• The United States invaded Grenada, taking out the Marxist regime that was developing there. Ronald Reagan signed a bipartisan bill into law to attempt to save a threatened Social Security system.
• Pope John Paul II traveled to Belize.
• Yuri Andropov was living out his short tenure at the head of the USSR. Even though Korean Air flight 007 was shot down after violating Soviet airspace, and all 269 people on board the plane died, Andropov and Reagan would share Time's Man of the Year award.
• Margaret Thatcher was ironing along in Britain, where Tony Blair had just become an MP. Francois Mitterand was in France, and Helmut Kohl had recently ascended in West Germany: Bettino Craxi was the first socialist premier of Italy.
• 241 US Marines were killed in a suicide bombing at Beirut International Airport.
• A blowout at the Nowruz oil field on the Persian Gulf released 600,000 tons of petroleum in the worst oil spill in history.
• Deng Xiaoping and Hu Yaobang were overseeing the slow commercialization of China.
• The first constitution to enfranchise blacks and Asians in the Republic of South Africa was ratified.
• 150 million people in East Africa faced starvation.

• ARPAnet was switched from NCP to the TCP protocol, and would later spin off its military servers to form the beginnings of a civilian internet.
• Microsoft Windows was released to the public.
• Sally Ride rode on the Space Shuttle Challenger as the first American woman in space. Spacelab was launched aboard the Shuttle Columbia.
• The Boeing 757 went into service.

• The last episode of M*A*S*H aired with some fifty million households watching... equivalent to over sixty percent of the American television viewer population. It was the most-watched single program in American history. Dallas again became the most-watched show, taking back the lead from 60 Minutes.
• Return of the Jedi was released.
• The Nintendo Entertainment System went on sale.
• Penn State won the Sugar Bowl, their first national championship: the Washington Redskins beat the Miami Dolphins in the second-highest-rated Super Bowl in history.
• Hamburger SV defeated Aberdeen in the European Cup.
• The Baltimore Orioles won the World Series, defeating the Philadelphia Phillies: Cal Ripken, Jr. was named MVP.
• The New York Islanders won the Stanley Cup for the fourth year in a row.

• Japanese pop star Utada Hikaru
• Noder of all trades sekicho

• Filipino political figure Benigno Aquino, Jr.
• Physicist Buckminster Fuller
• Author Arthur Godfrey
• Author Tennessee Williams

• A total eclipse of the sun was visible in Southeast Asia.
• The coldest recorded temperature on Earth in history: -129 deg F, recorded at Vostok Station in Antarctica.
• Avianca flight 011 crashed while landing at Barajas International Airport in Madrid: 183 died.

1982 << 1983 >> 1984