RETURN TO INDEX
Top Song(s)
• The Weeknd - Blinding Lights
• Roddy Ricch - The Box
• Post Malone - Circles
• Harry Styles - Watermelon Sugar
• Dua Lipa - Don't Start Now
Top Film(s)
• Palm Springs
• The Father
• Another Round
• Tenet
• Soul
Best Selling Book(s)
• The House in the Cerulean Sea - T.J. Klune
• House of Earth and Blood - Sarah J. Maas
• The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue - Victoria E. Schwab
• American Dirt - Jeanine Cummins
• The Midnight Library - Matt Haig
Famous Deaths
• January 16 - Peter Hammersley, British Rear-Admiral who served on and designed submarines
• February 4 - Daniel arap Moi, Kenya's longest serving President (1978-2002)
• March 13 - Barbara Harris, 1st American Episcopal female bishop
• April 18 - Takuo Aoyagi, Japanese engineer who invented the pulse oximeter
• May 29 - Ron Johnston, English geographer (electoral geography)
• June 8 - Pierre Nkurunziza, President of Burundi (2005-20)
• July 23 - Benjamin Mkapa, Tanzanian politician, President of Tanzania (1995-2005)
• August 31 - Pranab Mukherjee, Indian politician, 13th President of India (2012-17)
• November 9 - Amadou Toumani Toure, Mali politician, President of Mali (2002-12)
• December 2 - Valery Giscard d'Estaing, French politician, President of France (1974-81)
Medical/Science/Technology
• The American Cancer Society reports a 2.2% drop in the cancer death rate between 2016 and 2017.
• Scientists discover mitochondria existing in human blood that are not part of larger cells.
• The drugs remdesivir and chloroquine are shown to effectively inhibit SARS-CoV-2 in vitro.
• Researchers report that they have developed a way to 3D bioprint graphene oxide with a protein.
• Scientists report to have used CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing inside a human's body for the first time.
• The United States now has more reported COVID-19 cases than any other country in the world, including China.
• A study affirms that DNA from Neanderthal populations from different parts of the world introgressed into modern-day Eurasian DNA.
• NASA publishes a detailed study of Arrokoth, the most distant body ever explored by a spacecraft.
• Scientists report the development of the smallest synthetic molecular motor, consisting of 12 atoms and a rotor of 4 atoms.
• NASA spacecraft OSIRIS-Rex reached out and grabbed rocks from a 4.5-billion-year-old asteroid named Bennu.
Political
• January 9 - The House of Representatives votes 224–194 to pass a non-binding War Powers Resolution.
• January 15 – President Donald Trump and China's Vice Premier Liu He sign the U.S.–China Phase One trade deal in Washington, D.C.
• January 16 – The impeachment trial of President Donald Trump begins in the U.S. Senate.
• February 4 – President Donald Trump delivers his third State of the Union address.
• March 5 - The Senate approves an $8.3 billion federal emergency aid package in response to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic.
• March 11 - COVID-19 pandemic: President Trump announces a 30-day ban on incoming travel from Europe (with the exception of the United Kingdom).
• August 4 – The Great American Outdoors Act is passed.
• September 17 – President Trump announces the formation of the 1776 Commission.
• November 15 - 2020 presidential election: President Trump concedes that Joe Biden won the presidential election.
• December 11 - The Supreme Court denies a lawsuit to overturn Joe Biden's victory in four battleground states.
National
• February 13 – The McClatchy newspaper chain files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
• March 2 - A tornado outbreak strikes four counties around Nashville, Tennessee, killing 26 people.
• April 1 - Coal companies owned by West Virginia Governor Jim Justice agree to pay $5 million for thousands of mine safety violations.
• May 29 - Minneapolis officer Derek Chauvin is charged with third-degree murder and manslaughter in the killing of George Floyd.
• June 3 – A 5.5 earthquake said to be an aftershock of the 2019 Ridgecrest earthquakes hits near Searles Valley, California.
• July 4 - The 2020 Salute to America Independence Day event is held in Washington, D.C.
• August 19 – Apple Inc. becomes the first U.S. company to be valued at over $2 trillion.
• September 6 – California sets a new record for land area destroyed by wildfires, with 2.1 million acres burned in the year thus far.
• October 7 - Ruby Tuesday files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after closing 185 restaurants.
• November 4 – The United States formally withdraws from the Paris Agreement.
Worldwide
• January 8 - Persian Gulf crisis: Iran attacks Iraqi military bases hosting U.S. troops, injuring more than 110 service members.
• February 24 – The Pakatan Harapan coalition government of Malaysia collapses and is replaced by the Perikatan Nasional coalition.
• March 9 - Italy becomes the first country to implement a nationwide quarantine in response to the COVID-19 outbreak.
• April 10 - The Democratic Republic of the Congo reports the first case of Ebola since February 2020.
• May 10 - The Iranian Navy frigate Jamaran accidentally strikes the Iranian support vessel Konarak with a missile, killing nineteen sailors.
• June 15 - Turkish and Iranian forces commence air and artillery strikes against Kurdistan Workers' Party forces in Iraqi Kurdistan.
• July 8 – At least 180 bodies are found in mass graves in Djibo, Burkina Faso, where soldiers are fighting jihadists.
• August 4 – An explosion caused by unsafely stored ammonium nitrate kills at least 218 people, injures thousand in Beirut, Lebanon.
• September 3 - The skeletons of 200 mammoths and 30 other animals are unearthed at a construction site for the Mexico City Santa Lucía Airport.
• October 6 – Serious floods affected in Central Vietnam, lasted nearly 3 months and killed at least 249 people.