Chronology year 1983

5 min read

ARPANET migrates to the TCP/IP protocol, a fundamental step towards the creation of the modern internet.
The Kīlauea volcano in Hawaii erupts — one of the longest on record, lasting until 2018.
Launch of the IRAS satellite (Infrared Astronomical Satellite), the first orbital infrared telescope, which discovers new comets and evidence of other solar systems.
The UK is hit by red rain caused by Saharan sand carried through the atmosphere.
The Seikan tunnel, in Japan, connects the islands of Honshu and Hokkaido for the first time — with the longest underwater section in the world at the time.
The single Down Under by the band Men at Work tops the music charts.

Death of singer and drummer Karen Carpenter, from the duo The Carpenters, due to complications from anorexia nervosa, at the age of 32.
The Ash Wednesday bushfires in Australia destroy around 2,000 homes and kill 75 people.
The Nellie massacre takes place in India: more than 2,000 Muslims are killed during the Assam Movement.
Michael Jackson's Thriller album remains at number 1 on the Billboard for 37 weeks, setting a world record.
The final episode of MASH* is watched by 105.9 million viewers in the USA — an all-time record for a TV show at the time.

A tornado hits Los Angeles with winds of up to 157 mph — the most destructive in California history.
Sony and Philips launch the first CD players in the USA, revolutionizing the music industry.
Chuck Hull invents stereolithography — the basis of modern 3D printing.
Fainting epidemic affects up to 1,000 young people in the West Bank; subsequent investigations point to mass hysteria.
Magnitude 5.5 earthquake in Popayán, Colombia, kills 267 people.

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament protest in Berkshire, UK: tens of thousands form a 14-mile human chain between three nuclear weapons centers.
Biggest cash robbery in British history to date: £6 million is taken at gunpoint from a Security Express van.
Astronauts Peterson and Musgrave perform the first spacewalk of the space shuttle program (mission STS-6), lasting more than four hours.
David Copperfield surprises by making the Statue of Liberty "disappear" in a televised presentation.
The German magazine Stern announces the discovery of alleged Hitler diaries — later confirmed to be forgeries.
The Pioneer 10 probe crosses the orbit of Pluto, becoming the first spacecraft to go beyond the solar system.

Magnitude 6.5 earthquake hits Coalinga, California.
Two independent scientific studies confirm that AIDS is caused by the retrovirus HIV.
David Bowie's single Let's Dance reaches number one in the US and UK simultaneously — the artist's only single to do so.
Return of the Jedi is released and becomes the highest-grossing film of 1983.
An earthquake in the Sea of Japan generates a tsunami that kills 100 people.

Fire in the bathroom of Air Canada Flight 797 kills 23 people; the episode leads to the mandatory adoption of smoke detectors and emergency lighting on planes.
A message in a bottle found in Queensland, Australia, had been written 73 years earlier by a passenger on the SS Arawatta.
In the United Kingdom general elections, Margaret Thatcher is re-elected prime minister.
NASA's STS-7 mission uses a robotic arm to recover a satellite from orbit for the first time.
The Soviet Soyuz T-9 mission is launched, taking cosmonauts Vladimir Lyakhov and Aleksandr Aleksandrov to the Salyut 7 station.

Athlete Calvin Smith, from the USA, breaks the world record for the 100 meter dash, crossing the line in 9.93 seconds.
The arcade game Mario Bros. is released in Japan by Nintendo.
Australian aviator Dick Smith completes his first solo trip around the world by helicopter.
A girl is born by cesarean section in Virginia, despite her mother having suffered brain death 84 days earlier.

Hurricane Alicia hits Texas, killing 22 people and causing billions of dollars in damage.
Military coup in Guatemala: Óscar Humberto Mejía Victores overthrows dictator Efraín Ríos Montt.
Samantha Druce, 12 years old, becomes the youngest person to swim across the English Channel, in 15 hours and 27 minutes.

Korean Airlines Flight 007 is shot down by a Soviet Su-15 fighter over the Sea of Japan, killing all 269 people on board.
President Ronald Reagan announces that GPS will be made available to the civilian public.
The rock band Kiss appears for the first time on MTV without traditional makeup.
117 people die when Gulf Air Flight 771 crashes in the United Arab Emirates.
The Soviet nuclear warning system triggers a false alarm of an American attack; Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov decides not to report the alert, avoiding a possible catastrophe.

Richard Noble sets the world land speed record at 1,047 km/h in the Thrust2 car in the Nevada desert.
Paul McCartney releases the album Pipes of Peace in the United Kingdom.
More than a million people march in London against nuclear weapons.
400,000 protest in Brussels against the stockpiling of missiles in Central Europe.
First release of Microsoft Word, for MS-DOS.
The US invades Grenada to prevent Soviet-Cuban expansion on the island.
More than 550,000 people protest in The Hague, Netherlands, against nuclear missiles.
First democratic elections in Argentina after seven years of military dictatorship.

American cruise missiles arrive in the United Kingdom, at RAF Greenham Common.
In Liverpool, Janet Walton gives birth to six girls after fertility treatment — the first all-female sextuplets to survive.
Aeroflot Flight 6833 is hijacked in Soviet Georgia; the crisis lasts two days and ends with the intervention of special forces.
The film The Day After — a fictional portrayal of a nuclear war — is shown on American TV, shocking the public.
Tycoon Alfred Heineken, kidnapped since November 9, is released by police in Amsterdam.

The music video for Michael Jackson's Thriller premieres on MTV, revolutionizing the format of music videos.
First successful heart and lung transplant simultaneously at Harefield hospital, England.
93 people die when two jets collide on the runway at Madrid airport.
A truck bomb hits the American Embassy in Kuwait; five other simultaneous explosions are attempted in the same city.
The Who announce their split for the first time.
A car bomb explodes outside Harrods in London, killing six people — attack claimed by the IRA.