Space Shuttle Discovery lifting off

The Space Shuttle was a partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from April 12, 1981, to July 21, 2011, by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in the United States. Launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, five Space Shuttle orbiter vehicles flew on a total of 135 missions during 30 years. They conducted science experiments in orbit, helped build the International Space Station, and launched numerous satellites, interplanetary probes, and the Hubble Space Telescope. Four fully operational orbiters were initially built: Columbia, Challenger, Discovery (pictured), and Atlantis. Lost in mission accidents were Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003, with a total of fourteen astronauts killed. A fifth operational orbiter, Endeavour, was built in 1991 to replace Challenger. The Space Shuttle was retired from service upon the conclusion of Atlantis's final flight. ( Full article...)

Australian advertisement of Aloha from Hawaii via Satellite

• ... that Elvis Presley's concert Aloha from Hawaii via Satellite (advertisement pictured) took place at midnight in Hawaii to match the prime time of its target audience in Asia and Oceania?
• ... that Charles Scott Napier graduated from the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in 1916, but could not be sent overseas until he turned nineteen in 1918?
• ... that the Turkish government forced the last monks of Vazelon Monastery to leave in 1923, more than one thousand years after the monastery first opened?
• ... that Marion Miley, a 1930s amateur golfer ranked second in the United States, was murdered at the age of 27?
• ... that the tourist submarine Windermere operated for only two seasons on her namesake lake in Cumbria, England?
• ... that Vikram Phadnis designed around 800 costumes for the Bollywood film Salaam-e-Ishq?
• ... that attending the first Women in Print Conference inspired Carol Seajay to create Feminist Bookstore News?
• ... that The Top 100 Drugs can fit in a pocket?

La Soufrière eruption

• In golf, Hideki Matsuyama wins the Masters Tournament.
• In horse racing, Minella Times wins the Grand National, with Rachael Blackmore becoming the first female jockey to win in the race's 182-year history.
• The volcano La Soufrière erupts (pictured) in Saint Vincent, forcing the evacuation of around 20,000 people.
• Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, the consort of Queen Elizabeth II, dies at the age of 99.
• Archaeologists announce the discovery of the ancient Egyptian city of Aten.

April 12: Cosmonautics Day in Russia ( 1961); Yuri's Night

Yuri Gagarin

• 627 – King Edwin of Northumbria was baptised by Bishop Paulinus of York.
• 1831 – Broughton Suspension Bridge near Manchester, England, collapsed, reportedly because of mechanical resonance induced by troops marching in step across the bridge.
• 1861 – Confederate forces began bombarding Fort Sumter in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina, starting the American Civil War.
• 1961 – Aboard Vostok 1, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin (pictured) performed the first human spaceflight, completing one orbit of Earth in 108 minutes.
• 2013 – Four Chadian soldiers were killed in a suicide bombing by jihadist rebels in Kidal, Mali.