Is Britain prepared for more wildfires? | The Week UK

A series of wildfires destroyed homes and swathes of land across the UK as the country contended with record-high temperatures.

Scores of major incidents were announced by fire brigades across the country as blazes broke out in the 40C-plus heatwave.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan said it was the busiest day for the London Fire Brigade since the Second World War – it received more than 2,600 calls on Tuesday, seven times the usual number. Khan told Sky News that a total of 41 properties had been destroyed in fires across the capital.

Experts have warned that the UK will need to learn how to deal with wildfires, as the number recorded this year is double that of 2021, according to data seen by The Times.

As of Tuesday there had been 420 fires in England and Wales since the start of the year, according to the National Fire Chiefs Council, by far outstripping the 247 in the whole of 2021, and 200 the year before that.

Will the UK face more wildfires?

Conditions were “ripe” for wildfires as temperatures reached a new record high of 40.3C, said ITV.

Speaking to the broadcaster, Dr Thomas Smith, assistant professor in environmental geography at London School of Economics (LSE), said: “The fire risk was extreme, with record-breaking temperatures accompanied by very low relative humidity, this coming on top of a very long spell without rain. This can lead to extreme fire behaviour with fast-spreading fires burning with high intensity (large flames), making it very difficult to fight.”

And as the climate continues to warm, the extreme temperatures we saw earlier this week are likely to become more frequent, increasing the likelihood of fires, with experts warning that the UK could become more susceptible to the kinds of fires seen in Wennington, east London, where houses are close to patches of vegetation.

These types of fires are known as “Wildfire Urban Interface fires”, said Dr Rory Hadden, Rushbrook senior lecturer in fire investigation, University of Edinburgh. “Usually in the UK large wildfires are confined to relatively remote areas such as heath and moorland," Dr Hadden said.

Fires and frost: French wine industry hit by wildfires and 'historic' low ...

France’s wine industry had already been hit by forecasts that this year’s harvest could be “the smallest vintage for at least 50 years”, Decanter reported earlier this month. Now vineyards in the south-east of the country are assessing the damage from “heartbreaking” wildfires.

A blaze broke out last week in the Var region, located between Provence and the French Riviera, which forced thousands of people to evacuate. Spread by strong winds, the wildfires were mostly in forests, but several rosé wine-growing areas were also badly affected, the BBC reported.

The CIVP, Provence’s wine producers’ association, said it was unclear how much damage had been caused. But on Thursday, the National Federation of Agricultural Workers’ Unions in France estimated that 73 wineries and five cooperatives were affected, though not necessarily damaged, Food&Wine said.

Fires are a regular occurrence in the south of France, but they are usually “smaller and quickly contained”, Decanter said. More than 1,200 firefighters worked to contain the blaze, which “ravaged” 7,100 hectares of land and caused two deaths.

Philip Collins, a writer for the New Statesman, was on holiday at a French farmhouse when the fire hit. “I felt as if I was in a scene from a disaster movie,” he said.

‘All our life’s work is put at risk’

Maison Mirabeau, a Provence vineyard that produces rosé, was one winery hit by the fires, Sky News reports. The vineyard’s British owners Jeany and Stephen Cronk revealed the extent of the damage in a post on Instagram.

“The past few days have been heartbreaking to watch as the devastation has unfolded over Provence with fires sweeping across 7,000 hectares of land and protected forest,” they wrote. “We have been watching in agony and praying for our Domaine Mirabeau and the vineyards of our colleagues and partners in the area, as all our life’s work is put at risk by the raging fires.

“We are still assessing the impact of the fires on our estate, but for now we are pleased to share that everyone from Mirabeau, the animals and houses at the Domaine have been saved.”

‘Strenuous’ harvest ahead across the Med

It’s not just France that has seen its wine industry hit by wildfires. The “scorching and dramatic summer” around the Mediterranean has also caused “unprecedented destruction” in Turkey, Greece and southern Italy. “Producers in many of the countries’ wine regions have been forced to start planning for a strenuous harvest, upset by infrastructural damage, labour shortage and smoke taint,” Decanter said.

Fire is the latest problem to hit French wine producers this year, the BBC reports. In April “rare deep frosts” destroyed buds on grapevines in the vineyards of Bordeaux, Burgundy, the Languedoc and the Rhône valley.

The “devastating frosts and problems with mildew fungus” means France is facing a “historic” low in terms of harvest size in 2021, Decanter said. A preliminary forecast from the French government said production is likely to fall between 24% and 30% overall from last year. This would make 2021 the “smallest French wine harvest since at least 1970”.

Arizona wildfires: New fire prompts evacuations near Seligman

Ron Dungan

The Republic | azcentral.com

Find the latest news about wildfires across Arizona, including road closures, evacuation orders, fire weather alerts and what to watch for day by day.

July 12: Southeastern Arizona fire chars 3.2 square miles

Authorities say a wildfire burning mostly on state land in southeastern Arizona charred about 3.2 square miles in 12 hours.

The fire was reported about 10 p.m. Tuesday some 15 miles southeast of Sunizona and southwest of the Chiricahua National Monument in Cochise County.

Authorities say the flames have been fanned by gusty winds. The cause of the fire isn't immediately clear.

Authorities say there was zero percent containment as of late Wednesday afternoon.

They say 80 percent of the fire is on state land with 20 percent on Coronado National Forest land.

More than 150 firefighters are at the scene including nearly a dozen aircraft plus water tenders and engines.

The Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management is managing the wildfire with assistance from the Coronado National Forest.

Associated Press contributed to this article.

July 8: No evacuations near Daisy Mountain

Phoenix fire officials said there have been no evacuation orders issued in the Daisy Mountain and Black Canyon City area, and none are needed at this point.

Strong winds have pushed smoke from a nearby fire into the region and Phoenix Fire spokesman Larry Subervi said the department has been "inundated" with 911 calls from people asking if they need to evacuate because of smoke coming from the wildfire near the Interstate 17 at milepost 244.

Subervi said there is "no threat of fire at this time" but said anyone with health or respiratory problems that are sensitive to smoke can choose to leave the area or take other precautions.

The nearest fire to the area appears to be the Brooklyn Fire, burning six miles northeast of Black Canyon City.

The lightning-caused wildfire has burned nearly 36,000 acres since it started Friday afternoon and currently stands at five percent containment.

One hundred fire personnel are working to combat the fire, which officials said doesn't currently threaten any structures or wildlife. There are no evacuation orders under this fire.

July 8: New fire prompts evacuations near Seligman

The Limestone Fire that started Saturday evening prompted officials to evacuate residents nine miles west of Seligman in the Bridge Canyon subdivision, the Arizona State Forestry said.

The fire was sparked by a lightning strike at about 5:45 p.m., spokeswoman Tiffany Davila said.

July 8: Heat poses challenge for Tucson wildfire

Officials say extreme heat will challenge firefighters battling a wildfire in the Santa Catalina Mountains overlooking Tucson.

High temperatures in the Tucson area are expected to range from 109 to 114 on Thursday and Friday. Fire management team spokeswoman Sandra Lopez said heat limits what firefighters can do and carry, while restricting the use of aircraft.

An anticpated weather change by Saturday is expected to help firefighters by increasing moisture and producing rainfall.

The fire has burned more than 38 square miles, and its perimeter is 11 percent contained. The summer-retreat community of Summerhaven atop Mount Lemmon remains evacuated.

Nearly 700 personnel are assigned to the fire, which started Friday. Its cause remains under investigation.

Associated Press contributed to this article.

July 4: Burro Fire rages northeast of Tucson

Frye Fire

Lightning started the Frye Fire on June 7. About 648 officials have been combating the fire that has burned approximately 46,760 acres. The fire is 45% contained, according to Coronado National Forest officials.

Officials say they're estimating that the fire will be fully contained by July 30.

Burro Fire

The Burro Fire is still raging northeast of Tuscon. The fire has burned 19,057 acres and is zero percent contained, according to the Coronado National Forest.

There are 469 people fighting the fire that started on June 30.

Officials said that "zero containment doesn't mean zero effort," as firefighters have stopped the fire's advance on the south side, and made contingency plans to protect structures in areas where the fire might advance.

An evacuation order remains in place for residents along the Catalina Highway up to Summerhaven, said the Coronado National Forest.

Officials said a stage 2 fire restriction has been implemented in the forest, which prohibits building a fire, using an explosive, smoking outside of a building or car, firing a weapon and driving a vehicle off road.

Fireworks are also prohibited year-round on all federal lands, according to the Coronado National Forest.

Goodwin Fire

The Goodwin Fire is 91% contained and expected to be fully contained by July 13, according to the Prescott National Forest.

Officials said the cause is still under investigation, but the fire started sometime during the afternoon of June 24.

Forest service officials continued to warm the public of the dangers of flying drones in a area close to a wildfire.

The Prescott National Forest stated that, "[It's] illegal, endangers aviators as well as crews on the ground, and slows operations which potentially could result in the fire increasing in size."

Flying a drone near a wildfire can result in large fines up to $25,00 and jail time, according to officials.

July 3: Community on Mount Lemmon evacuated

Summerhaven, a small community on Mount Lemmon, was ordered to be evacuated beginning at 6 a.m. July 3.

No residents will be allowed back into the community, which includes part-time residents and cabin owners, until the order is lifted, Coronado National Forest officials said.

The fire had grown to 14,000 acres.

Goodwin Fire

Yavapai County Sheriff's Office announced that several evacuation orders had been lifted.

Residents of Walker, Potato Patch, Mount Union, Mountain Pine Acres, Pine Flat (Forest Road 177) and the west side of Poland Junction just south of Mayer were allowed back in their communities in the morning, and residents of Breezy Pines (Forest Road 58) were to be allowed back into their homes after noon.

Because the fire was still active, residents were urged to remain vigilant and monitor fire news.

The Yavapai County Sheriff Office urged residents whose wells may have been affected to avoid the use of water for cooking or consumption until the water was tested by the county health department.

July 2: Burro Fire grows to 5,000 acres

Evacuations have been ordered in the area of the Burro Fire northeast of Tucson, and a Type 1 Incident Management Team was assigned to take control of the fire on July 2.

The fire started about 10:30 a.m. June 30, according to Coronado National Forest officials.

Officials say the fire is in the foothills of Redington Pass near Burro Tank. The fire has burned 5,000 acres, primarily high grass and brush.

Redington Road is closed from milepost 2 to 14. The Mount Lemmon Highway is now closed from the base to the Palisades area.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

Goodwin Fire

The greatest potential for fire growth continues to be on the north and northwest portions of the fire, burning 14 miles southwest of Prescott in Yavapai County. Fire crews are working July 2 to complete burnout operations and to hold the line on the northwest side of the fire to prevent threats to Breezy Pines and Walker.

