Today in History: August 22, helicopter crash in Iraq kills 14 US soldiers
Today is Saturday, Aug. 22, the 234th day of 2026. There are 131 days left in the year.
Today in history:
On Aug. 22, 2007, a Black Hawk helicopter crashed in Iraq, killing all 14 U.S. soldiers aboard.
Also on this date:
In 1791, the Haitian Revolution began as enslaved people of Saint-Domingue rose up against French colonizers.
In 1851, the schooner America outraced more than a dozen British vessels off the English coast to win a trophy that came to be known as the America’s Cup.
In 1910, Japan annexed Korea, which remained under Japanese control until the end of World War II.
In 1922, Irish revolutionary Michael Collins was shot to death, apparently by Irish Republican Army members opposed to the Anglo-Irish Treaty that Collins had cosigned.
In 1965, a 14-minute brawl ensued between the San Francisco Giants and the Los Angeles Dodgers after Giants pitcher Juan Marichal struck Dodgers catcher John Roseboro in the head with a baseball bat. (Marichal and Roseboro would later reconcile and become lifelong friends.)
In 1968, Pope Paul VI arrived in Bogota, Colombia, for the start of the first papal visit to South America.
In 1972, John Wojtowicz (WAHT’-uh-witz) and Salvatore Naturile took seven employees hostage at a Chase Manhattan Bank branch in Brooklyn, New York, during a botched robbery; the siege, which ended with Wojtowicz’s arrest and Naturile’s killing by the FBI, inspired the 1975 movie “Dog Day Afternoon.”
In 1989, Black Panthers co-founder Huey P. Newton was shot to death in Oakland, California.
In 1992, on the second day of the Ruby Ridge siege in Idaho, an FBI sharpshooter killed Vicki Weaver, the wife of white separatist Randy Weaver.
In 1996, President Bill Clinton signed welfare reform legislation that ended guaranteed cash payments to the poor and demanded work from recipients.
In 2003, Alabama’s chief justice, Roy Moore, was suspended for his refusal to obey a federal court order to remove his Ten Commandments monument from the rotunda of his courthouse.
In 2016, a bomb attack targeting an outdoor wedding party in Turkey killed at least 30 people and wounded 94 others. The attack came as the country was still reeling from a failed coup attempt weeks earlier.
In 2022, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the United States’ top infectious disease expert who became a household name — and the subject of partisan attacks — during the COVID-19 pandemic, announced he would be leaving the federal government in December after more than five decades of public service.
Today’s Birthdays:
- Author Annie Proulx is 91.
- Baseball Hall of Famer Carl Yastrzemski is 87.
- Pro Football Hall of Fame coach Bill Parcells is 85.
- Writer-producer David Chase is 81.
- International Swimming Hall of Famer Diana Nyad is 77.
- Baseball Hall of Famer Paul Molitor is 70.
- Rock guitarist Vernon Reid is 68.
- Country singer Collin Raye is 66.
- Rock singer Roland Orzabal (Tears For Fears) is 65.
- Singer Tori Amos is 63.
- International Tennis Hall of Famer Mats Wilander (VEE’-luhn-dur) is 62.
- Rapper GZA (JIHZ’-ah)/The Genius is 60.
- Actor Ty Burrell is 59.
- Celebrity chef Giada De Laurentiis is 56.
- Actor Rick Yune is 55.
- Comedian-actor Kristen Wiig is 53.
- Pop singer Dua Lipa is 31.
- Actor Raphael Alejandro is 19.