2009 Explained

2009 (MMIX) is the current year of the Anno Domini/Common Era in accordance with the Gregorian calendar. It is a common year starting on Thursday and the last year of the 2000s decade.

2009 has been designated as the:

• International Year of Astronomy.^{[1] [2]}
• International Year of Natural Fibres.

Events

January

• January 1 - Austria, Japan, Mexico, Turkey, and Uganda assume their seats on the United Nations Security Council.
• January 1 - The Czech Republic takes over the presidency of the Council of the European Union from France.
• January 1 - At least 61 people are killed in a fire in Bangkok during New Year celebrations.
• January 1 - Asunción, the capital of Paraguay, becomes the American Capital of Culture and Vilnius and Linz become the European Capitals of Culture.
• January 1 - Slovakia adopts the Euro as its national currency, replacing the Slovak koruna.
• January 3 - Israel launches a ground invasion of Gaza.

• January 7 - Russia shuts off all gas supplies to Europe through Ukraine. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin publicly endorses the move and urges that international observers be brought into the energy dispute.^[3]
• January 12 - The Electronic System for Travel Authorization becomes mandatory for participating travelers from Visa Waiver Program countries in advance of travel to the United States^[4] .
• January 13 - Ethiopian military forces begin pulling out of Somalia, where they have tried to maintain order for nearly two years.^[5]
• January 15 - US Airways Flight 1549, en route to Charlotte/Douglas International Airport from New York's LaGuardia Airport, ditches in the Hudson River off Manhattan. All 155 passengers and crew are evacuated and taken to safety. The plane is apparently brought down by a flock of Canada Geese.^[6]
• January 17 - Israel declares a unilateral cease-fire against Hamas militants and puts an end to attacks after 22 days of violence in Gaza.
• January 20 - Barack Obama is inaugurated as the 44th, and first African-American, President of the United States.^[7]
• January 22 - U.S. President Barack Obama signs an order to close Guantanamo Bay detention camp within one year.^[8]
• January 22 - Congolese rebel leader Laurent Nkunda is captured by Rwandan forces after crossing over the border into Rwanda.
• January 23 - The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency launches the world's first-ever Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite, "Ibuki", from Tanegashima Space Center.^[9]
• January 26 - The first-ever trial at the International Criminal Court is held. Former Union of Congolese Patriots leader Thomas Lubanga is accused of training child soldiers to kill, pillage, and rape.^[10]
• January 26 - The Icelandic government and banking system collapse; Prime Minister Geir Haarde immediately resigns.^[11]
• January 28 - The IMF issues its worst outlook for the world economy in 60 years.^[12]
• January 29 - An Israeli Defense Forces air raid injures nine people in the Gaza Strip in response to continued militant rocket fire.
• January 30 - The North Korean government declares all its political and military agreements with South Korea "dead".^[13]

February

• February 1 - Patriarch Kirill I of Moscow is enthroned as the Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church.^[14]
• February 1 - Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir is appointed as the new Prime Minister of Iceland, becoming the world's first openly gay head of government.^[15]
• February 2 - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announces that Iran has launched its own satellite, "Omid", into orbit on an Iranian-built rocket.^[16]
• February 7- The deadliest bushfires in Australian history begin; they kill 210 people, injure 500 more, and leave 7,500 homeless. The fires come after Melbourne records the highest-ever temperature (46.4°C, 115°F) of any capital city in Australia. Both arson^{[17] [18]} and global warming^{[19] [20]} are suspected causes.
• February 8 - The Taliban releases a video which shows Polish geologist Piotr Stańczak, who was abducted by the Taliban on September 28, 2008, being beheaded. It is the first killing of a Western hostage in Pakistan since American journalist Daniel Pearl was beheaded in 2002.^[21]
• February 10 - A Russian and an American satellite collide over Siberia, creating a large amount of space debris.^[22]
• February 11 - Morgan Tsvangirai is sworn in as the new Prime Minister of Zimbabwe following the power-sharing deal between him and President Robert Mugabe signed in September, 2008.^[23]
• February 12 - Darwin Day, the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin,^{[24] [25] [26]} is commemorated at the London Natural History Museum and elsewhere.
• February 12 - Colgan Air Flight 3407 crashes into a home in Clarence Center, a suburb of Buffalo, New York, killing 49 on the plane and one on the ground.^{[27] [28]}
• February 16 - The trial of former Khmer Rouge leader Kang Kek Iew begins in Phnom Penh, 30 years after Cambodian leader Pol Pot was overthrown.
• February 17 - The JEM rebel group in Darfur, Sudan sign a pact with the Sudanese government, planning a ceasefire within the next 3 months.^[29]
• February 25 - Turkish Airlines Flight 1951, a Boeing 737-800 aircraft with 135 passengers on board, crashes into a field outside Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, killing nine and injuring 84.^[30]
• February 25 - Members of the Bangladesh Rifles paramilitary force begin mutinying. Over 80 are killed.