The fire has consumed 27,327 acres.

Frye Fire

The Frye Fire continues to burn in steep rugged terrain on the slopes of Mount Graham in the Pinaleno Mountain Range, growing to 45,154 acres in size on July 2, according to Coronado National forest officials.

The day's goal is to keep the fire confined to National Forest System lands and keep it from burning onto adjoining state and private lands. Monsoon moisture will be on the rise as the week progresses, with daily afternoon and evening thunderstorms possible.

July 1: Goodwin Fire over 25,000 acres

The Goodwin Fire just south of Prescott has reached 25,714 acres as of 7:40 a.m. Saturday, according to the InciWeb.

Several communities are under evacuation orders today including Blue Hills, Upper Blue Hills, Dewey and all areas west of SR 69 south to mile post 280, according to the Yavapai County Sheriff's Office.

There are 1,222 personnel working on the fire and it is currently 44 percent contained.

Crews today will be working in the Breezy Pines area, trying to stop any northward movement of the fire.

The cause of this fire is still unknown.

Gentry Fire

The Gentry fire located in the Black Mesa Ranger District of the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests has reached over 400 acres as of Saturday morning.

The fire, caused by lighting, is 10 percent contained with 212 personnel working to put out the fire.

Crews are mainly working with tall grass, brush, high temperatures and low humidity.

Swisshelms Fire

According to the Arizona State Forestry, the Swisshelms fire has burned almost 8,000 acres.

Gusty winds are adding to the dynamic fire behavior.

The Swisshelms Fire just east of Elfrida has grown to 7,250 acres since June 27, burning in tall grass and brush. The fire is 25 percent contained.

Crews are worried about high temperatures and low humidity that increase the potential for dynamic fire behavior.

June 29: New: Gentry Fire burns near Forest Lakes and Heber-Overgaard

The Gentry Fire has grown to about 100 acres Thursday since it was sparked by lightning on Wednesday, the U.S. Forest Service said.

The fire is burning about 5 miles south of Forest Lakes and 10 miles south of Heber-Overgaard.

Crews were working to protect the Gentry Lookout station on Thursday using Forest Road 300 as a holding line to the south and Forest Road 86 to the north. Forest Road 86 was closed and sections of Forest Road 300 may eventually be closed, the U.S. Forest Service said.

No other structures were threatened.

If conditions allow, the fire may burn out another 400 acres on Thursday night and help burn the dead and downed materials left over from the massive Rodeo-Chediski Fire in 2002.

That fire forced evacuations in Heber-Overgaard and other communities along the Mogollon Rim, destroyed several hundred homes and scorched about 470,000 acres.

The Gentry Fire burnout will help reduce the risk of another high-intensity wildfire.

June 28: Ducey declares Goodwin Fire 'top priority'

In a series of tweets Wednesday morning, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey said he wanted to assure Yavapai County residents that the state's attention and resources were focused on containing the Goodwin Fire, which had burned more than 20,600 acres and was 1 percent contained.

"I want the residents of Yavapai County to know the #GoodwinFire is the state's top priority right now," Ducey tweeted.

UPDATES: Find out the latest evacuations, closures from the Goodwin Fire

June 27: Goodwin Fire prompts Mayer evacuations; main highway closed

Officials on Tuesday ordered the town of Mayer evacuated because of a fast-moving Arizona wildfire that has burned nearly 4,500 acres.

The evacuations initially were ordered for everything west of Main Street in Mayer but later included the entire community, the Yavapai County Sheriff's Office said.

Mayer is home to about 1,400 residents.

Evacuations also were ordered in the Breezy Pines subdivision, the area north of the Goodwin-Mayer Road/County Road 177, and west of Highway 69 from Mayer to Poland Junction, according to the Yavapai County Sheriff's Office.

In addition, Chaparral Hills and Poland Junction Proper were ordered evacuated late Tuesday afternoon. The fire still was west of those communities.

The evacuations do not include areas east of Highway 69, which was closed Tuesday in both directions between Interstate 17 at Cordes Junction and the State Route 169 junction because of the fire on Tuesday.

SR 169 between Prescott Valley and I-17 and SR 89 via U.S. 60 and U.S. 93 through Wickenburg are alternate routes, the Arizona Department of Transportation said.

An earlier evacuation order for the community of Pine Flat is still in place, officials said.

Pre-evacuation notices have been ordered for Walker, Potato Patch, Mountain Pine Acres and Mount Union.

Motorists traveling to or from the Prescott area should research conditions, according to the Arizona Department of Transportation.

Go to the Arizona traveler Information site at az511.gov, call 511 or follow ADOT on Twitter @ArizonaDOT.

Frye Fire

Buildings at the Mount Graham International Observatory escaped harm in the Frye Fire, which has burned more than 38,000 acres in southeast Arizona, but the condition of the telescopes inside is unknown.

"The Forest Service did a great job of fighting the fire back,” said observatory director Eric Buckley. The fire has moved away from buildings and is now burning along Arizona 366, cutting off access to the observatory, Buckley said.

“We just haven’t had a chance to get the technicians and the engineers in those buildings.” Buckley said.

“Telescopes are very, very delicate instruments. Telescopes and heat don’t get along very well … but honestly we just don’t know yet,” he said.

Most of the fire has been within the burn scar of the Nuttall Complex Fire, which scorched about 29,000 acres in 2004.

June 26: Goodwin Fire grows to 1,500 acres

The Goodwin Fire burning about 14 miles south of Prescott had scorched nearly 1,500 acres as of Monday night, officials said.

Fire crews had been order to pull back efforts temporarily Monday as conditions deteriorated, but suppression efforts resumed as conditions improved.

An evacuation order was in place for the community of Pine Flat and a pre-evacuation order for residents of Breezy Pines.

A community information meeting is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at Mayer High School in Spring Valley.

The fire began Saturday afternoon in the Prescott National Forest and has resulted in the closure of numerous county and forest roads in the area. The cause was under investigation.

Frye Fire

Firefighters continued to battle the Frye Fire in southeast Arizona, which has burned more than 38,000 acres. Firefighters have had some success to the east and northeast edges of the blaze, which is burning in the burn scar of the 2004 Nuttall Complex Fire.

Firefighters are trying to keep the fire contained to the burn scar, building fire lines to protect cabins and other structures in the area.

Wind and dry weather remain a concern and could cause the fire to expand, according to a press release updating the fire's progress.

Beeline Highway

Another fire just northeast of Fountain Hills led the Arizona Department of Transportation to close one southbound lane of State Route 87 southbound Monday evening.

The brush fire was near Mile Marker 208, about eight miles south of Sunflower.

David Albo, spokesman for the Tonto National Forest, said the fire had burned 275 acres as of Monday evening and the cause was under investigation. Roughly 70 people were working to combat the fire.

Albo said ground crews were working to establish containment lines, and aircraft and helicopters were used to slow the fire's spread.

June 23: Arizona declares emergency in response to wildfires

Gov. Doug Ducey declared a state of emergency on Friday in response to the growing number of wildfires in Arizona and directed additional resources be made available for fire-suppression efforts.

The declaration authorizes the release of $200,000 in emergency funds and requests the State Emergency Council provide fire officials with additional resources as needed to combat the fires.

As of Friday afternoon, there were 14 active wildfires around Arizona, the largest of which is the Frye Fire that has burned through more than 21,000 acres of land near Safford.

The lightning-caused fire started on June 7 and was 10 percent contained as of Friday afternoon. Crews expect the fire to be fully contained by July 30.

June 23: Coconino Forest beefs up fire restrictions

Although campfire restrictions were in place last weekend on Coconino National Forest, 34 people had fires anyway, and abandoned them, according to a press release from the U.S. Forest Service.

The agency will move forward with stage two restrictions, in an effort to further protect the forest. Coconino now has restrictions on smoking, shooting, woodcutting, blow-torching, off-driving and blowing things up.

Because a hot muffler on dry grass is one of many ways you can accidentally start a fire, the Forest Service is asking the public to be careful when picking a campsite.

The restrictions went into effect Thursday and will remain in effect until the state gets some rain. Violations are punishable by a fine of up to $5,000, six months in prison, or both.

June 21: Encino Fire destroys 4 homes

The Encino Fire burning in Sonoita has burned four homes and spread to about 1,300 acres since it sparked on Tuesday.

Another 122 homes are threatened, according to Chief Joseph De Wolf of the Sonoita-Elgin Fire District.

One firefighter with the U.S. Forest Service suffered a broken ankle and was transported to a Tucson hospital Tuesday evening, De Wolf said.

Wolf said the upcoming heat of the day would pose a significant challenge but that his goal was to have residents back in their homes by Wednesday night.

June 20: Evacuations issued in Sonoita

A new, "rapidly spreading" wildfire was sparked on Tuesday in southern Arizona, prompting officials to issue evacuation notices in Sonoita, a small area about 50 miles southeast of Tucson.

The notices were issued for residents on Boyd, Toledo and Terry roads, as well as Apache Trail, Holbrook Drive and all adjacent streets, according to the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Office.

"Last report received was of three homes that have been destroyed and many others remain threatened,'' the Sheriff's Office said on its Facebook page Tuesday night.

Officials said evacuees can find refuge at the Sonoita Fairgrounds or the Harvest Church at 3107 Highway 83.

No further details were immediately available.

June 18: Highline Fire evacuation orders lifted

The Highline Fire near Payson expanded by several hundred acres since Saturday and has now reached 6,092 acres with 60 percent containment as of Sunday afternoon, according to the Tonto National Forest.

The slow growth and large containment prompted officials to lift the evacuation and pre-evacuation orders for residents and local businesses in the Bonita Creek, La Cienega and Ellison Creek Estates north of the control road in the fire area, according to the Gila County Sheriff's Office.

Officials said the progress made in the last two days gave them confidence to deem evacuations unnecessary.

All road closures remain in effect around the perimeter of the fire, with officials only granting access to residents and local business traffic.

There are 1,243 fire personnel working on combating the fire.

Crews tonight will focus on the southeast portion of the fire above La Cienega and Ellison Creek Estates, officials said.

Structure protection groups will remain in place in the communities south of the fire, while crews on the northwest side of the fire will conduct burnout operations to limit fire movement north, officials said.

The Boundary Fire, burning on Kendrick Mountain 17 miles northwest of Flagstaff, has reached 7,367 acres and was 18 percent contained as of Sunday afternoon, according to officials with the Kaibab National Forest.

Just under 400 personnel were working to combat the fire on Sunday.

North winds overnight on Saturday pushed light smoke into some communities near Flagstaff early Sunday morning, but officials said most smoke was cleared by dawn.

