1970 (MCMLXX) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1970th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 970th year of the , the 70th year of the , and the 1st year of the decade.
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January 4 – The 7.1 MwTonghai earthquake shakes Tonghai County, Yunnan province, China, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme). Between 10,000–15,621 were killed and 26,783 were injured.
January 12 – Biafra capitulates, ending the Nigerian Civil War.
January 14 – Diana Ross and The Supremes perform their farewell live concert together at the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas. Ross's replacement, Jean Terrell, is introduced onstage at the end of the last show.
January 15 – After a 32-month fight for independence from Nigeria, Biafran forces under Philip Effiong formally surrender to General Yakubu Gowon.
January 20 – The Greater London Council announces its plans for the Thames Barrier at Woolwich to prevent flooding (the barrier opens in 1981).
MacDonald family massacre: Jeffrey R. MacDonald kills his wife and children at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, claiming that drugged-out "hippies" did it.File:Ohsumi.jpg
Author David Irving is ordered to pay £40,000 libel damages to Capt. John Broome over his book The Destruction of Convoy PQ17.
February 18 – A jury finds the Chicago Seven defendants not guilty of conspiring to incite a riot, in charges stemming from the violence at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Five of the defendants are found guilty on the lesser charge of crossing state lines to incite a riot.
February 19 – Poseidon bubble: shares in Australian nickel mining company Poseidon NL, which stood at $0.80 in September 1969, peak at around $280 before the speculative bubble bursts.
February 21 – Construction begins on the Boğaziçi Bridge crossing the Bosphorus in Istanbul.
February 22 – Guyana becomes a Republic within the Commonwealth of Nations.
February 26 – Chevrolet releases the second generation Camaro.
March[]
March 1 – Rhodesia severs its last tie with the United Kingdom, declaring itself a republic.
March 5 – The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty goes into effect, after ratification by 56 nations.
A bomb being constructed by members of the Weathermen and meant to be planted at a military dance in New Jersey, explodes, killing 3 members of the organization.
Süleyman Demirel of AP forms the new government of Turkey (32nd government).
Citroën introduces the SM at the Geneva Auto Salon.
A solar eclipse passes along the Atlantic coast region. Totality is visible across southern Mexico and across the southeast coast of the United States, Nantucket, and Nova Scotia.
March 12 – Teenagers in the United Kingdom vote for the first time, in a by-election in Bridgwater.
March 15 – The Expo '70 World's Fair opens in Suita, Osaka, Japan.
March 16 – The complete New English Bible is published.
March 17 – The United States Army charges 14 officers with suppressing information related to the My Lai Massacre.
General Lon Nol ousts Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia.
United States Postal Service workers in New York City go on strike; the strike spreads to the state of California and the cities of Akron, Ohio, Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston, and Denver; 210,000 out of 750,000 U.S. postal employees walk out. President Nixon assigns military units to New York City post offices. The strike lasts 2 weeks.
March 20 – The Agency for Cultural and Technical Co-operation (ACCT) (Agence de Coopération Culturelle et Technique) is founded.
NASA's Explorer 1, the first American satellite and Explorer program spacecraft, reenters Earth's atmosphere after 12 years in orbit.
Japan Airlines Flight 351, carrying 131 passengers and 7 crew from Tokyo to Fukuoka, is hijacked by Japanese Red Army members. All passengers are eventually freed.
American President Richard Nixon signs the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act into law, banning cigarette television advertisements in the United States from January 1, 1971.
American Motors Corporation introduces the Gremlin.
The 1970 United States Census begins. There are 203,392,031 United States residents on this day.
April 4 – Fragments of burnt human remains believed to be those of Adolf Hitler, Eva Braun, Joseph Goebbels, Magda Goebbels and the Goebbels children are crushed and scattered in the Biederitz river at a KGB center in Magdeburg, East Germany.
A huge gas explosion at a subway construction site in Osaka, Japan kills 79 and injures over 400.
Israeli Air Force F-4 Phantom II fighter bombers kill 47 Egyptian school children at an elementary school in what is known as Bahr el-Baqar massacre. The single-floor school is hit by 5 bombs and 2 air-to-ground missiles.
In a press release written in mock-interview style, that is included in promotional copies of his first solo album, Paul McCartney announces that he has left The Beatles.[1]
April 17 – Apollo program: Apollo 13splashes down safely in the Pacific.
April 21 – The Principality of Hutt River "secedes" from Australia (it remains unrecognised by Australia and other nations).
April 22 – The first Earth Day is celebrated in the U.S.
April 24 – China's first satellite (Dong Fang Hong 1) is launched into orbit using a Long March-1 Rocket (CZ-1).