March

• March 2 - President of Guinea-Bissau João Bernardo Vieira is assassinated during an armed attack on his residence in Bissau.^[31]
• March 3 - Gunmen attack a bus carrying Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore, Pakistan, killing six policemen and two civilians, injuring six team members, and critically injuring reserve umpire Ahsan Raza.^[32]
• March 4 - The International Criminal Court (ICC) issues an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur. Al-Bashir is the first sitting head of state to be indicted by the ICC since its establishment in 2002.^[33]
• March 7 – NASA's Kepler Mission, a space photometer which will search for extrasolar planets in the Milky Way galaxy, is launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, USA.

Predicted and scheduled events

April

• April 2 - G-20 Leaders Summit will be held in London.^[34]
• April 3 - April 4 - The 21st NATO Summit will be held, 60 years after the founding of the organization.
  • April 4 - Albania and Croatia will join NATO.

May

• May 12 – On STS-125, the Space Shuttle Atlantis will conduct the last servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope.
• May 21 - The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and the LCROSS impactor will be launched to the Moon. Part of NASA's Lunar Precursor Robotic Program (LPRP).
• May 25 – Triple conjunction of Jupiter and Neptune, Jupiter 24' south. First of three triple conjunctions of Jupiter and Neptune.

June

• June 1 - Greenland will become a separate country within the Kingdom of Denmark.
• June 4-7 - The European Parliament election 2009 will take place, the exact date varies depending on country.
• June 7 - A referendum on changing the Act of Succession will be held in Denmark.

July

• July 1 – Sweden takes over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union from the Czech Republic.
• July 11 - NASA will launch Ares I-X, a test flight intended to gather aerodynamic data that will support the development of the Ares I crew launch vehicle. Ares I-X will be the first test flight of a future human orbital launch vehicle by NASA since STS-1 in 1981.

September

• September- The Burj Dubai in Dubai, United Arab Emirates will be completed. It is already the tallest man-made structure ever built.^{[35] [36]}
• September - The Large Hadron Collider will be restarted. The LHC was shut down on 19 september 2008 after problems with a magnet quench.
• September 29 - NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft will make its final flyby of Mercury, decreasing the velocity for orbital insertion.

October

• October - NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/ will be launched to study the sun, delivering an unprecedented one terabyte of data to earth each day.
• October - The British House of Lords is replaced by the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom as the highest appellate court in the country.^[37]
• October - RFSA's Phobos-Grunt, sample return from Phobos.
• October 2 - The host city of the 2016 Summer Olympics will be announced at the 121st Session (which will also be the XIIIth Olympic Congress) of the International Olympic Committee to be held in Copenhagen, Denmark.

November

• November - Singapore will host the 21st Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum.
• November - NASA's WISE mission will be launched. It will survey the entire sky in the infrared with far greater sensitivity than any previous mission ever has: over hundreds of millions of astronomical objects will be catalogued.^[38]
• November 30 – December 11 - The UNFCCC's COP15 Copenhagen 2009 conference will be held in Copenhagen, Denmark.^[39]

December

• December 10 - On STS-130, the Space Shuttle Endeavour will deliver and install the Node 3 and the Cupola on the International Space Station.
• December 12 - The Oasis of the Seas cruise ship will make its maiden voyage. When completed it will be the largest passenger ship ever built, carrying 5,400 passengers.
• December 21 – Triple conjunction of Jupiter and Neptune, Jupiter 34' south. Last of three triple conjunctions of Jupiter and Neptune.

Unknown dates

• Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro, and possibly Ukraine and Georgia will join NATO program Membership Action Plan, the last step before full membership.
• East African Community to implement a common currency called the East African shilling.
• First flight of the SpaceX Dragon commercial manned orbital spacecraft.

Deaths

See main article: Deaths in 2009.