Northeast winds on Sunday are expected to push smoke toward Williams and Bellemont, with officials advising individuals sensitive to smoke to stay indoors.

The closure on Highway 180 between mileposts 236 and 248 remains in effect.

June 17:

The Highline Fire near Payson has reached 5,737 acres with 44 percent containment as of Saturday morning, according to Mike Reichling from the Southwest Area Incident Management Team.

There are 1,240 working firefighters who made success on the east and west sides of the fire Friday night, Reichling said.

Ellison Creek and La Cienega estates are still under evacuation and will remain under evacuation today.

Bonita Creek will be under evacuation notice as of today.

Oficials also said humidity is "critically low" and temperatures are rising, so fire behavior may be very active.

Crews will be working on the north end of the fire today in hopes of containing it, according to officials.

June 16: Flames stop short of community

The Highline Fire made its way down the hills of Gila County and toward the Payson communities of La Cienega and Ellison Creek Estates on Thursday night, but stopped short of a fire line built near homes.

Calm and shifting winds on Friday and Saturday are expected to slow the fire's advance and redirect its spread, pushing the flames on top of each other.

"We expect them to push back up the canyon, pushing the fire into itself," a fire team spokesman said Friday morning.

Evacuation orders are still active for La Cienega and Ellison Creek Estates, though the emergency shelter at Payson High School stayed empty overnight. A few people checked in, stopping by for a free dinner or the latest fire update, but left to stay with family or friends.

The Highline Fire near Payson has reached 4,929 acres and 35 percent containment as of Friday morning.

There are 1,069 firefighters working on the Mogollon Rim, said Mike Reichling, public information officer for the Southwest Area Incident Management Team.

He added that the Mogollon Rim is a challenging area due to the changes in elevation.

Humidity percentage is in the single digits, which makes fire behavior "very erratic because of winds drying out fuels."

Firefighters will be working on the southeastern and western portions; however, they are concerned about using aircrafts.

Because of elevation and heat, aircrafts are limited in their abilities to drop water and retardant, Reichling said.

In addition, 10 people were evacuated from the southeastern side of the fire but three stayed, despite the evacuation orders, according to Reichling.

He said the three that stayed signed forms stating that they understand the risk.

June 15: Evacuations ordered after fires merge

The Highline Fire near Payson has merged with a second wildfire, the Bear Fire, and the combined blaze now has burned over 4,258 acres, officials said Thursday.

An evacuation order was later issued for La Cienega and Ellison Creek Estates northeast of Payson, according to the Tonto National Forest.

The order does not affect the Bonita Creek Estates community, which is still under a pre-evacuation notice.

The evacuations were prompted by "rapid fire movement towards the community," officials said, adding that they were concerned that the fire could reach the community overnight.

The evacuation order became effective 7:30 p.m. Thursday.

Residents will not be allowed in until the area is deemed safe again.

A Red Cross shelter is set up at the Payson High School. Large animals can be brought to the Payson Multi-Event Center.

The Highline Fire had been moving toward the Bear Fire, and the two merged Monday. They are now being managed as one fire, the Forest Service said in a press release.

The fire continues to challenge firefighters to the east as it burns in upper Ellison Canyon.

Updates for the Highline Fire can be found at @HighlineFire on Twitter.

June 14: Highline Fire near Payson expands

The 4-day-old Highline fire burned eastward through upper Moore Creek, onto the Myrtle Trail and into upper Ellison Creek as firefighters worked to suppress the flames overnight, officials reported Wednesday.

The fire north of Payson had expanded to more than 1,300 acres, officials said.

Crews used air tankers to slow the fire's progress above the Rim and used strategic fire operations south of the 300 Road at the Rim overnight. The blaze started about 8 miles north of Payson.

Moving forward, firefighters look to hold the fire north of the Highline Trail, south of the 300 Road and create a new line of protection at the head of Ellison Creek.

No evacuations are in effect, though the community of Bonita Creek remains under a precautionary pre-evacuation notice.

Updates for the Highline Fire can be found at @HighlineFire on Twitter.

June 13: Highline Fire lines hold

Crews strengthened fire lines along the north side of the Highline Fire on Tuesday. The U.S. Forest Service said in a press release that crews faced rolling debris and other hazards as they battled the fire, which is burning in steep terrain near Payson.

No evacuations are in effect, though the community of Bonita Creek remains under a precautionary pre-evacuation notice. A community meeting will take place at 6 p.m. Tuesday at the Starlight Pines Community Center in Blue Ridge.

Coconino National Forest and Kaibab National Forests will restrict campfires to developed campgrounds beginning Thursday. Campfires, charcoal and wood stoves are prohibited.

June 12: Fires keep communities on edge

Firefighters continued to battle the Highline Fire near Payson on Monday. The 750-acre blaze moved quickly up the Mogollon Rim when it started Saturday, and by Monday the Forest Service said in a press release that crews had 460 people working day and night for full suppression.

No evacuations were ordered, though a precautionary notice was issued for residents of Bonito Creek Canyon. A community meeting will take place 7 p.m. Monday, June 12 at the Payson High School auditorium, 301 S. McLane Road.

A cold front could bring high southwest winds to the fire, which is burning in rugged terrain with grass, thick brush, oak and ponderosa pine.

Firefighters were using helicopters, back burns and air tankers. Crews from the nearby Bear Fire battled spot fires north of Forest Road 300 and built a fire line with a bulldozer.

A number of trails in the area have been closed.

In southeast Arizona, the Lizard Fire continued to burn near Dragoon. Firefighters expected dry, windy conditions, which failed to materialize, giving them the opportunity to work the fire’s eastern flanks.

Evacuations were ordered Monday afternoon in the Cochise Stronghold area, beginning at the intersection of Cochise Stronghold and Ironwood Road and including everything west and south from there. A pre-evacuation will remain in the Redhead area, according to the Sheriff's Office.

The fire, which merged with the Dragoon Fire last week, has burned 14,954 acres and is 15 percent contained, according to InciWeb, a multi-agency web site dedicated to wildfire.

Helicopter water drops helped crews working to protect structures in the area.

The lightning-caused fire has 615 firefighters working toward suppression of the fire, which is burning near the communities of Dragoon, Pearce, Sunsites and Cochise Stronghold.

June 11: Highline Fire burns northwest of Payson

The Highline Fire, which ignited Saturday afternoon, spread to cover 750 acres near the Mogollon Rim on Sunday.

The expansion spurred Coconino National Forest closures, including Knoll Lake, the General Crook Trail and parts of the Cabin Loop Trail System.

Firefighters were "working around the clock" to suppress the fire, officials said, with units using hand crews, engines, water tenders, dozers, helicopters and air tankers.

No evacuation orders were in effect as of Sunday night.

June 11: Tee Fire burns near Black Canyon City

The Tee Fire began burning around 7 p.m. Saturday night about 4 miles away from Black Canyon City and near Table Mesa.

Tiffany Davila, a representative for Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management, told The Republic that the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office was working with the department to ensure nearby campers had evacuated the area. Davila said there weren't any nearby structures for the fire to endanger.

The fire's estimated to be roughly 700 acres.

June 10: 2 fires merge; power threatened

The Lizard Fire has merged with the Dragoon Fire in the Coronado National Forest east of Tucson and is moving south.

The Cochise County Sheriff's Office has evacuated residents south of Dragoon Road and in the Cochise Stronghold. Pre-evacuation warnings have been issued in other nearby areas.

Power lines in Cochise County are being threatened, and some of the lines may be shut off.

The fire has spread over 7,500 acres.

June 10: U.S. 180 north of Flagstaff still closed

In northern Arizona north of Flagstaff, U.S. 180 remains closed due to smoke from the Boundary Fire.

The lightning-caused fire is burning on the northeast side of Kendrick Peak and includes areas in both the Coconino and Kaibab national forests.

The fire has spread to 3,800 acres, according to fire officials. it is expected to remain active for the next few days as forecasts call for high winds.

June 8: Fires reported in southeast Arizona

Multiple fires have been reported in southeast Arizona. Five of them were "significant," said Dolores Garcia, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Land Management. Firefighters were battling some of them aggressively because of possible threats to homes and other structures. Among them is the Lizard Fire, which was spread over 3,500 acres on Thursday, June 8.

Meanwhile, increased winds near the Boundary Fire north of Flagstaff forced a closure of U.S. 180 between mileposts 236 and 248, according to a press release from the U.S. Forest Service.

The multiagency website InciWeb reported that access to the Ten of Diamonds area of the Black River was closed because of the Freeze 2 Fire. The closure includes access points from both Fort Apache Reservation and San Carlos Reservation. The fire is burning on the San Carlos side of the river.

The Antelope Fire, near Kingman, was also being watched closely because of "threats to homes," Garcia said.

Many of the fires were lightning-caused, though others remain under investigation.

June 7: Boundary Fire grows

The Boundary Fire began burning Wednesday afternoon 17 miles northwest of Flagstaff, officials said.

Lightning caused the fire to break out on the northeast side of Kendrick Peak in the Kendrick Mountain Wilderness just before 4:30 p.m.

As of Wednesday evening, the fire had consumed 450 acres and was being fueled by heavy dead and down trees as well as forest debris left from the Pumpkin Fire of 2000, officials said.

The fire was expected to move onto the Kaibab National Forest side of the boundary line within the next several days.

Increased winds are expected over the next few days in the area.

June 7: Slim Fire at 3,000 acres

The Slim Fire is burning about 4 miles north of Forest Lakes in the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests.

The lightning-caused fire was reported June 2 and had grown to about 3,000 acres by Wednesday evening, according to officials.

The fire, which was about 16 miles west of Heber, was burning in Ponderosa pine and mixed conifer.

The fire was 30 percent contained Wednesday, with 304 personnel battling the blaze.

The fire is expected to be fully contained by June 30.

Officials said a flight restriction is in effect over the area, which includes drones and unmanned aerial vehicles.

June 7: Snake Ridge Fire fully contained

A 15,333-acre wildfire near Happy Jack, southeast of Sedona, was fully contained as of Monday, officials said.

Firefighters began a burnout Sunday morning that they expected would last several days, according to officials.

Burnout activity began around 8 a.m. Sunday as firefighters attempted to contain the fire by mid-week. Crews plan to direct the fire to burn away from property and trail heads for another 15,000 acres for approximately two more weeks.

Smoke drifted toward the northern Arizona communities of Holbrook, Snowflake and Show Low on Sunday and Monday, officials said. Throughout the burnout, smoke was visible from communities along Lake Mary Road, State Routes 87 and 260, and other Verde Valley cities.

