the Champion was crowned King of Hungary.
1917 – World War I: USS Jacob Jones became the first American destroyer to be sunk by enemy action when it was torpedoed by German submarine SM U-53.
1941 – The British Secret Intelligence Service established a facility known as "Camp X" in Ontario, Canada, to train covert agents in clandestine operations.
1957 – The first U.S. attempt to launch a satellite failed with an explosion (pictured) on the launch pad at Cape Canaveral.
1992 – The Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, India, was destroyed by Hindu Kar Sevaks, who believed that it was built on the birthplace of Rama.

Jan van Scorel (d. 1562) · William Arnott (b. 1827) · Mary Margaret O'Reilly (d. 1949)

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Today's featured picture

One of the first issue of coins for the Japanese yen. This coin was introduced in 1870 as part of the Meiji government's modernization program, replacing the Tokugawa coinage with silver 5-, 10-, 20- and 50-sen and 1-yen pieces, as well as gold 2-, 5-, 10- and 20-yen pieces. The 20 gold yen contained (on average) 33.33 grams of gold (0.9000 fine) and weighed 0.9645 ounces.

Coin: Empire of Japan (image courtesy of the National Numismatic Collection, National Museum of American History)

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