April 26 – The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is founded.
April 29 – The U.S. invades Cambodia to hunt out the Viet Cong; widespread, large antiwar protests occur in the U.S.
May[]
May 1 – Demonstrations against the trial of the New Haven Nine, Bobby Seale, and Ericka Huggins draw 12,000. President Richard Nixon orders U.S. forces to cross into neutral Cambodia, threatening to widen the Vietnam War, sparking nationwide riots and leading to the Kent State shootings.
May 4 – Kent State shootings: Four students at Kent State University in Ohio, USA are killed and 9 wounded by Ohio National Guardsmen, at a protest against the incursion into Cambodia.
Arms Crisis in the Republic of Ireland: Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney are dismissed as members of the Irish Government, for accusations of their involvement in a plot to import arms for use by the Provisional IRA in Northern Ireland.
Feyenoord wins the European Cup after a 2–1 win over Celtic.
Hard Hat Riot: Unionized construction workers attack about 1,000 students and others protesting the Kent State shootings near the intersection of Wall Street and Broad Street and at New York City Hall.
The Beatles release their 12th and final album, Let It Be.
The New York Knicks win their first NBA championship, defeating the Los Angeles Lakers 113-99 in Game 7 of the world championship series at Madison Square Garden.
May 10 – The Boston Bruins win their first Stanley Cup since 1941 when Bobby Orr scores a goal 40 seconds into overtime for a 4-3 victory which completes a four-game sweep of the St. Louis Blues.
Henry Marrow is killed in an alleged hate crime in Oxford, North Carolina.
Lubbock tornado: An F5tornado hits downtown Lubbock, Texas, the first to hit a downtown district of a major city since Topeka, Kansas in 1966; 28 are killed.
Ulrike Meinhof helps Andreas Baader escape and create the Red Army Faction which exists until 1998.
In the second day of violent demonstrations at Jackson State University in Jackson, Mississippi, state law enforcement officers fire into the demonstrators, killing 2 and injuring 12.
May 17 – Thor Heyerdahl sets sail from Morocco on the papyrus boat Ra II, to sail the Atlantic Ocean.
May 23 – A fire occurs in the Britannia Bridge over the Menai Strait near Bangor, Caernarfonshire, Wales, contributing to its partial destruction and amounting to approximately £1,000,000 worth of fire damage.
May 24 – The scientific drilling of the Kola Superdeep Borehole begins in the USSR.
May 26 – The SovietTupolev Tu-144 becomes the first commercial transport to exceed Mach 2.
May 27 – A British expedition climbs the south face of Annapurna I.
The 7.9 MwAncash earthquake shakes Peru with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe) and a landslide buries the town of Yungay, Peru. Between 66,794–70,000 were killed and 50,000 were injured.
June 15 – Operation Wedding: fifteen refuseniks try to escape from the Soviet Union by hijacking a plane.
June 18 – United Kingdom general election, 1970: the Conservative Party wins and Edward Heath becomes Prime Minister, ousting the Labour government of Harold Wilson after nearly six years in power. The election result is something of a surprise, as most of the opinion polls had predicted a third successive Labour win.[2]
Said bin Taimur, Sultan of Muscat and Oman, is deposed in a palace coup by his son, Qaboos.
Two CS gas canisters are thrown into the chamber of the British House of Commons.
July 30 – Damages totalling £485,528 are awarded to 28 Thalidomide victims.
July 31 – NBC anchor Chet Huntley retires from full-time broadcasting.
August[]
August 7 – Harold Haley, Marin County Superior Court Judge, is taken hostage and murdered, in an effort to free George Jackson from police custody.
August 17 – The U.S. sinks 418 containers of nerve gas into the Gulf Stream near the Bahamas.
August 17 – Venera program: Venera 7 is launched toward Venus. It later becomes the first spacecraft to successfully transmit data from the surface of another planet.
August 24 – Vietnam War protesters bomb Sterling Hall at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, leading to an international manhunt for the perpetrators.
August 29 – Chicano Moratorium against the Vietnam War, East Los Angeles, California. Police riot kills three people, including journalist Rubén Salazar.
September[]
September 1 – An assassination attempt against King Hussein of Jordan precipitates the Black September crisis.
Vietnam War – Operation Jefferson Glenn: The United States 101st Airborne Division and the South Vietnamese 1st Infantry Division initiate a new operation in Thua Thien Province (the operation ends in October 1971).
Formula One driver Jochen Rindt is killed in qualifying for the Italian Grand Prix. He becomes World Driving Champion anyhow, first to earn the honor posthumously.