The fire ignited due to lightning on May 19 about nine miles northwest of Clints Well, around 10 miles southwest of Happy Jack.

The area around where the fire burned continues to be closed to the public, officials said.

June 2: Roads open near Kellogg Fire

Firefighters secured the perimeter of the Kellogg Fire and turned mop-up operations over to local crews on Friday. The fire burned 780 acres of grasslands near the southeast Arizona town of Sonoita, forcing road closures and evacuations. Two barns were burned in the wind-driven blaze, but evacuations have been lifted and roads have reopened.

“I think our crews got a good handle on it yesterday,” said Tiffany Davila, a spokeswoman for the Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management. The evacuations were largely a precaution because the fire was so close to residential areas.

“Anytime you’ve got a wind-driven fire. It can move pretty quick," Davila said.

June 2: Badger Fire nearly contained

Firefighters hoped to see 100 percent containment on the Badger Fire by nightfall, said Dolores Garcia, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. Both lanes of Interstate 17 north of Phoenix were open going into the weekend. Garcia said drivers may see some smoke in the area. She encouraged motorists to report smoke if they are unsure where it is coming from.

“We’re going to see, unfortunately, roadside fires, as long as there’s grass along the side of the road,” she said.

June 1: Kellogg Fire forces evacuations

A fast-moving brush fire that sparked Thursday afternoon in Sonoita burned about 250 acres within an hour of its start and forced 15 homes to evacuate, officials said.

The Kellogg Fire broke out about 1 p.m. just south of State Route 82 and north of Old Sonoita Highway, the latter of which is closed.

June 1: Badger Fire stop straffic

Separately, a brush fire alongside Interstate 17 near Cordes Junction brought traffic to a standstill on northbound lanes Thursday afternoon, officials said. The Badger Fire apparently started when a vehicle broke down and was forced to pull off to the side of the road, sparking dry vegetation about 2 p.m.

The fire, which burned more than 60 acres, was controlled in a few hours and the highway reopened about 4:30 p.m., officials said, after traffic backups reached 8 miles.

— Josiah Destin

June 1: Exploding balls fighting blazes

National forest crews have been fighting fire with fire in the last week by dropping combustible spheres that resemble ping-pong balls from helicopters to help control a lightning-caused blaze in Arizona.

The devices are filled with flammable substances that cause them to ignite once they hit the ground. By using the exploding balls, authorities didn’t have to send firefighters into unsafe and remote areas.

“The flammable spheres burn out in a circular pattern on the forest floor, as each circle of fire slowly grows they eventually burn into each other,” said Kaitlyn Webb, a spokesperson for Coconino National Forest.

The fire started on May 19 roughly 8 miles southwest of Happy Jack and has since covered more than 12.5 square miles, Incident Commander trainee Jason McElfresh said.

Authorities expect to soon have the fire contained.

— Associated Press

May 30: Restrictions in Prescott National Forest

Fire restrictions will go into effect in Prescott National Forest at 8 a.m. June 1. Campfires and charcoal and wood stoves will only be allowed in developed campsites and recreation sites with metal rings or grills until the ban is lifted.

Smoking is prohibited except in vehicles, buildings or developed recreation sites. Smokers are required to remain in an area at least three feet in diameter that is barren or cleared of all flammable materials.

Target shooting is also prohibited under the ban.

Dry, windy conditions and a number of abandoned campfires over the Memorial Day weekend led to the ban, the Forest Service said in a news release.

A wet winter brought relief throughout Prescott National Forest, but the moisture also helped grass grow, and that grass is drying. Tall grass can make fires difficult to control.

For a list of campgrounds where fires and charcoal are allowed, call 928-777-5799 or go to the Prescott Forest website.

May 30: Fire near Tortilla Flat burns 150 acres

A brush fire that ignited near Tortilla Flat in the early morning May 30 had burned about 150 acres and was about 80 percent contained by midafternoon, according to the U.S. Forest Service.

The fire burned close to State Route 88, and the Arizona Department of Transportation shut down a 13-mile stretch of the highway for most of the morning and into the afternoon.

The fire was reported about 6:30 a.m. near Tortilla Flat, said Carrie Templin, a Tonto National Forest spokeswoman.

"The fire is human-caused, but at this time we don't have any additional information. It is under investigation," she said.

May 29: Firefighters contain Joe's Hill Fire

Firefighters contained the Joe's Hill Fire about noon May 29, according to the Daisy Mountain Fire Department.

Six structures were lost in the fire, including a mobile home and storage facilities, the department released.

The fire ignited in Black Canyon City on the afternoon of May 27, was controlled, then jumped containment lines and eventually grew to 50 acres, leading to evacuation orders for about 35 residents.

MORE:Arizona wildfires: Black Canyon City evacuation lifted

The evacuation orders in Black Canyon City were lifted on the evening of May 28 as firefighters gained about 50 percent control of the fire that started in a salvage yard Saturday.

The American Red Cross closed the shelter it set up for about 20 people who were forced from their homes, including two people who lost their homes, the organization said.

Those two people, as well as one person who was placed in a hotel for health concerns during the fire, will be provided follow-on services from the Red Cross, the organization said.

May 28: Joe's Hill Fire expands to 50 acres

About 200 firefighters were battling a 50-acre blaze that forced evacuations for about 20 homes in Black Canyon City and destroyed six structures.

The Joe's Hill Fire broke out again late May 27 in a salvage yard, according to the Department of Forestry and Fire Management.

"We're looking at about 35 residents that have been evacuated," said Daisy Mountain Fire Chief Mark Nichols.

Officials hope to have the fire suppressed by 6 p.m. May 29, according to The Department of Forestry and Fire Management.

The fire was initially contained by local fire departments, but the Department of Forestry and Fire Management said that the fire started back up under suspicious circumstances later that night.

The cause of the fires is not currently known, and is under investigation according to the department.

"We're doing an evaluation of the fire right now," Nichols said.

There have been no additional evacuations and no permanent structures damaged outside of the facility where the fire started, according to the department.

"We've lost a couple structures but we don't have an exact count. We're thinking we've lost up to six," Nichols said.

Nichols was confident that the firefighters would be successful in their suppression efforts.

"Everything is looking good so far," he said.

May 28: Residents near Joe Hill Fire evacuated

Just after 11 p.m. May 27 a fire, dubbed the Joe Hill Fire, broke out at the C and S, an auto salvage yard on Smitty Way at Tara Springs Road in Black Canyon City, authorities said.

An initial brush fire in the area had been thought to be extinguished, but continued to burn, affecting the yard.

Crews worked overnight to contain the fire, which was reported to be at 15 acres on the morning of May 28, It was an multi-agency effort, involving about 240 firefighters from Black Canyon, Daisy Mountain, Scottsdale, Paradise Valley, Phoenix and Glendale fire departments.

Residents in the vicinity were evacuated as a precaution, with a shelter set up at the Canon School near Velda Rose and School Loop roads.

No further evacuations were expected as of 6 a.m. Sunday, but the Red Cross said they will remain on hand to provide support

May 27: Road closures for Pinal Fire expands

The Pinal Fire closure order has been expanded to include portions of three roads and an additional area, authorities said.

The revisions will remain in effect until July 31, or until the Pinal Fire has been mitigated.

The portion of Forest Road 55, locally known as Russell Road, has been closed from the Tonoto National Forest boundary south to the intersection of Forest Road 652, as well as east to the intersection with Forest Road 112C.

The portion of Forest Road 157, from the forest boundary south to the intersection with Forest Road 55.

The portion of Forest Road 112C from the intersection with Forest Road 55 in Kellner Canyon, southeast to the intersection with Forest Road 112 in Icehouse Canyon.

The portion of national forest land between Forest Road 55 and Forest Road 157, south from the forest boundary to the intersection of the above three roads at Tuxedo Junction.

May 27: Black Canyon City structures at risk

A one-acre fire ignited in Black Canyon City on the afternoon of May 27, threatening multiple structures and spreading to a vehicle storage yard, authorities said.

Shortly before 7 p.m., 24 units were on the scene, mostly from Daisy Mountain and Black Canyon fire departments. The fire was near the 21000 block of East Smitty Way.

May 27: Forest closures in Snake Ridge Fire

The lightning-caused Snake Ridge Fire had grown to 4,850 acres on May 27 and was still creeping across the forest floor in the Coconino National Forest.

Forest closure areas have been expanded to the north and east of the fire area, which is about nine miles northwest of Clints Well and several miles west of Lake Mary Road.

Smoke is expected to be visible along Lake Mary Road, on state Routes 87 and 260, and in nearby communities and the Verde Valley over the next several days.

May 27: Pre-evacuation order in Pinal Fire

The Pinal Fire burning south of Globe had scorched more than 6,400 acres of land by the morning of May 27.

On Friday, officials issued a precautionary pre-evacuation notice to some residents in the area, the Gila County Sheriff's Office said.

The notice only affects residents in the Icehouse and Kellner canyons who are south of the Icehouse and Kellner junction, southwest of Globe.

Officials stressed that residents do not need to leave the area at this time, adding that the precautionary notice is because of a change in the fire's "weather and fuel conditions."

Local public-safety personnel will go door to door to give residents information about the pre-evacuation procedures, the Sheriff's Office said.

The Sheriff's Office said residents should start making preparations now in case an evacuation becomes necessary.

Residents with livestock can choose to shelter their animals at the Burch Sale Yard, officials said, adding that the Phoenix Humane Society would assist in providing shelter for pets if necessary.

More than 600 personnel were working on combating the fire, almost double the number from Wednesday.

On Wednesday, the fire had consumed about 4,300 acres.

The Pinal Fire is the first naturally caused fire to spread through the area in 65 years, starting from a lightning strike on the afternoon of May 8. The fire is being fueled by timber and chaparral in the area, officials said.

Fire officials determined early on to treat the fire as a controlled burn because the area had not burned naturally in so long, while keeping crews in place to prevent it from crossing containment lines.

Residents with questions were asked to call the Pinal Fire Incident Command Center at 928-487-0676.

The Tonto National Forest said the fire was expected to be contained by June 15.

May 27: Authorities issue drone warning

Firefighters spotted four drones flying illegally near the Pinal Fire, according to the U.S. Forest Service.

The drones have hindered firefighting operations, prompting the agency to repeat its message that drones are not allowed near wildfires.

When drones are in the area, firefighters ground their aircraft. Helicopters are particularly susceptible to collisions, even with smaller objects, and so it is considered unsafe to fly with a drone in the air.

One drone operator has been cited for flying near the Pinal Fire.

Drone operators who violate the law "may be subject to civil penalties, including fines of up to $25,000, and potentially criminal prosecution," the agency said in a news release.

