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Highway tunnel in Seattle opens to traffic

The Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement tunnel, also known as the SR 99 Tunnel, is a bored highway tunnel in the city of Seattle, Washington, United States. The 2-mile, double-decker tunnel carries a section of State Route 99 under Downtown Seattle from SoDo in the south to South Lake Union in the north. The first full day of tunnel operations saw lower traffic volumes, with only 22,145 vehicle trips, due to an ongoing snowstorm, as well as confusion at the left-side exits.

The 150th episode of 'Arrow' airs on CW

The 7th season is the first not to feature original cast members Willa Holland and Paul Blackthorne, who play Thea Queen/Speedy and Quentin Lance, respectively, as series regulars following both actors' departures during the previous season. They did, however, reprise their roles for the series' 150th episode.

Death of Tim Piazza

Timothy John Piazza died as the result of having two days earlier at the Beta Theta Pi fraternity at Pennsylvania State University at University Park, Pennsylvania. The incident led to the closure of the fraternity's chapter at the university and at least 26 members of the fraternity face charges, including involuntary manslaughter.

Computer beats four of the world’s top poker players

Libratus is an artificial intelligence computer program designed to play Poker. Libratus broke through the $1,000,000 barrier for the first time. At the end of the day, it was ahead $1,194,402 in chips against the human team. At the end of the competition, Libratus was ahead $1,766,250 in chips and thus won resoundingly.

Series of avalanches in Afghanistan kill more than 100 people

The Afghanistan avalanches were a series of avalanches that struck villages on the Afghanistan–Pakistan border. More than 100 people reportedly died in the disaster, including more than 50 people in Nuristan Province and at least 19 people in the neighboring Badakhshan area of Pakistan's Chitral region. Dozens of homes and farms were destroyed, and hundreds of animals died due to the avalanches.

Migos feat. Lil Uzi Vert are at #1 on the US singles chart

Migos, an American hip-hop group from Georgia, managed to reach No. 1 on the US Singles chart with the lead single of their 2nd studio album 'Culture'. Even before peaking at the top of the charts, the song became an internet phenomenon, which helped its commercial performance, eventually causing it to spike up on the charts.

The world premiere of 'A Bronx Tale'

A Bronx Tale is a musical based on the play by the same name with a book by Chazz Palminteri, music by Alan Menken, and lyrics by Glenn Slater. After a ten-year development process, the original one-man show was adapted into a new musical and premiered at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, New Jersey before opening on Broadway December later that year.

Van Morrison describes becoming a Sir as "amazing" and "exhilarating"

Van Morrison has described becoming a Sir as amazing and exhilarating after receiving a knighthood from the Prince of Wales at Buckingham Palace. The artist was introduced as Sir Ivan Morrison as he stepped forward to be dubbed a knight. He received the honor for services to the music industry and tourism in Northern Ireland.

Williams admits lying about being aboard a helicopter shot down in Iraq in 2003

Brian Williams apologized for and recanted his disproven Iraq War story that he had told on a Nightly News broadcast. He claimed that a military helicopter he was traveling in had been "forced down after being hit by an RPG." Soon after it aired, Williams' story was criticized by Lance Reynolds, a flight engineer on board one of the three Chinook helicopters that had been attacked.

TransAsia Airways Flight 235 crashes

TransAsia Airways Flight 235 was a domestic flight that crashed into the Keelung River shortly after takeoff from Taipei Songshan Airport, 5.4 km to the west of Songshan in Taiwan. The TransAsia Airways flight, operated with a ten-month-old ATR 72-600 aircraft, was flying from Taipei to Kinmen, a Taiwanese island off the coast of mainland Fujian, with 53 passengers and five crew on board. There were 15 survivors.

Satya Nadella emerges as new Microsoft boss

Nadella was announced as the new CEO of Microsoft, the third chief executive in the company's history. Nadella changed the company’s direction after becoming CEO. His tenure has emphasized openness to working with companies and technologies with which Microsoft also competes, including Apple Inc., Salesforce, IBM, and Dropbox.