September 6 – Dawson's Field hijackings, The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine hijacks 4 passenger aircraft from Pan Am, TWA and Swissair on flights to New York from Brussels, Frankfurt and Zürich.
Under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) the Environmental Science Services Administration (ESSA) Corps, one of seven federal uniformed services of the United States, is renamed to NOAA Commissioned Officer Corps under the soon to be formed National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
The Wichita State University football team's "Gold" plane crashes in Colorado, killing most of the players. They were on their way (along with administrators and fans) to a game with Utah State University.
Jochen Rindt becomes Formula OneWorld Driving Champion, first to earn the honor posthumously.
In Bolivia, Army Commander General Rogelio Miranda and a group of officers rebel and demand the resignation of President Alfredo Ovando Candía, who fires him.
National Educational Television ends operations, being succeeded by PBS.
U.S. President Richard Nixon's European tour ends.
The Front de libération du Québec (FLQ) kidnaps James Cross in Montreal and demands release of all its imprisoned members. The next day the Canadian government announces it will not meet the demand, beginning Quebec's October Crisis.
The Public Broadcasting Service begins broadcasting.
Vietnam War: In Paris, a Communist delegation rejects U.S. President Richard Nixon's October 7 peace proposal as "a maneuver to deceive world opinion."
October 9 – The Khmer Republic is proclaimed in Cambodia which begins the Civil War with the Khmer Rouge.
October Crisis: In Montreal, a national crisis hits Canada when Quebec Minister of Labour Pierre Laporte becomes the second statesman kidnapped by members of the FLQ terrorist group.
October 11 – Eleven French soldiers are killed in a shootout with rebels in Chad.
October 12 – Vietnam War: U.S. President Richard Nixon announces that the United States will withdraw 40,000 more troops before Christmas.
Egyptian president Anwar Sadat names Mahmoud Fawzi as his prime minister.
October 21 – A U.S. Air Force plane makes an emergency landing near Leninakan, Soviet Union. The Soviets release the American officers, including 2 generals, November 10.
October 22 – Chilean army commander René Schneider is shot in Santiago; the government declares a state of emergency. Schneider dies October 25.
October 24 – Salvador Allende is elected President of Chile.
October 25 – The wreck of the Confederate submarine Hunley is found off Charleston, South Carolina, by pioneer underwater archaeologist, Dr. E. Lee Spence,[3] then just 22 years old. Hunley was the first submarine in history to sink a ship in warfare.
October 26 – Garry Trudeau's comic stripDoonesbury debuts in approximately two dozen newspapers in the United States.
In Jordan, the government of Ahmed Toukan resigns; the next prime minister is Wasfi al-Tal.
A cholera outbreak in eastern Slovakia causes Hungary to close its border with Czechoslovakia.
Gary Gabelich drives the rocket-powered Blue Flame to an official land speed record at 622.407 mph (1,001.667 km/h)[4] on the dry lake bed of the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. The record, the first above 1 000 km/h, stands for nearly 13 years.
October 30 – In Vietnam, the worst monsoon to hit the area in 6 years causes large floods, kills 293, leaves 200,000 homeless and virtually halts the Vietnam War.
November[]
November 1 – Club Cinq-Sept fire in Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, France, kills 146.
(November 1) polish vice president killed at Karachi airport, Pakistan
Democrats sweep the U.S. Congressional midterm elections; Ronald Reagan is reelected governor of California; Jimmy Carter is elected governor of Georgia.
Vietnam War – Vietnamization: The United States turns control of the air base in the Mekong Delta to South Vietnam.
Social workers in Los Angeles take custody of Genie, a girl who had been kept in solitary confinement since her birth.
November 5 – Vietnam War: The United States Military Assistance Command in Vietnam reports the lowest weekly American soldier death toll in 5 years (24 soldiers die that week, which is the fifth consecutive week the death toll is below 50; 431 are reported wounded that week, however).
Egypt, Libya and Sudan announce their intentions to form a federation.
Tom Dempsey, who was born with a deformed right foot and right hand, sets a National Football League record by kicking a 63-yard field goal to lift the New Orleans Saints to a 19-17 victory over the Detroit Lions at Tulane Stadium.
The British comedy television series, The Goodies debuts on BBC 2.
Vietnam War: The Supreme Court of the United States votes 6–3 not to hear a case by the state of Massachusetts, about the constitutionality of a state law granting Massachusetts residents the right to refuse military service in an undeclared war.
November 10 – Vietnam War – Vietnamization: For the first time in 5 years, an entire week ends with no reports of United States combat fatalities in Southeast Asia.
November 12 – Soviet author Andrei Amalrik is sentenced to 3 years for 'anti-Soviet' writings.
Hafez al-Assad comes to power in Syria, following a military coup within the Ba'ath Party.
