What happend on 17th August

16.08
18.08
1978

Double Eagle II becomes first balloon to cross the Atlantic Ocean when it lands in Miserey near Paris, 137 hours after leaving Presque Isle, Maine.

1970

Venera program: Venera 7 is launched. It will later becomes the first spacecraft to successfully transmit data from the surface of another planet, Venus.

1969

Category 5 Hurricane Camille hits the Mississippi coast, killing 248 people and causing $1.5 billion in damage.

1963

A ferry linking remote islands off the coast of Okinawa sinks, killing 112.

1962

East German border guards kill 18-year-old Peter Fechter as he attempts to cross the Berlin Wall into West Berlin. He thus became the first victim of the wall.

1960

Gabon gains independence from France.

1953

Addiction: First meeting of Narcotics Anonymous in Southern California.

1945

Indonesia proclaims itself independent from the Netherlands.

1943

World War II: The US 7th Army under General George S. Patton arrive in Messina, Italy, followed several hours later by the British 8th Army under Field Marshal Bernard L. Montgomery, thus completing the Allied conquest of Sicily.

1918

Bolshevik revolutionary leader Moisei Uritsky is assassinated.