January

• January 1 - Nizar Rayan, Palestinian military and political leader (b. 1959)
• January 1 - Johannes Mario Simmel, Austrian writer (b. 1924)
• January 1 - Helen Suzman, South African activist and politician (b. 1917)
• January 3 - Pat Hingle, American actor (b. 1924)
• January 11 - Pio Laghi, Italian Roman Catholic Cardinal (b. 1922)
• January 12 - Claude Berri, French film director (b. 1934)
• January 12 - Arne Næss, Norwegian philosopher (b. 1912)
• January 13 - Patrick McGoohan, Irish-American actor (b. 1928)
• January 14 - Ricardo Montalbán, Mexican-American actor (b. 1920)
• January 15 - Said Seyam, Palestinian politician (b. 1957)
• January 16 - Andrew Wyeth, American painter (b. 1917)
• January 20 - Stéphanos II Ghattas, Egyptian Patriarch of Alexandria (b. 1920)
• January 27 - John Updike, American writer (b. 1932)
• January 27 - R. Venkataraman, 8th President of India (b. 1910)
• January 30 - Ingemar Johansson, Swedish boxer (b. 1932)

February

• February 6 - James Whitmore, American actor (b. 1921)
• February 9 - Eluana Englaro, Italian patient in right-to-die case (b. 1970)
• February 18 - Kamila Skolimowska, Polish hammer thrower (b. 1982)
• February 23 - Sverre Fehn, Norwegian architect (b. 1924)
• February 25 - Philip José Farmer, American writer (b. 1918)
• February 27 - Manea Mănescu, Romanian Prime Minister (b. 1916)

March

• March 2 - João Bernardo Vieira, President of Guinea-Bissau (b. 1939)

Awards

Nobel Prizes

• Chemistry - to be announced
• Economics - to be announced
• Literature - to be announced
• Peace - to be announced
• Physics - to be announced
• Physiology or Medicine - to be announced

Major Religious holidays

• January 6 - Christmas in most Armenian Apostolic Churches of Christianity.
• January 7 - Christmas in most Eastern Orthodox Churches of Christianity.
• January 14 - Pongal
• January 26 - Lunar New Year
• February 23 - Shivaratri
• February 25 - Ash Wednesday
• March 11 - Holi
• April 3 - Ramanavami
• April 8 - Passover begins
• April 12 - Easter for Western Christians
• April 19 - Easter for many Eastern Christians
• May 2 - Buddha's Birthday
• May 8 - Buddha Purnima / Vaisakhi Purnima
• May 28 - Shavuot begins
• August 6 - Raksha Bandhan
• August 14 - Krishna Janmashtami
• August 23 - Ganesh Chaturthi
• September 2 - Onam
• September 18 - Rosh Hashannah begins
• September 19 - Navratri begins
• September 20 - Eid al-Fitr
• September 27 - Yom Kippur begins
• September 28 - Dussehra
• October 2 - Sukkot begins
• October 17 - Diwali
• November 1 - All Saints' Day for Roman Catholics
• November 27 - Eid al-Adha
• December 11 - Hanukkah begins
• December 25 - Christmas in Western Christianity and some Eastern Orthodox Churches.

In fiction

Computer and video games

Set in 2009:

• Mega Man 2 and Mega Man in Dr. Wily's Revenge
• Abuse^[40] (1996)
• Incoming (1998)
• Dino Crisis (1999)
• (2001), the Plant chapter occurs on April 29 and April 30, causing devastation to New York City from its coast, when Arsenal Gear crash lands into Federal Hall.
• (2005): Storyline begins on August 31, 2009.
• Indigo Prophecy (also known as Fahrenheit in some regions) (2005)
• Shattered Union (2005): U.S. President David Jefferson Adams is elected in a sham election, and becomes the most unpopular president in U.S. history.
• (2006), takes place between April 2009 and March 2010.
• Splinter Cell Double Agent (2006)
• Army of Two-portion of game set in 2009.

Film

• Freejack (1992), in November^[41]
• 2009 Lost Memories (2002)
• I Am Legend (2007): The events triggering the story begin around Winter of 2009.
• Cloverfield (2008): On May 22, the events of the story take place.
• Eagle Eye (2008): The events of the movie take place between January 26, 2009 and April 12, 2009.

Television

• Macross (1982-1983) (adapted outside Japan as the first part of Robotech): The alien Zentradi arrive at Earth on February 7 (February 9 in Robotech), triggering the devastating Space War I or First Robotech War.
• Family Matters: In the 1994 episode "Father of the Bride", Carl Winslow sleeps for fifteen years and wakes up in the year 2009 where main characters Steve Urkel and Laura Winslow are married with four children.
• Charmed ("Morality Bites," 1999) Phoebe Halliwell is executed on February 26 by burning at the stake for murdering a man with her powers.
• Batman Beyond (1999 - 2001): In the episode "Out of the Past," it is revealed that sometime in 2009, Batman fought Ra's al Ghul in an incident they referred to as "The Near-Apocalypse of 09." An incident that Ra's has started.
• Blue Gender (1999-2000): A vicious new disease breaks out forcing Yuji Kaido and other infected humans into cryogenic stasis until a cure can be found.
• Dark Angel (2000-2002): Max Guevara and her "brothers and sisters" escape from Manticore in 2009. America is devastated by an electromagnetic pulse later in the same year.
• Ultraman Nexus (2004-2005) is set in 2009, acting as a sequel to the 2004 film Ultraman: The Next which was set in its production year.
• The West Wing ("The Ticket," 2005): Former President Jed Bartlet opens his presidential library in New Hampshire and chats with some of his former staffers.
• 2007 television series The Sarah Jane Adventures is set in this time, the earliest January following "a year and a half" after Doctor Who episode "School Reunion".
• The Doctor Who episode Last of the Time Lords is set mainly in this year. Also Series 4 of the show is set in 2009 with the episode Partners In Crime, The Sontaran Strategem/The Poison Sky and The Stolen Earth/Journey's End. The events of the Turn Left parallel universe takes place partly here too.