The fire, which has burned about 6,418 acres since May 8, is being allowed to burn in some areas but contained in others. Firefighters had to ground a tanker releasing retardant until one of the drone issues was resolved, the Forest Service reported.

May 24: Fire restrictions imposed in southeastern Arizona, Tonto Forest

Dry conditions have triggered fire restrictions throughout southeast Arizona, including Coronado National Forest, where campfires are banned except in developed campgrounds.

Charcoal fires, smoking, target shooting, welding and smoking are included in the ban, which was announced in a multiagency press release.

Camp stoves are allowed. Fires are allowed in metal fire rings at campgrounds but must be extinguished when you leave the campsite.

The ban also covers a number of national parks and monuments, state lands and the Gila District of the Bureau of Land Management. Although there is no camping where some of the restrictions apply, smoking is restricted to vehicles, buildings, developed recreation sites or barren areas at least 3 feet in diameter clear of all flammable materials.

The national parks and monuments are:

Saguaro National Park

Casa Grande Ruins National Monument

Coronado National Memorial

Chiricahua National Monument

Fort Bowie National Historic Site

Tumacácori National Historical Park

Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument

State lands in Cochise, Graham, Greenlee, La Paz, Pima, Pinal, Santa Cruz and Yuma counties are also under fire restrictions.

Tonto National Forest announced a ban last week.

For more information, go to firerestrictions.us.

Fire restrictions in effect for Tonto Forest

Tonto National Forest has imposed fire restrictions, banning open campfires and other activities that may spark a wildfire.

Rising temperatures have prompted the agency to restrict fires to metal fire rings in developed campsites, which means campers in undeveloped areas must use stoves, lanterns and heating devices.

The agency has also banned welding equipment, chain saws, or "operating combustion engines without spark-arresting devices," the agency said in a press release.

Target shooting is prohibited while the restrictions are in place. Hunting is allowed. Fireworks and explosives are prohibited year-round. Exploding targets and tracer rounds are illegal on public lands.

Smoking is prohibited except within an enclosed vehicle or building, or at a developed recreation site as long as butts are not tossed on the ground.

With temperatures climbing, grasses and leaves are drying out and the fire danger is rising, the agency said.

For more information on fire restrictions, call 602-225-5200, or go to the Tonto Forest's website.

10 of the biggest wildfires since 2002

Today’s wildfires are bigger than they once were. That’s no guarantee that this fire season will be bigger than the last, but in 2002, when the Rodeo-Chediski fire burned about 468,638 acres, Arizona got a glimpse of what a century of fire suppression, climate change and a spark can lead to.

High Country News reports that not only are large wildfires more common, but the fire season is also longer.

Here is a look at Arizona’s 10 biggest blazes since 2002.

Crews battle fires near Nogales, Globe

Two wildfires burning in parts of Arizona were not posing an immediate threat to any residents and at least one was being allowed to continue burning, according to officials.

The Peña Fire had burned about 300 acres of mostly grass and brush as of Tuesday night in an area south of Peña Blanca Lake west of Nogales, Coronado National Forest officials said.

The second major fire was burning about 6 miles south of Globe, west of State Route 77, in the Pinal Mountains.

The Pinal Fire was caused by lightning on May 8, according to Tonto National Forest officials.

It had burned about 206 acres as of Tuesday and was zero percent contained, but crews were working the fire as a natural prescribed burn to help prevent future fires, noting the area had not experienced a fire since 1952, when 36 lightning strikes were recorded, said Andrew Mandell, incident commander.

Find more details on both fires here and return to azcentral.com for updates.

Setting small fires to prevent the big ones

For the past decade, Coconino National Forest has burned between about 8,000 to 22,000 acres each year with prescribed fires. The cost of a controlled burn is in the thousands of dollars.

Wildfire costs — manpower, home damage, rehabilitation, property value and other costs — run into the millions.

And prescribed burns can help restore forest health after decades of fire suppression.

Read more about how firefighters protect forests with prescribed burns.

Old Bisbee fire burns at least 6 structures

Authorities say at least six structures have been lost after a wind-whipped fire in Bisbee.

The fire had burned little more than five acres and was contained overnight.

Although about 50 people were evacuated Monday evening during the firefight, no overnight shelters were needed, according to the Cochise County Sheriff's Office.

No injuries were reported.

Read more about the firefighting efforts in the Old Bisbee fire.

Father of hotshot hopes to move buggy to museum

Two buggies used by the Granite Mountain Hotshots have been put up for sale, and the father of one of the fallen firefighters hopes to turn one of the vehicles into a memorial.

Joe Woyjeck, a retired fire captain and volunteer at the Los Angeles County Fire Museum, said he would like to bring one of the buggies to the museum, to honor the 19 firefighters who died battling the Yarnell Hill Fire in June 2013.

The buggies were used to transport the hotshots to fire scenes and were in Yarnell June 30, the day the Yarnell Hill Fire killed all but one of the elite firefighters.

Woyjeck said his son, Kevin, spent a lot of time in the fire museum while he was growing up.

READ MORE:About the Yarnell Hill fire and the Granite Mountain Hotshots

“All three of my children were in the museum pretty much from the time they could walk,” Joe Woyjeck said.

The Daily Courier in Prescott reported that, in addition to the buggies, the city of Prescott would like to sell Fire Station 7, where the hotshots were based.

Woyjeck said he was focused on the buggies and did not know what might happen to the fire station.

“We want to make sure at least one of the buggies is in our collection … and is treated with dignity and respect,” he said.

Although the museum will have the final say, Woyjeck said he envisions having a plaque or seat assigned to each firefighter in the back of the buggy. He also envisions a place where people can leave letters for the fallen hotshots.

Woyjeck said he expects to hear soon on the museum’s bid.

“There’s no agenda involved other than honoring those 19 firefighters. … We’re keeping our fingers crossed.”

READ MORE: Complete coverage of Arizona wildfires

Includes information from Arizona Republic reporters April Morganroth, Kelsey Mo, Robert Gundran and Adrian Marsh.

Thinking of buying a home in 2022? Here's what to expect - CNN

If you're one of many would-be homebuyers who got shut out of the real estate market last year, you might be hoping for better luck in 2022.

The good news is that you probably won't see the jaw-dropping jumps in home prices seen last year. But prices are still expected to go higher and mortgage rate hikes are anticipated, too.

The housing market had the strongest showing in 15 years in 2021, sending home prices through the roof . Prices skyrocketed nearly 20% through the third quarter compared to a year before, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

Heading into this year, just 26% of consumers thought it was a good time to buy a home, according to Fannie Mae's Home Purchase Sentiment Index for December. That was a sharp decrease in sentiment from one year earlier, when 52% believed it was a good time to buy.

One big reason prices have skyrocketed is that there are so few homes on the market. Housing inventory hit an all-time low in December. And, as long as there are way more buyers than sellers, competition will remain fierce and prices will go up.

"Even though demand remains strong, a majority of consumers clearly have reservations about purchasing a home at current prices," said Doug Duncan, Fannie Mae senior vice president and chief economist.

But that hasn't stopped people from house hunting. Here's what to expect if you're one of them.

Home prices will go up, just not as fast as last year

Home prices are widely expected to continue to rise this year, but not at the eye-popping pace of 2021.

"That kind of price increase was a shock. 'Unprecedented' is not strong enough. It was nuts," said Skylar Olsen, senior director and principal economist at Tomo Networks, a buyer-focused mortgage and home-purchasing platform.

The median price of a home was $346,900 in 2021 , up 16.9% from 2020, and the highest on record, according to the National Association of Realtors.

A panel of economists convened by the NAR forecast median home prices will increase by 5.7% in the upcoming year, while a panel of housing experts polled by Zillow expect home values to rise 6.6% in 2022.

But exactly what happens next will depend largely on how both buyers and sellers react to the changing market.

"If buyers finally balk at unaffordable prices, sales volumes could fall," said Jeff Tucker, senior economist at Zillow. "But if homeowners finally start listing their homes en masse, we could see a sales bonanza, cooling the pace of price appreciation."

Mortgage rates will rise

Already in the first few weeks of the year, the average 30-year fixed rate for a mortgage has jumped significantly , rising to the highest rate it's been since the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020.

That trend toward higher rates is expected to continue, although not necessarily at the pace seen in the past couple of weeks.

"We are expecting interest rates to rise this year and that directly impacts affordability for families and their ability to finance a home," said Jeff Ruben, president of WSFS Mortgage. "We don't see it being a situation where it will choke off the home purchase market, but we project that the rise in interest rates will dampen activity a bit."

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 3.56% last week. The average was 2.77% this time last year.

Inventory will grow, but so will the number of buyers

While the availability of homes for sale often ebbs and flows, last year seemed to be all ebb.

"The last 18 months have been out of control -- every time you turn around it's been record-high prices or record-low inventory," said Mike Miedler, president and CEO of real estate firm Century 21. "We have lost the cyclicality of the market."

But this year, the housing market is expected to return to its normal seasonal cycle, with more homes coming on to the market in the spring, then tapering off throughout the summer. But competition will remain stiff: Experts say buyers -- many of whom have been putting offers on homes since last spring -- will continue to come in hordes, at least for the first part of the year.

"In the spring, you'll see that demand come in strong driven by interest rates that are climbing," Miedler said. "You'll see people who were waiting on the sidelines -- when they see a spike in inventory they will come back into the market."

Some agents say a few buyers are starting early by looking now. The problem is, there's not much to look at.

At the end of 2021, inventory was at the lowest levels ever, with just 910,000 homes available to buy nationwide, according to the National Association of Realtors.

The problem is even more pronounced in popular areas.

Jennifer Branchini, a Compass agent, was working with a couple looking to buy in Pleasanton, California, in the Bay Area, where there are currently just under 20 homes on the market.

"If you have only one property that comes on the market around the median price of $1.3 million, that has every homebuyer looking," she said.

She's seen prices rise so much during the winter months that she advised some clients to just put their search on hold.

"When I look at what some homes are selling for, I told my clients, 'I can't even get behind that number for you guys,'" Branchini said.

Homes will continue to sell fast

Those looking to buy will have to act fast. Many homes have been going into contract in a matter of days of first being listed.

Last summer homes were taking an average of just 17 days to sell, according to the National Association of Realtors. But it depends on the price. Even during November, which was relatively slower, homes priced in the most popular sweet spot of between $250,000 to $500,000 sold in an average of 10 days.

In the greater Washington, DC, area Gail Chisholm, an agent with Compass, said agents often put a home on the market on a Thursday, allow buyers to see it over the weekend during one open house, and then ask that offers are submitted by Tuesday evening.

