Timeline Log 018: February

February is the second month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. It is the shortest month and the only month with fewer than 30 days.

February was named after the Latin term februum, which means purification, via the purification ritual Februa held on February 15 in the old Roman calendar.

February 1, 2010, President Barack Obama will propose a $3.8 trillion budget for fiscal 2011 that foresees the deficit hitting a record $1.6 trillion in the current fiscal year but falling to about $700 billion by 2013. (WSJ)



February 1, 2010, 



February 1, 2010,



February 1, 2010,

February 1, 2010, Chinese state media voices its disapproval after the Obama administration unveils its first arms package for Taiwan, a move that prompted China to threaten sanctions on the firms involved. (Reuters)
February 1, 2010, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton presses China to back Iran sanctions for its nuclear program. (WSJ)
 

February 2, 2010, Season 6 Premiere of Lost

February 2, 2010, A hearing whether to repeal the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy is held in the United States allowing the possibility of openly gay people to become active-duty members of the United States armed forces. (BBC
February 2, 2010, China says that relations will be undermined if U.S. President Barack Obama meets the Dalai Lama. (BBC)
February 2, 2010, The Lancet medical journal issues a full retraction of a paper that caused a 12-year international controversy over alleged links between the MMR vaccine and autism. (BBC)
February 2, 2010, Finance Minister of Germany Wolfgang Schaeuble says that the German government will buy stolen information on Swiss bank accounts, offered in a CD that contained 1,500 names in exchange for 2.5 million euros, to pursue tax evasion. (Bloomberg)
 
February 3, 2010, L'Homme Qui Marche I by Alberto Giacometti, a bronze sculpture sells in London for £65,001,250, a new world record auction price. (BBC)



February 3, 2010,




February 3, 2010, A major fireball is reported in the skies over Ireland, lighting up "the whole country". (RTÉ)
February 3, 2010, Avatar becomes the highest grossing film in the U.S. and Canada while surpassing the 2 billion dollars mark in worldwide sales. (Reuters)
February 3, 2010, NASA and Cornell University have given up attempting to move the Spirit rover, currently stuck in sand near Home Plate, Gusev crater on the planet Mars, and are converting it into a stationary outpost. Its twin rover, Opportunity, remains mobile on Mars. (Space.com)

February 4, 2010, Yahoo! sells HotJobs to Monster.com for US$225million. (PA)

February 5, 2010, Release of Dear John

February 5, 2010, Release of From Paris with Love

February 5, 2010, Release of Video Game Dante's Inferno



February 5, 2010,



February 5, 2010, The last native of India's Andaman Islands fluent in the Aka-Bo language dies, rendering the language extinct. (Daily Mail)
February 5, 2010, New images of the dwarf planet Pluto reveal rapid changes on its surface. (BBC)
February 5, 2010, Uganda's deputy Foreign Minister Henry Okello Oryem says the country's anti-homosexuality Bill "will be changed". (BBC)
 
 February 6, 2010, The Group of Seven nations agree to write off Haiti's debts following a conference in Iqaluit, Nunavut. (BBC)



February 6, 2010, American politician Sarah Palin speaks at a gathering of the Tea Party movement in Nashville. (BBC)



February 6, 2010,
 



February 6, 2010,



February 6, 2010, Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana Mitch Landrieu is elected Mayor of New Orleans. (New York Times)
February 6, 2010, Spain’s economy fell 3.6% in 2009, the most in decades. (Mercopress)

February 7, 2010, New Orleans Saints Defeat the Indianapolis Colts 31 -17 in Superbowl 44.