Bus crashes near Yucaipa, California

8 people dead and 30 injured in an accident on a narrow road near Yucaipa, California. A bus collided with other cars and flipped over. The 55-year-old bus driver was found guilty and sentenced to 15 years.

Singer Reg Presley dies

Presley was hospitalized with what was suspected to be a stroke. He was also suffering from pneumonia and fluid around the heart. The following month, Presley announced he had been diagnosed with lung cancer and therefore decided to retire from the music industry. Just over a year later Presley died from this cancer and, according to Altham, "a succession of recent strokes." Presley was cremated at Basingstoke Crematorium, Hampshire.

Adele is at #1 on the US singles chart with 'Set Fire To The Rain'

Several months after Adele released 'Set Fire to the Rain', the power ballad finally peaked at top of the Billboard Hot 100. Written by her, alongside her producer Fraser T. Smith, it was released as a single from her second studio album 21. It also peaked at No. 1 in Belgium, Poland, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia.

Old Spice debuts 'The Man Your Man Could Smell Like' TV ad

Smell like a Man, Man is a television advertising campaign in the United States created by ad agency Wieden+Kennedy for Old Spice. The campaign is also commonly referred to as The Man Your Man Could Smell Like, being the title of the campaign's initial 30-second commercial.

The Facebook website is launched

Zuckerberg launched "TheFacebook", originally located at thefacebook.com. Membership was initially restricted to students of Harvard College; within the first month, more than half the undergraduates at Harvard were registered on the service.

Courtney Love is arrested at Heathrow Airport

Courtney Love was arrested after an alleged incident of air rage during the flight. She was accused of abusing the crew with offensive language and refusing to remain in her seat after the crew refused to allow her nurse into the 1st class section. The incident led to her being banned from Virgin Airlines.

ABBA billion dollar offer

Several years after the band was considered dissolved, the members were offered a billion dollars to reunite for a comeback tour. However, not even this was able to persuade them, as they turned down the offer, one member saying in an interview that "no amount of money would change our minds."

Afghanistan earthquake

The Afghanistan earthquake occurred at 19:03 local time near the Afghanistan-Tajikistan border. The strike-slip shock had a moment magnitude of 5.9 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of VII. With several thousand dead and hundreds injured, the event's effects were considered extreme.

1997

Mario Lemieux is 7th NHL player to score 600 goals

Lemieux, playing against the Vancouver Canucks, scored his 600th career goal in his 719th game, and went on to put up his tenth career 100-point season, both the second-most in history after Wayne Gretzky's 600 goals in 718 games and fifteen 100-point seasons.

Liberace dies at 67

Władziu Valentino Liberace was an American pianist, singer, and actor. At the height of his fame, Liberace was the highest-paid entertainer in the world, He was secretly diagnosed HIV positive in August by his private physician in Las Vegas, 18 months before his death. Liberace died of cytomegalovirus pneumonia as a result of AIDS.

Karen Carpenter dies at age 32

Carpenter died rather early after collapsing in her bedroom, at her parent's house because of heart failure which was caused by complications were related to her eating disorder anorexia nervosa. It was little known at the time, but her death led to increased awareness of eating disorders.

The Bee Gees are at #1 on the US singles chart with 'Staying Alive'

'Stayin' Alive' was released as the second single from the 'Saturday Night Fever' soundtrack by Bee Gees. After its release, the song went up the charts and hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the early February, keeping its top position for 4 weeks straight, becoming one of the most recognizable tunes of the band.

Soldiers and children are killed in coach bombing

The M62 coach bombing occurred on the M62 motorway in northern England, when a Provisional Irish Republican Army bomb exploded in a coach carrying off-duty British Armed Forces personnel and their family members. Twelve people were killed by the bomb, which consisted of 25 pounds of high explosive hidden in a luggage locker on the coach.