"It moves very fast, there is buyer's fatigue for sure," Chisholm said. "If you find the house you think is your dream house and offer $150,000 or more over ask and waive all contingencies and you still don't get it? And you've lost five houses that way and paid $500 on pre-inspections each time? I have buyers who have taken a break. But many still have to find a home."

In very competitive markets like hers, she said, the baseline for buyers to compete is to include an escalation clause and escalation cap in their offer, which spells out how much they are willing to top the next closest offer, up to a specific amount.

Beyond that she lays out all the levers that buyers can use, so they can adjust the offer to their risk tolerance.

"It is usually the offer with the fewest contingencies, the highest escalation cap, the most money down and the most accommodation of the seller's needs that wins."

In a market this competitive, buyers need to come with their agent and mortgage team in place and be ready to make decisions, said Olsen.

"If you're in the search process, new listings are coming, but they sell so darn fast," she said. "Your search for a home is a job."

Still, Olsen said she's fearful the pressure and fatigue will lead buyers to make rash decisions they may regret.

"I'm so worried that people will buy out of desperation to finally win a bid and not buy at a price they can afford sustainably," she said. "Buy a home that is a good match."

Australia election: The 'lucky country' is facing a climate crisis test ...

Woodburn, Australia (CNN) Ken Morrison has twice been up to his neck in water during climate disasters .

The first time, in 2007, he was trapped in a pool with a towel over his head as wildfires ripped through Australia's Hunter Valley , a wine-growing region about three hours' drive north of Sydney.

"The roar is unbelievable. You can feel the oxygen getting taken out of the air," recalled the 57-year-old paramedic, who was on the job treating volunteer firefighters for burns and broken bones at the time.

The second incident was this February, when relentless rain burst the banks of the Richmond River, sending a tsunami-like wave surging through the small town of Woodburn in northern New South Wales, where Morrison lives. He waded in darkness to free a boat stored in the back shed so his family could escape the floodwater.

"I'm in total darkness. I got leeches all over me. Covered," he told CNN, standing in boots caked with mud in his backyard after a second flood in April.

Australia has long been known as the "lucky country," partly due to its wealth of coal and gas, as well as minerals like iron ore, which have driven generations of economic growth.

But it's now sitting on the frontier of a climate crisis, and the fires, floods and droughts that have already scarred the country are only expected to become more extreme as the Earth warms.

Despite its exposure to the crisis, Australia has one of the worst records on climate action in the developed world, with plans under the current government to cut emissions by just 26-28% from 2005 levels by 2030 -- a target that pales in comparison to those set by its allies in the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union. Even the Business Council of Australia, which represents companies including mining interests, supports a higher target.

The water was high enough for Ken Morrison and his family to climb over the second balcony into his boat.

On May 21, Prime Minister Scott Morrison (who is of no relation to Ken Morrison) will be asking Australians to re-elect his center-right Liberal Party and its ally, the Nationals, in a coalition government, after a three-year term bookended by climate-related disasters: The Black Summer fires in 2019-20 that razed bushland covering an area equivalent in size to the UK, claimed dozens of lives and killed or displaced roughly three billion animals . Then the floods this year that swamped Ken Morrison's home and so many others like it in New South Wales and further north in Queensland.

But the Prime Minister's bid for a second term could be thwarted by his main rival, Labor Party leader Anthony Albanese, who's promising to cut emissions by 43% by 2030.

Saturday's vote is a pivotal one -- it will either provide a mandate for more of the same, or set the country on a different path.

A bushfire burns near the town of Bilpin, Australia, on December 19, 2019 during the Black Summer fires.

were "concerned" about the crisis, and two-thirds thought the country should be doing more about it. According to the Ipsos Climate Change report , a survey of 1,000 voters in the last week of March showed that four in fivewere "concerned" about the crisis, and two-thirds thought the country should be doing more about it.

But public surveys have been wrong before.

In 2019, opinion polls predicted a win for the opposition center-left Labor Party and its ambitious plan to boost the use of renewables and electric cars. But Labor lost, and the vote only vindicated the coalition's inaction on climate.

While current polls show Labor is on track to win this election, the crisis is now competing with other problems that appear more immediate -- the cost of living, the rise of China and inflation among them.

Ken Morrison says he's not sure who he'll vote for, but he knows it won't be either of the main parties: "Liberal and Labor, they're the same horse with different stripes."

'This is coal. Don't be afraid'

Before he became prime minister, Scott Morrison cemented his position as an unflinching ally of the fossil fuel industry when he wielded a lump of coal in parliament to taunt the opposition about its renewable energy policy.

"This is coal. Don't be afraid. It won't hurt you!" he bellowed over jeers. "It is coal that has ensured for over 100 years that Australia has enjoyed an energy competitive advantage."

Then Treasurer Scott Morrison hands Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce a lump of coal during Question Time in Canberra on Feb. 9, 2017.

That was five years ago, but the Australian government has been on the record as an international holdout on climate action since 1997, when it strong-armed delegates during the landmark Kyoto talks to secure a deal to not only avoid cutting its net emissions but to actually increase them to 108% of its 1990 levels by 2012.

Australia relies on fossil fuels to power its economy, and in the last 10 years, the mining industry has earned 2.1 trillion Australian dollars ($1.5 trillion USD) in export revenues, amounting to 21% of total GDP growth.

While much of the world is working on a green recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, Australia is considering more than 100 new fossil fuel projects, many of which could go online within the next decade.

If all fossil fuel developments under consideration in Australia went ahead, they could collectively contribute an extra 1.7 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions each year, according to research by independent think tank The Australia Institute. That is a lot of greenhouse gas -- more than three times the amount Australia already emits, and nearly double of what all the global aviation produces in a year.

The federal government has long supported coal and gas with subsidies that amounted to 10.5 billion Australian dollars (US$7.2 billion) in the 2021-22 budget, and now, its economic recovery plan is decidedly "gas-fired." Among its new gas projects and pipelines is the Scarborough to Pluto development in Western Australia, which will emit between 1.37 1.6 billion tons of greenhouse gasses in its lifetime, including emissions sent offshore. That's equivalent to nearly 15 new coal-fired power stations, according to recent analysis.

Australia "appears intent on replacing fossil fuels with fossil fuels," notes a scathing assessment from the Climate Action Tracker, which monitors climate commitments by governments.

On paper, both major parties say they want to reach net-zero emissions by 2050 and are promising to spend around 20 billion Australian dollars ($14 billion) to get there.

For the coalition, that means more gas projects and investing in emissions-reducing technologies like carbon capture and storage (CCS), a method of trapping and storing carbon from fossil fuels to allow for their continued use. But the technology is not 100% effective, and scientists have warned against using it to meet climate goals.

JUST WATCHED 'Climate Wars:' How Australia wasted a decade to act against climate change Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH 'Climate Wars:' How Australia wasted a decade to act against climate change 05:07

For Labor, reaching net zero means overhauling the electricity grid, offering discounts on electric cars, and creating new solar banks and community batteries. But Albanese hasn't ruled out more coal projects, saying that applications will be approved if they "stack up environmentally, and then commercially" -- a nod to how politically popular supporting coal mining jobs is among the party's traditional voting base.

The Greens are promising to phase out the mining, burning, and export of thermal coal by 2030 and end fossil fuel subsidies, but as a minor party its influence will be limited unless its candidates can secure enough seats to sway a hung parliament.

The 'lucky country'

Back in Woodburn, northern New South Wales, some residents are still living in tents and caravans pitched in front of mud-stained houses 11 weeks after the first flood in February. Having lost everything, it would be easy to assume they'd tilt towards parties promising greater climate action. But not necessarily.

Tamara Collins, a remote nurse who lives near Ken Morrison's house, said she'll vote Labor, but only because their local candidate answered the phone when she and her husband, Tim Phillips, were scooping toxic mud from the floor of their newly renovated house.

Tamara Collins and Tim Phillips are living in their shed after floodwater ruined their newly renovated home in Coraki, New South Wales.

Cam Hollows, a doctor and the son of prominent eye surgeon Fred Hollows, lives and works in the region. As water rushed into homes, he took a helicopter to remote communities cut off by floodwater to help with relief efforts. "A lot of people that live in the bush don't choose to live here because they're lucky in life," he said. "The 'lucky country' has a lot of unlucky people."

About a third of the nation's 26 million people live outside major cities in regional towns and villages. The cost of living is typically lower, but life in rural Australia can be hard. There are fewer jobs and prolonged droughts have robbed many farmers of their livelihoods.

Hollows describes the "two very different classes in Australia" in terms of caravans: "There's the $80,000 caravans towed behind $100,000 cars and caravans that haven't had wheels for 40 or 50 years." Some are used for extended holidays, others are permanent homes.

Woodburn is in the federal electorate of Page, a safe seat held by the National Party, the Liberal Party's conservative coalition partners, who typically represent regional voters.

In Page, Hollows expects the Liberal National Coalition to "bleed yellow," a reference to the United Australia Party, which is making its pitch to voters on bright yellow billboards on roads and highways around the country. The right-wing party is a collection of candidates led and bankrolled by Clive Palmer, the brusque former mining magnate who has promised to "Make Australia Great!" on a platform of capped mortgages and pulling all Australian investments out of Europe and the US. Palmer has no climate policy at all.

A new wave of Australian politics

At the opposite end of the ideological scale to Palmer sit the Independent "teal" contenders, named after the color most have chosen to use in their campaigns, who are launching challenges in 22 predominantly marginal electorates.

And almost all of the candidates are women.

Their plan is to take inner-city seats held by Morrison's government by offering climate action to fiscally conservative voters who won't back Labor but are tired of the coalition's business-as-usual approach to fossil fuels.

While these candidates are independent, all are backed by "Climate 200," an organization pushing to elect Independent voices capable of negotiating larger emissions reduction targets.

One of the teal candidates is Jo Dyer, an Australian theater and film producer, who decided to run for office after becoming frustrated with what she described as the "revolving door" between Australia's political class and the fossil fuel industry.

Jo Dyer is vying for the federal seat of Boothby, south of Adelaide, in South Australia.

"Climate change is seen as some sort of ideological issue here as opposed to an impending global crisis -- it's been reduced to part of the culture wars," Dyer told CNN during a meeting in her local seat of Boothby, a collection of suburbs in the nation's driest state of South Australia, which encompasses rugged coastline and sprawling foothills.

At a climate forum hosted by Dyer, local resident Cheryl Lange said she was fed up with the lack of urgency of the major parties.

"I'm voting for a climate candidate because the big parties are under the thumb of the fossil fuel companies. There's no sense at all of the urgent need to take action," she said.

In Dyer's view, this is a last-chance election -- one which could reveal uncomfortable truths about Australia's priorities.