February 7, 2010,



February 7, 2010,



February 8, 2010, Dr. Conrad Murray is charged with involuntary manslaughter in pop singer Michael Jackson's death.(BBC)



February 8, 2010,



February 8, 2010, Space Shuttle Endeavour launches successfully from Kennedy Space Center at 4:14 EST, marking the beginning of STS-130, a two-week mission to the International Space Station. (UPI)

February 10, 2010,



February 10, 2010, Nationwide strikes led by Communist and Socialist parties take place in Greece to protest the government's handing of the country's debt. Most of the country was brought to a standstill as factories, schools, airports and hospitals closed down or reduced capacity. (BBC)
February 10, 2010, President Barack Obama on Tuesday sat in the East Room of his White House and listened to an all-star lineup of performers pay tribute to the music that he said fueled freedom marches and civil disobedience. (Huff)
February 10, 2010, A 3.8-magnitude earthquake strikes near Chicago, United States. No reports of major damage. (CNN)
February 10, 2010, Officials in Haiti state that at least 230,000 people died in the 2010 Haiti earthquake, but that number may yet grow, approaching the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake as the deadliest natural disaster of the 21st century thus far. (BBC)

February 11, 2010, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announces that Iran is now a nuclear state, following a successful 20% uranium enrichment. (New York Times)



February 11, 2010, Former U.S. President Bill Clinton undergoes heart surgery after chest pains in New York. (New York TImes)



February 11, 2010, British fashion designer Alexander McQueen is found dead at his home in London at the age of 40 on the eve of his mother's funeral. (BBC News)



February 11, 2010, A European Union summit takes place to discuss a possible bailout for Greece's economy. (Reuters)
February 11, 2010, The European Parliament rejects an agreement that would have granted the United States Terrorist Finance Tracking Program unlimited access to the SWIFT bank transactions database. (BBC News)
February 11, 2010, A large eruption occurs at the Soufriere Hills volcano in Montserrat after a partial lava dome collapse, sending ash to a height of 50,000 feet. (Montserrat Volcano Obeservatory)

February 12, 2010, Release of The Lightning Thief

 
February 12, 2010, Release of The Wolfman

February 12, 2010, Release of Valentines Day

February 12, 2010,

February 12, 2010,



February 12, 2010,



February 12, 2010,



February 13, 2010, NATO forces in Afghanistan launch Operation Moshtarak against the Taliban-controlled village of Marja in Helmand Province. (The New York Times)





February 13, 2010,



February 13, 2010,

 

February 13, 2010, The letters of J. D. Salinger reveal new details about how the author became reclusive and reluctant to engage with the "big shitty world". (The Times)

February 14, 2010, Valentines Day

February 14, 2010, Beginning of "The Year of the Tiger"

February 14, 2010,



February 14, 2010, Nine Irish Roman Catholic bishops and Cardinal Seán Brady arrive in Rome to discuss the Murphy Report and Ryan Report into the Catholic sexual abuse scandal in Ireland with Pope Benedict XVI, the first such meetings there in eight years. (RTÉ)

February 15, 2010,



February 15, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI begins a two-day meeting with all 24 Irish Roman Catholic bishops to discuss child abuse in a "quite unprecedented" move. (Al Jazeera)

February 16, 2010,



February 16, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI issues a statement after a two-day meeting with all Irish bishops in the Vatican, including labelling paedophilia a "heinous crime", but his nuncio refuses to appear before an inquiry in Dáil Éireann. (RTÉ)
February 16, 2010, The Queen Mary 2 arrives at the Port of Shanghai, making her first port call in China since her maiden voyage in 2004. (Xinhuanet)

February 17, 2010,



February 17, 2010, 500,000 residents of Mexico City have been vaccinated against the A/H1N1 flu. (Xinhuanet)
February 18, 2010, A small private plane is intentionally crashed into an office building in Austin, Texas. (FOX News)




February 18, 2010,



February 18, 2010,



February 18, 2010, United States President Barack Obama meets with the Dalai Lama amid opposition from China. (Times of India)
February 18, 2010, The top climate change official at the United Nations and Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Yvo de Boer, announces his resignation. (The Times)

February 19, 2010, Release of Shutter Island

February 19, 2010, Release of The Ghost Writer

February 19, 2010, Series Premeire of The Ricky Gervais Show

February 19, 2010, A temple complex in Turkey that predates even the pyramids is rewriting the story of human evolution.