Patty Hearst is kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army

19-year-old Hearst was kidnapped from her Berkeley, California, apartment. She was beaten and lost consciousness during the abduction. Shots were fired from a machine gun during the incident. An urban guerrilla group called the Symbionese Liberation Army claimed responsibility for the abduction.

'No, No Nanette' closes at 46th St Theater NYC after 861 performances

The production was well-reviewed and ran for 861 performances. It sparked interest in the revival of similar musicals from the 1920s and '30s. Tony and Drama Desk Awards went to costume designer Raoul Pène Du Bois, choreographer Donald Saddler, and Gallagher as the best leading actress; Kelly won a Tony as best featured actress, and Shevelove's work earned him a Drama Desk Award for outstanding book.

'Patton' premieres in New York

'Patton' is an American epic biographical war film about U.S. General George S. Patton during World War II. It was directed by Franklin J. Schaffner from a script by Francis Ford Coppola and Edmund H. North, who based their screenplay on the biography 'Patton: Ordeal and Triumph' by Ladislas Farago and Omar Bradley's memoir 'A Soldier's Story'.

Fatah founder Arafat is elected Chairman of the PLO

Yasser Arafat was a Palestinian political leader. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization and President of the Palestinian National Authority. Ideologically an Arab nationalist, he was a founding member of the Fatah political party.

The Rolling Stones release 19th Nervous Breakdown

The 19th Nervous Breakdown song by The Rolling Stones was written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. The song reached number 2 on both the US and UK charts while topping the NME charts. In 2015, it was used in the Universal Pictures animated film called Minions.

The Righteous Brothers are at #1 on the UK & US singles chart

You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' managed to climb to the top of Billboard Hot 100 just a few weeks after its debut, staying there for a week. Release in the UK was in early January, debuting at No. 35 on the UK Top 40, reaching No. 1 in its fourth week and keeping the position until the next one.

Yalta Conference foreshadows the Cold War

The Yalta Conference was the World War II meeting of the heads of government of the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union for the purpose of discussing Germany and Europe's postwar reorganization. The three states were represented by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Premier Joseph Stalin.

Teflon is invented

American chemist Roy Plunkett discovered polytetrafluoroethylene, more commonly known as Teflon. It has one of the lowest coefficients of friction of any solid. It is used as a non-stick coating for pans and other cookware and as coating on catheters to prevent bacteria to adhere to the surface of the tube.

1932

The III Olympic Winter Games open in Lake Placid, New York

It was the first of four Winter Olympics held in the United States. The Games were opened by Franklin D. Roosevelt, then the Governor of New York. Seventeen countries participated and the U.S. won the medal tally with a total of 12 medals.

'The Garden Party' appears in the Saturday Westminster Gazette

"The Garden Party" is a short story by Katherine Mansfield. It was first published in three parts in the Saturday Westminster Gazette and the Weekly Westminster Gazette. It later appeared in The Garden Party: and Other Stories. Its luxurious setting is based on Mansfield's childhood home at Tinakori Road, Wellington.

1899

German club Werder Bremen is founded

The club was founded as Fußballverein Werder by a group of 16 vocational high school students who had won a prize of sports equipment. The students took the club's name from a German word for "river peninsula", which described the riverside field on which they played their first football games.

George Washington becomes the first elected U.S. president

George Washington was unanimously elected for the first of his two terms as president, and John Adams became the first vice president. G. Washington was enormously popular, and his agreement to serve as the first President of the United States ensured that he was listed first when the electors cast their votes on the appointed day.

Kepler-Brahe collaboration begins

German mathematician and astronomer Johannes Kepler arrives to Prague. He provided his mathematical knowledge to make sense of data Brahe had accumulated as an astronomical observer. This led to the discovery of the famous three laws of planetary motion and later to the theory of universal gravitation.

Anniversaries of the (in)famous