Books

• Wilson Tucker, The Year of the Quiet Sun (1970)
• Gregory Benford, Threads of Time^[42] (1974)
• David Brin, The Postman (1985)

Notes and References

1. Web site: News Release - IAU0606: The International Astronomical Union announces the International Year of Astronomy 2009. October 27, 2006. International Astronomical Union. 2008-11-01.
2. Web site: The International Year of Astronomy 2009. IYA2009. 2008-11-01.
3. Web site: Europeans shiver as Russia cuts gas shipments.
4. Web site: Warning over new US travel rules.
5. News: Somali joy as Ethiopians withdraw. 2009-01-13. BBC News. News article. 2. 2009-01-25.
6. http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/local&id=6606410 Scott Curkin. "Gov't official says 'bird strike' cause of crash." WABC. New York. Online. January 15, 2009.
7. Ruane. Michael. D.C.'s Inauguration Head Count: 1.8 Million. 2009-01-22. 2009-01-20. Washington Post.
8. News: Obama orders Guantanamo closure. 2009-01-22. BBC. News video. 1. 2009-01-22.
9. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2009%5C01%5C26%5Cstory_26-1-2009_pg14_2
10. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601116&sid=a_4iKnLHRml4&refer=africa
11. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/27/iceland-prime-minister-resignation
12. http://www.forbes.com/2009/01/28/imf-economic-growth-markets-equity-0128_markets40.html
13. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123336413128735469.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
14. http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iBj6MsyOdONqr7VqosMUuNKXJGPAD962RK7O0
15. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article5627522.ece
16. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/iranian-satellite-launch-prompts-fresh-concern-1545013.html
17. http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/global-warming/bushfires-threaten-homes/2009/02/07/1233423538280.html
18. http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/global-warming/blackouts-bushfires-and-deaths-feared/2009/02/06/1233423496747.html
19. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/08/2485420.htm
20. http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/feb/08/global-warming-weather-science
21. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/world/asia/10pstan.html
22. http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=6860864
23. Web site: Tsvangirai sworn in Zimbabwe PM. 2009-02-11. BBC News. BBC. 2009-02-11.
24. News: Darwin the naturalist left evolutionary mark. Porter. Mary Jean. 2009-01-28. The Pueblo Chieftain. 2009-01-28.
25. Web site: Call for public holiday to celebrate Darwin. 2009-01-22. MSNBC/Associated Press. 2009-01-29.
26. News: Evolution can coexist with God. Sharma. Mukul. 2009-01-23. Economic Times. 2009-01-29.
27. http://www.buffalonews.com/home/story/577959.html
28. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123450692271581811.html
29. http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=6894843
30. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article5804954.ece
31. http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/africa/03/02/guineabissau.general/index.html
32. Web site: Gunmen shoot Sri Lanka cricketers. 3 March 2009. BBC News. 3 March 2009.
33. Web site: http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUS123622821727. 4 March 2009. Reuters. 4 March 2009.
34. http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=556&ArticleID=6050&l=en
35. http://archive.gulfnews.com/articles/08/06/09/10219878.html Burj Dubai completion delayed by another eight to nine months
36. http://burjdubai.com/MediaCenter/PressReleases/2008September01.asp Burj Dubai now a record 688 meters tall and continues to rise
37. http://www.justice.gov.uk/news/announcement_081007c.htm Written Statement of the Lord Chancellor and Justice Secretary regarding the Supreme Court
38. Web site: NASA's Shuttle and Rocket Missions. NASA.
39. http://www.cop15.dk/en COP15, United Nations Climate Change Conference, Copenhagen 2009
40. http://www.allgame.com/game.php?id=709
41. http://crudefutures.typepad.com/crude_futures/2006/02/park_slope_2009.html
42. http://books.google.com/books?id=9kyyAAAAIAAJ&dq=Threads+of+Time&q=2009&pgis=1#search_anchor