"People often say this is 'not who we are as a country,'" Dyer said. "Well, if this government is rewarded, we'd have to say, actually this is exactly who we are."

A different pathway

The landmark Paris agreement in 2015 saw 200 nations put their differences aside with a promise to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels by the end of the century -- a commitment that was strengthened at last year's summit in Glasgow.

But neither of Australia's major parties are currently coming to the table with targets that are consistent with those goals, according to climate scientists.

The coalition's targets are currently in line with nearly 4 degrees Celsius of warming globally, while Labor's path would see a 2 degrees Celsius temperature rise, according to Climate Analytics , led by one of Australia's top scientists, Bill Hare.

Hare is acutely aware of the existential threats facing his nation, but says if enough climate-conscious candidates win their seats and apply pressure in Parliament, the election could be "transformative."

"Underneath this horrible inaction lies an enormous opportunity to be a leader in clean energy," Hare said, explaining that "a lot of the things Australia does to enable mining and gas extraction are very relevant to the rapid scaling up of the basic supply infrastructure needed for renewables."

A 55-hectare array of solar panels on a farm near Dubbo in New South Wales.

On top of having the tools to harness more renewable energy, Australia has the natural resources to provide it, with more solar potential per square meter than any other continent, and some of the best wind assets in the world.

Renewable energy already accounts for almost 33% of the nation's power, according to the sector's peak body. And states like South Australia -- where two-thirds of electricity is generated from wind and solar -- have been world-leading in their transition away from fossil fuels.

But back in Woodburn, where the sound of yet more rain keeps locals awake at night, voters like Ken Morrison are banking on self-reliance as they stare down the barrel of more extreme weather events, rather than any kind of change in government.

The boat that he once stored in the back shed now lives in the garage beneath his two-story home, ready in the event of a flash flood.

"And the kayak," he said, "so we can get in and out quickly."

The most important events from 1917 to 2017: WWI to Trump's election

Angelo Young and John Harrington

24/7 Wall Street

Over the past 100 years we’ve witnessed some of the most profound changes in human history.

Between wars, technological developments, progress in civil rights and breakthroughs in science and medicine, the old order that held back hundreds of millions of people has been swept away.

Centuries-old empires crumbled as new ideologies – from communism to fascism – for better or worse found roots in many places of the world. Progressive human rights ideas also emerged and changed the world as women, blacks, and the LGBT community demanded, and often won, equal rights. Technology evolved, modifying and innovating our lives in ways never dreamed of.

The world certainly has progressed, but wars have raged on, and climate change has picked up speed, endangering the ecosystems of our planet.

To put this in perspective, 24/7 Wall St. has compiled a list of the most important event in each of the past 100 years. We drew on research material and news reports to determine what event had the biggest impact in a particular year.

1919: National booze ban

• Date: Oct. 28

• Location: Washington D.C.

Congress passes the 18th Amendment that bans the production, transport or sale of alcoholic beverages in the United States. The legislation opens the way for Prohibition, which lasts from 1920 to 1933. The public flouts the law, which succeeds in enriching gangsters and contributing to the rise of organized crime.

1920: Women's suffrage

• Date: Aug. 26

• Location: Washington, D.C.

Though the United States was founded under democratic principles, only a minority of its population (starting with white landowning males over the age of 21) could actually vote. But after the 19th Amendment of the Constitution is passed, women finally gain a voice and the right to cast their ballots.

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1921: Chinese Communists rise

• Date: July 1

• Location: Beijing

In a prequel to the rise of Mao Zedong and Red China, the Chinese Communist Party is founded, and three weeks later it convenes its first National Congress that is attended by Mao. It would take another 28 years before the Republic of China becomes the People's Republic of China.

1922: British Empire shrinks

• Date: Feb. 28

• Location: London

The British Empire was at its peak toward the end of World War I, commanding a global population estimated to be as many as 570 million people, or about a fourth of the world's population at the time. The empire's size began to shrink in 1920, when Britain declared limited independence for Egypt, which leads to full independence two years later.

1923: Great Kanto earthquake

• Date: Sept. 1

• Location: Tokyo, Yokohama, Japan

The Great Kanto earthquake, also known as the Tokyo-Yokohama earthquake, strikes the Japanese mainland at noon on Sept. 1, 1923, with a magnitude of 7.9 on the Richter scale. The death toll is estimated at 140,000 people. The force of the temblor destroys hundreds of thousands of homes that either collapse or are engulfed in fire. The quake sets off a tsunami that reaches a height of almost 40 feet at Atami in the Sagami Gulf, killing 60 people there. The most significant outcome of the catastrophe is the rebuilt Tokyo that would become a modern metropolis.

1924: From Lenin to Stalin

• Date: Jan. 21

• Location: Moscow

Following the death of Vladimir Lenin on Jan. 21, the new leader of the Soviet Union, Joseph Stalin, immediately begins a purge of political rivals. Some are simply moved to different positions, while others, like Leon Trotsky, the presumed successor to Lenin, are exiled. Stalin's paranoia grows as he takes control of the nation, and with it the level of violence and killing of anyone perceived to be a threat to his power and control.

1925: Scopes monkey trial

• Date: July 10

• Location: Dayton, Tennessee

After teaching the theory of evolution in a Tennessee high school, the state prosecutes science teacher John Thomas Scopes because state law prohibits such teaching as it runs counter to Biblical beliefs. The trial pits well-known Christian fundamentalist William Jennings Bryan against renowned attorney Clarence Darrow. The jury rules against Scopes, forcing him to pay a fine of $100 (about $1,460 in 2017 dollars). It would take another 43 years before the U.S. Supreme Court rules that laws punishing people for teaching evolution violate the First Amendment.

1926: U.S. starts numbered highway system

• Date: Nov. 11

• Location: U.S.

In a precursor to the modern interstate highway system, the federal government introduces a national highway numbering system in an effort to standardize roadways, especially local roads and trails with names unfamiliar to outsiders. The U.S. Numbered Highway System makes it easier for the growing number of car owners to figure out how to get from one city or town to the next and opens the way for the great American road-trip tradition.

1927: Lindbergh nonstop to Paris

• Date: May 21

• Location: New York to Paris

When the monoplane The Spirit of St. Louis touches down at Le Bourget Field in Paris on the evening of May 21, Charles Lindbergh becomes the person to fly over the Atlantic Ocean nonstop. Lindbergh would become one of the heroes of the age. His feat fires the imagination of aspiring aviators about the commercial possibilities of flight. Lindbergh would stay in the news, but for regrettable reasons. A strong advocate for American isolationism in the 1930s, he is criticized for his admiration of Nazi Germany's aircraft industry. Also, his son would be killed during a bungled kidnapping attempt in 1932.

1928: Earhart crosses Atlantic

• Date: June 17-18

• Location: Wales

Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to pilot a plane across the Atlantic, from Newfoundland to Wales, making her an American national heroine and feminist icon who would go on to set numerous aviation records. She would later set another record as the first person – man or woman – to fly solo from Hawaii to the U.S. mainland. Earhart and her co-pilot Fred Noonan would vanish over the Pacific Ocean in 1937 during Earhart's attempt to circumnavigate the globe. Recent evidence has emerged indicating Earhart may have sent distress signals after surviving a crash, possibly on the remote Gardner Island in the western Pacific Ocean.

1929: Wall Street crashes

• Date: Oct. 24-29

• Location: New York City

The "Roaring Twenties" come to a halt on Black Tuesday in October 1929, when stocks take a nosedive, contributing to the Great Depression. Reasons for the worst economic downturn in American history include over-lending by weakly regulated banks, excessive stock price valuation, too many stocks purchased on margin, unrestrained exuberance that sends millions of people to convert their savings into stocks, tightening of the credit by the Federal Reserve and an agricultural drought.

1930: Ho Chi Minh rises in Vietnam

• Date: Feb. 2

• Location: Hanoi

In an event that would have repercussions for U.S. foreign policy decades later, Vietnamese independence fighter Ho Chi Minh founds the Communist Party of Vietnam as part of his effort to oust French colonial occupiers. "Uncle Ho," as he was known to his many supporters, was inspired by the Russian Bolsheviks, who oppose the Tsarist autocracy, seeing parallels between that struggle and the fight against the foreign occupiers of his country.

1931: Empire State Building completed

• Date: May 1

• Location: New York City

President Herbert Hoover inaugurates the completion of the Empire State Building on May Day. It becomes the tallest building of the iconic Manhattan skyline until the construction of the World Trade Center Towers are completed in 1973. Incredibly, the 86-story office building took only 13 months to build, with construction starting in March of the previous year.

1932: Hitler becomes German

• Date: Feb. 25

• Location: Germany

Seven years after Adolf Hitler renounces his Austrian citizenship, a fellow member of the Nazi Party gets him a low-level government job, which comes with automatic citizenship. This opens the way for him to run for office. Already a well-known party activist, it takes Hitler only two years from receiving his citizenship status to becoming the leader of Germany.

1933: FDR elected

• Date: March 12

• Location: Washington, D.C.

With the Great Depression sending millions of Americans to soup kitchens and chasing whatever work they can find, newly elected President Franklin Delano Roosevelt begins his weekly "Fireside Chats" as Americans are eager for guidance and solace during those dark times. FDR's first radio talk explains to Americans in plain language why he ordered that banks would close temporarily at different time in different parts of the country. The purpose, he explains, is to curb panic rushes of withdrawals, which has been hurting efforts to stabilize the banking system.

1934: Hitler consolidates power

• Date: June 30

• Location: Berlin

Germans, who had been suffering from a disastrous economic depression in 1929-30, begin to embrace the ideas of the Nationalist Socialist Workers Party – the Nazi Party. It becomes the largest party after the 1932 elections. In 1933, Adolf Hitler is appointed chancellor of Germany. After President Paul von Hindenburg dies in 1934, Hitler then purges members of his own party – the bloody Night of the Long Knives – with the help of Nazi storm troopers and becomes the unquestioned leader of Germany.

1935: FDR launches New Deal

• Date: Aug. 14

• Location: Washington, D.C.

President Roosevelt, grappling with the Great Depression, signs into law his signature Social Security Act, a law that creates the country's first retirement security system. Earlier that year, as part of his "New Deal" policy, the president established the Works Progress Administration, a massive economic stimulus program, putting millions of Americans to work building the country's public infrastructure.

1936: Owens flouts Nazis

• Date: Aug. 3

• Location: Berlin

As the concept of racial purity and superiority dominates Germany in the 1930s, African-American sprinter Jesse Owens of Oakville, Alabama, shows them who is the master racer. During the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, and under the gaze of Adolf Hitler, Owens wins four Olympic gold medals for the 100-meter and 200-meter sprints, the long jump, and the 100-meter relay.

