350 people and children are killed in a massacre in Beslan, North Ossetia. Armed Chechen rebels took over 1000 people including school children at a school. The rebels demanded international recognition of an independent Chechnya. The hostage crisis lasted for 3 days and ended after Russian troops stormed the school.

The Wreck of the sunk ship Titanic is found in the North Atlantic Ocean. A French-American expedition group found the wreck, which sunk on 14 April 1912 on her first voyage from Southampton, UK, to New York City, U.S.

Pioneer 11 makes its closest approach to Saturn. The NASA built space probe was the first probe to encounter Saturn - it flew by the planet at a distance of 13,000 miles (21,000 km). After its flyby, the probe went on a trajectory to go outside the Solar System. All contacts with it were lost a few weeks later.

Life magazine publishes parts of the Old Man And The Sea. One of American author Ernest Hemingway’s best-known works, the novel tells the story of an old man and his fishing misadventures. Within a few days of the publication of the excerpt, 5 million copies of the magazine had been sold.

Passenger Pigeons become extinct. Martha, the last Passenger Pigeon known to man, died at the Cincinnati Zoo, Cincinnati, Ohio effectively making Passenger Pigeons extinct.