1970 Bhola cyclone: A 120-mph (193 km/h) tropical cyclone hits the densely populated Ganges Delta region of East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), killing an estimated 500,000 people (considered the 20th century's worst cyclone disaster). It gives rise to the temporary island of New Moore / South Talpatti.
Southern Airways Flight 932 crashes in Wayne County, West Virginia; all 75 on board, including 37 players and 5 coaches from the Marshall Universityfootball team, are killed.
The Soviet Union enters the ICAO, making Russian the fourth official language of the organization.
November 16 – The Lockheed L-1011 TriStar flies for the first time.
Vietnam War: Lieutenant William Calley goes on trial for the My Lai Massacre.
Luna programme: The Soviet Union lands Lunokhod 1 on Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains) on the Moon. This is the first roving remote-controlled robot to land on another world, and is released by the orbiting Luna 17 spacecraft.
U.S. President Richard Nixon asks the U.S. Congress for US$155 million in supplemental aid for the Cambodian government (US $85 million is for military assistance to prevent the overthrow of the government of Premier Lon Nol by the Khmer Rouge and North Vietnam).
The United Nations Security Council demands that no government recognize Rhodesia.
November 19 – European Economic Community prime ministers meet in Munich.
November 20 – The Miss World 1970 beauty pageant, hosted by Bob Hope at the Royal Albert Hall, London is disrupted by Women's Liberation protesters. Earlier on the same evening a bomb is placed under a BBC outside broadcast vehicle by The Angry Brigade, in protest at the entry of separate black and white contestants by South Africa.
Syrian Prime Minister Hafez al-Assad forms a new government but retains the post of defense minister.
In Ethiopia, the Eritrean Liberation Front kills an Ethiopian general.
Vietnam War – Operation Ivory Coast: A joint Air Force and Army team raids the Sơn Tây prison camp in an attempt to free American POWs thought to be held there (no Americans are killed, but the prisoners have already moved to another camp; all U.S. POWs are moved to a handful of central prison complexes as a result of this raid).
November 22 – Guinean president Ahmed Sékou Touré accuses Portugal of an attack when hundreds of mercenaries land near the capital Conakry.
November 23–24 – The Guinean army repels the landing attempts.
Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma! makes its network TV debut, when CBS telecasts the 1955 film version as a 3-hour Thanksgiving special.
The American Indian Movement seizes a replica of the Mayflower in Boston.
November 25–November 29 – A U.N. delegation arrives to investigate the Guinea situation.
November 25 – In Tokyo, author and Tatenokai militia leader Yukio Mishima and his followers take over the headquarters of the Japan Self-Defense Forces in an attempted coup d'état. After Mishima's speech fails to sway public opinion towards his right-wing political beliefs, including restoration of the powers of the Emperor, he commits seppuku (public ritual suicide).
The Italian House of Representatives accepts the new divorce law.
Ethiopia recognizes the People's Republic of China.
The BasqueETA kidnaps West German Eugen Beihl in San Sebastián.
Luis Echeverría becomes president of Mexico.
December 2 – The United States Environmental Protection Agency is established.
December 3 – October Crisis: In Montreal, kidnapped British Trade Commissioner James Cross is released by the Front de libération du Québec terrorist group after being held hostage for 60 days. Police negotiate his release and in return the Government of Canada grants 5 terrorists from the FLQ's Chenier Cell their request for safe passage to Cuba.
December 3 – Burgos Trial: In Burgos, Spain, the trial of 16 Basque terrorism suspects begins.
Giovanni Enrico Bucher, the Swiss ambassador to Brazil, is kidnapped in Rio de Janeiro; kidnappers demand the release of 70 political prisoners.
The U.N. General Assembly supports the isolation of South Africa for its apartheid policies.
During his visit to the Polish capital, German ChancellorWilly Brandt goes down on his knees in front of a monument to the victims of the Warsaw Ghetto, which will become known as the Warschauer Kniefall ("Warsaw Genuflection").
December 13 – The government of Poland announces food price increases. Riots and looting lead to a bloody confrontation between the rioters and the government on December 15.
Burgos Trial: Three Basques are sentenced to death, twelve others sentenced to imprisonment (terms from 12 to 62 years), and one is released.
The suspected killers of Pierre Laporte, Jacques and Paul Rose and Francis Sunard, are arrested near Montreal.
December 29 – U.S. President Richard Nixon signs into law the Occupational Safety and Health Act.
December 30 – In Viscaya in the Basque country of Spain, 15,000 go on strike in protest at the Burgos trial death sentences. Francisco Franco commutes the sentences to 30 years in prison.
357,618,000
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