IOTD

“Into the wild blue yonder…”

Calendar day; August 19, 2015

Wednesday, the 19th of August, 2015 is the 231th day in 2015 and in the 34th calendar week.

General Events:

World Humanitarian Day
August 19, 2015 in the World

World Humanitarian Day (WHD) falls on August 19, 2015 and is a global celebration of people helping people. The awareness day was designated by the United Nations in an effort to raise public awareness of humanitarian assistance worldwide and the people who risk their lives in order to provide it. Every day humanitarian aid workers help millions of people around the world, regardless of who they are and where they are. The United Nations invites all Member States and the entities of the United Nations system, within existing resources, as well as other international organizations and non-governmental organizations, to observe WHD annually in an appropriate manner.

Humanitarian aid is material or logistical assistance provided for humanitarian purposes, typically in response to humanitarian crises including natural disaster and man-made disaster. The primary objective of humanitarian aid is to save lives, alleviate suffering, and maintain human dignity. It may therefore be distinguished from development aid, which seeks to address the underlying socioeconomic factors which may have led to a crisis or emergency. Aid is funded by donations from individuals, corporations, governments and other organizations. The funding and delivery of humanitarian aid is increasingly international, making it much faster, more responsive, and more effective in coping with to major emergencies affecting large numbers of people.

http://www.un.org/en/events/humanitarianday/

Where is World Humanitarian Day?
Worldwide

World Orangutan Day
August 19, 2015 in the World

Over the last two decades the world’s orangutan population has declined by more than 50 per cent. Despite being one of the most intelligent primate species on Earth, the orangutan is now endangered, mainly due to poaching, the illegal pet trade and loss of habitat.

In Indonesia and Malaysia vast swathes of the orangutan’s native rainforests are being removed to develop palm oil plantations. An area the size of 300 football pitches is cleared every hour to make way for oil palms and the oil derived from the crop is used in almost 50 per cent of consumer goods.

What happens to orangutans affected by this process is harrowing, according to Dr Karmele Llano Sanchez, executive director of International Animal Rescue Indonesia.

“When the forest is destroyed to make way for palm oil plantations, it’s easier for hunters to find and shoot orangutans,” she said. “These hunters kill the mother and other members of the family and take the babies to sell them into the pet trade.”

On World Orangutan Day, campaigners are calling on companies to only buy palm oil from sustainable sources. Wildlife charity WWF says consumers are only buying half of the sustainably produced palm oil being manufactured. With fewer than 60,000 orangutans estimated to be left in the wild, action to back up the promises can’t come soon enough.

Where is World Orangutan Day?
Worldwide

Savior of the Apple Feast Day
August 19, 2015 in Eastern slavic countries

Savior of the Apple Feast Day is celebrated on August 19, 2015. The Savior of the Apple Feast Day is an Eastern Slavic folk holiday, falling on the Feast of the Transfiguration. It is one of the three Saviour (Spas) days. The holiday has a pre-Christian origin and is associated with harvesting of ripe fruits, especially apples.

Where is Savior of the Apple Feast Day?
Nationwide Eastern slavic countries

National Aviation Day
August 19, 2015 in the USA

National Aviation Day is observed on August 19, 2015. The National Aviation Day is a United States national observation that celebrates the development of aviation. The holiday was established in 1939 by Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who issued a presidential proclamation which designated the anniversary of Orville Wright’s birthday to be National Aviation Day.

The proclamation was codified, and it allows the sitting US President to proclaim August 19 as National Aviation Day each year, if desired. His/her proclamation may direct all federal buildings and installations to fly the US flag on that day, and may encourage citizens to observe the day with activities that promote interest in aviation.

Where is the event?
Nationwide USA

Historical Events on 19th August:

43 BC – Octavian, later known as Augustus, compels the Roman Senate to elect him Consul.

1263 – King James I of Aragon censors Hebrew writing

1561 – Mary Queen of Scots arrives in Leith, Scotland to assume throne after spending 13 years in France

1587 – Sigismund III becomes king of Poland

1692 – Five more people hanged for witchcraft (20 in all) in Salem, Massachusetts

1772 – Gustav III seizes effective control of Swedish government & restores full power of monarchy, which had been subordinate to parliament since 1720

1791 – Benjamin Banneker writes a letter to the Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson using language from the “United States Declaration of Independence” to criticize Jefferson’s pro-slavery stance and to request justice for African Americans

1887 – Dmitri Mendeleev makes a solo ascent by balloon to an altitude of 11,500 feet (3.5 km) above Klin, Russia to observe an eclipse

1888 – 1st beauty contest (Spa, Belgium), 18 yr old West Indian wins

1919 – Afghanistan declares independence from UK

1941 – Ump Jocko Conlan ejects Pirate manager Frankie Frisch for coming out on field holding an umbrella to get a rainout

1942 – WWII: Over 4,000 Canadian & British soldiers killed, wounded or captured raiding Dieppe, France

1944 – Last Japanese troops driven out of India

1947 – J Arens & D van Dorpen synthetise vitamin A

1953 – The democratically elected Prime Minister of Iran Mohammad Mosaddegh is overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the United Kingdom (under the name ‘Operation Boot’) and the United States (under the name TPAJAX Project)

1960 – Francis Gary Powers convicted of spying by USSR (U-2 incident)

1965 – Auschwitz trials end with 6 life sentences

1970 – The Chinese Community in South Africa is granted ‘White’ status

1985 – Japan launches its 2nd probe of Halley’s Comet, Suisei

1989 – Tadeusz Mazowiecki, elected 1st non-communist president of Poland

1998 – South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission chairperson, Archbishop D. Tutu, releases documents revealing an alleged plot by Western countries to assassinate United Nations Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold of Sweden

2005 – The first-ever joint military exercise between Russia and China, called Peace Mission 2005 begins