February 20, 2010,



February 20, 2010, Olympic luger Nodar Kumaritashvili is buried in Bakuriani, Georgia. (BBC)
February 20, 2010, Bal wins the Golden Bear at the 60th Berlin International Film Festival. (Deutsche Welle)
February 20, 2010, The Canadian three-masted ship SV Concordia capsizes in a storm off the coast of Brazil. The entire crew, 64 people, are rescued after spending 48 hours on life rafts in rough seas. (The Sydney Morning Herald)

February 21, 2010,



February 22, 2010, Prince William becomes President at 2010 BAFTA Awards.(NYDaily)
February 22, 2010, The European Union and Germany deny a report of a 20-25 billion euro (£22 billion) aid plan for Greece, and Athens pledge again to take new steps if needed to keep tough deficit-cutting plans on target. (Reuters)

February 23, 2010,

February 23, 2010,



February 23, 2010,



February 23, 2010,



February 23, 2010, A United Nations report says mobile phones are used by around 4.6 billion in total or two-thirds of the world population, including more than half of people in the developing world. (Digital Trends)
February 23, 2010, China increases controls on the internet, requiring anyone who wishes to set up a website to produce identification and meet regulators. (BBC)

February 24, 2010,



February 24, 2010, The discovery of the sauropod genus Abydosaurus is announced. (ScienceDaily)
February 24, 2010, Toyota's President Akio Toyoda apologises to the United States Congress for safety problems that led to deaths and worldwide recalls of its vehicles. (BBC)
February 24, 2010, RasGas, a joint venture of Qatar Petroleum and ExxonMobil, starts its seventh LNG train, ensuring Qatar's position as the world's biggest producer of liquefied natural gas. (Reuters)

February 25, 2010,



February 25, 2010, Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin makes history as he leads a 10-member delegation to Gaza via Egypt, becoming the first EU Foreign Minister to visit since the 2009 Israeli assault after having previously been refused entry by Israel. He calls on Israel to end the blockade. (The Irish Times)
 
February 26, 2010,




February 26, 2010, Sunken Town Re-Emerges After 25 Years.(AOL)
February 26, 2010, The Organization of American States (OAS) Inter-American Commission on Human Rights issued a 300-page report on democracy and human rights in Venezuela under Hugo Chávez. (The Washington Post)
February 26, 2010, Prince settles his court case with MCD Productions which had sued the musician after he cancelled a 2008 Croke Park concert at short notice. (RTÉ)
February 26, 2010, An experiment in Minnesota's Soudan Mine reports detection of weakly interacting massive particles, a form of cold dark matter, with masses of 7-11 billion electronvolts.(Nature News)
February 26, 2010, President Moammar Gadhafi of Libya declares a holy war on Switzerland. (The Washington Post)
February 26, 2010, A 7.0 magnitude earthquake strikes off the southern coast of Japan's Ryukyu Island. (USA Today)

February 27, 2010,



February 27, 2010, An 8.8 magnitude earthquake hits near the city of Concepción, Chile. (BBC)




February 27, 2010, Drinks firm Gatorade ends its endorsement deal with golfer Tiger Woods after his string of extra-marital affairs. (BBC)
February 28, 2010, International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge officially closes the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada. Canada finishes in first place in the medal table with a record 14 gold medals, while the United States wins a record total of 37 medals. (Xinhua)



February 28, 2010, Hundreds of people wearing pink wigs and pink clothing walk out of Catholic Mass in 's-Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands in protest of a gay Dutch man being refused communion in a nearby town. (BBC)
February 28, 2010, Egyptian authorities announce the discovery of a granite head from a statue of Tutankhamun's grandfather Amenhotep III, which was unearthed at a temple in Luxor. (BBC)