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1937: UAW changes car industry

• Date: Feb. 11

• Location: Flint, Michigan

Nearly two years after the establishment of the United Automobile Workers (UAW), the union scores a major victory in Flint, Michigan. Workers at the General Motors Fisher Body Plant Number One lay down their tools and occupy the factory, demanding union representation, a fair minimum wage, safer working conditions, and not to outsource labor to non-union plants. Despite efforts by GM and local police to extricate them from the plant, including shutting off the heat, cutting off food supply, and attacks that leave 16 workers and 11 police officers injured, the strike lasts 44 days. The strike leads to an agreement between GM and the UAW, which includes a 5% pay raise and permission to talk in the lunchroom.

1938: Anti-Semitism surges

• Date: Nov. 9

• Location: Germany, Austria, Sudetenland

Growing anti-Semitic scapegoating amid Germany's crippling economic conditions culminates in the Kristallnacht, or "Night of Broken Glass," a pogrom sparked by a speech from German propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. Storm troopers and other Nazi groups are ordered to attack and destroy Jewish businesses, homes and houses of worship. In one night of attacks in Germany, Austria and the German-speaking area of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia, dozens of Jews are killed and tens of thousands are rounded up and sent to concentration camps.

1939: World War II starts

• Date: Sept. 1

• Location: Westerplatte, Poland

Under the cover of predawn darkness, a German battleship floats quietly into the center of Danzig Harbor and opens fire on a Polish stronghold in Westerplatte, the first shots of World War II. In the following weeks, Nazi forces, including 2,000 tanks and 1,000 aircraft, would shatter Polish defenses and surround Warsaw, which surrenders 26 days after the Danzig Harbor attack.

1940: McDonald's founded

• Date: May 15

• Location: San Bernardino, California

Brothers Richard and Maurice McDonald open McDonald's Barbecue Restaurant, offering BBQ ribs, pork sandwiches and 23 other menu items. Eight years later, they would restructure their popular local business to focus on hamburgers, milkshakes and fountain sodas, emphasizing speed, a simple menu and low prices. In the 1950s, businessman Ray Kroc would buy out the brothers and grow McDonald's into what it is today – the world's largest restaurant chain.

1941: Attack on Pearl Harbor

• Date: Dec. 7

• Location: Oahu, Hawaii

Knowing the U.S. is gearing up to engage them in the Pacific Ocean theater of World War II, Japan deploys a massive air attack on U.S. Navy ships parked at Pearl Harbor. The surprise assault by 353 Japanese aircraft leads to the deaths of 2,403 people, including 1,177 sailors aboard the ill-fated USS Arizona, one of 19 vessels that were damaged or destroyed in the attack. Nearly 330 aircraft were also damaged or destroyed. The United States declares war on Japan the next day and three days later against Germany and Italy.

1942: GIs arrive in Europe

• Date: Jan. 26

• Location: Northern Ireland

The first U.S. troops destined to fight in Europe in the world's greatest war arrive in Northern Ireland. It is the beginning of a military buildup that would culminate in the invasion of France more than two years later. Before then, the United States was providing only material support to its ally across the Atlantic, while building up what President Roosevelt called the "Arsenal of Democracy" in anticipation for the inevitable entry of the United States into the war in Europe.

1943: Invention of LSD

• Date: April 19

• Location: Basel, Switzerland

Swiss chemist Albert Hoffman had been studying the potential medicinal value of lysergic compounds when he accidentally exposed himself to LSD-25, which he had created years earlier in his lab. This was the first LSD trip, a quarter-century before the counterculture endorses the hallucinogenic compound. Hoffman describes the "not unpleasant" experience as "uninterrupted stream of fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense, kaleidoscopic play of colors." Hoffman takes a second dose and writes a paper about his discovery. The U.S. Army tests the drug on soldiers numerous times from 1955 to 1967, briefly toying with the idea of using LSD as a weapon to disorient enemy soldiers during combat.

1944: D-Day

• Date: June 6

• Location: Normandy France

The plan for the biggest one-day military campaign in history, the invasion of Normandy by Allied forces to push the Nazis out of France, is hatched in extreme secrecy a year earlier. The plan is conceived during the Quebec Conference by Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt. The invasion starts at 6:30 a.m. on five beaches, and over the next 24 hours about 4,900 Allied soldiers are killed, many of them the instant the doors of their Higgins transport boats opened directly into German machine gun fire.

1945: World War II ends

• Date: Sept. 2

• Location: Multiple

The surrender of Japan marks the end of World War II amid one of the most tumultuous years of the 20th century. Earlier in the year, leaders of three nations – Benito Mussolini, Franklin Roosevelt and Adolf Hitler – die and Nazi Germany surrenders. Though the surrender of Japan was inevitable, the prospect of a horrific Allied assault on the Japanese mainland convinces the United States to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The atomic bomb attacks, along with the entry of the Soviet Union in the war against Japan, compel the Japanese to surrender.

1946: Baby boom starts

• Date: Jan. 1

• Location: U.S.

More American babies are born – 3.4 million – in 1946 than in any year in U.S. history up to then. The number of births grows to 4 million per year from 1954 to 1964, the last year of the baby boomer generation, the biggest generation at that point in history.

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1947: India gains independence

• Date: Aug. 15

• Location: Washington, D.C

The sun sets on the British Empire in India in 1947, as the Asian nation becomes the world's largest democracy. Independence is the culmination of decades of work by Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Indian nationalists committed to throwing off the yoke of British colonialism. The transition to independence comes at a price. The subcontinent is partitioned into two nations, Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan. Violence erupts between Hindus and Muslims as Hindus migrate to India and Muslims shift to Pakistan. It is estimated that 1 million people die during the migration.

1948: Birth of Israel

• Date: May 15

• Location: Middle East

After Israel declares its independence following a UN resolution, neighboring Arab states with troops from Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Transjordan (now Jordan), Lebanon and Saudi Arabia attack the former British-controlled Palestinian mandate. The Arab-Israeli War ended with an armistice that leaves Israel with some territories as Egypt and Jordan retains control over the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, respectively.

1949: NATO founded

• Date: April 4

• Location: Washington, D.C.

Two years into the Cold War, the Soviet Union detonates its first nuclear bomb and quickly exerts its influence over Eastern Europe. It attempts to do the same in Western Europe, which is still recovering from the massive destruction of World War II. To respond to the Soviet threat, U.S. and Western European allies form the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Fundamentally, NATO simply states that an attack on any NATO member would be considered an attack on all NATO members. Cold War tensions ratchet up later that year when the communists take over China, the world's most populous nation.

1950: Korean War starts

• Date: June 25

• Location: Korea

The North Korean People's Army crosses the 38th parallel into South Korea, eliciting almost an immediate response from President Harry Truman, and starting the Korean War – a proxy battle between the United States and the People's Republic of China. Three years later, a ceasefire would halt the war. The uneasy relations between North Korea and South Korea last to this day.

1951: Rosenbergs sentenced

• Date: March 29

• Location: New York City

Husband and wife Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are convicted of espionage for their part in passing along atomic secrets to the Soviet Union during and after World War II. They are executed two years later. Not everyone is convinced of their involvement in the scheme. Supporters claim they are scapegoats swept up in the Cold War hysteria of the time. Documents revealed decades later would show the detailed extent of Julius Rosenberg's involvement in the spy ring, though Ethel's participation in the scheme remains inconclusive.

1952: First hydrogen bomb test

• Date: Nov. 1

• Location: Marshall Islands

The United States successfully detonates its first hydrogen bomb, a second generation thermonuclear device, in the Marshall Islands as part of Operation Ivy, one of a series of nuclear bomb tests. From 1946 to 1958, the United States used the remote Pacific Marshall Islands as its nuclear weapons testing site, detonating a total of 67 nuclear tests.

1953: The dawn of DNA

• Date: Feb. 28

• Location: Cambridge, England, U.K.

Cambridge University scientists James Watson and Francis Crick announce they have discovered the fundamental behavior and double-helix structure of DNA. Though scientists had been aware of DNA since the 1860s and its role in genetic inheritance since 1943, Watson and Crick were the first to explain how DNA works to replicate itself and pass on genes from one generation to the next.

1954: Brown vs. Board of Education

• Date: May 17

• Location: Washington, D.C.

In a landmark case involving Linda Brown of Topeka, Kansas, who had to cross a railroad track to reach an all-black elementary school even though an all-white school was closer, the U.S. Supreme Court rules that the segregated school system was unconstitutional on the basis of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution. The clause would be used again by the courts to reverse state-level racial segregation practices and ordinances.

1955: Parks starts a movement

• Date: Dec. 1

• Location: Montgomery, Alabama

Rosa Parks makes history by refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a Montgomery bus. The arrest of Parks for insisting to remain seated leads to the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the ascent of a young pastor named Martin Luther King, Jr., as a local activist leader to advance the civil rights cause. A successful federal lawsuit by the NAACP against the city leads to the desegregation of the Montgomery bus system on Dec. 21 of the following year.

1956: Hungary suppressed

• Date: Nov. 4

• Location: Budapest

Nine years after the start of the Cold War, Hungarians took to the streets, demanding democratic reforms. Three days later, Soviet Red Army troops invade Hungary, killing thousands. Nine days after the incursion, Budapest is occupied by the Soviet troops in one of the largest and most aggressive actions taken by the Soviet Union since the end of World War II.

1957: The Little Rock Nine

• Date: Sept 24

• Location: Little Rock, Arkansas

President Dwight D. Eisenhower orders federal troops to protect nine African American high school students as they start classes at the all-white Little Rock Central High School. This would become one of the first high-profile actions by the federal government against state-level racial segregation.

1958: U.S. launches first satellite

• Date: Jan. 31

• Location: Cape Canaveral, Florida

The United States successfully launches Explorer 1, three months after the Soviet Union sent its first satellite, Sputnik, into orbit. The two superpowers would go on to send more satellites into space, creating a Cold War space race to build ever more sophisticated orbital communications devices.

1959: Castro takes over Cuba

• Date: Jan. 1

• Location: Havana

U.S.-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista flees Havana as Fidel Castro's forces advance on the Cuban capital. Days later, rebels led by Che Guevara and Camilo Cienfuegos enter the city, followed two days later by Castro's forces, who quickly consolidate power in Cuba, establishing a communist government in the Caribbean's largest country.

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1960: Lunch Counter Sit-in

• Date: Feb. 1

• Location: Greensboro, North Carolina

When four African-American college students – Ezell A. Blair, Franklin E. McCain, Joseph A. McNeil and David L. Richmond – sit down at a Woolworth's lunch counter and ask for service, they are denied. The young men refuse to leave, leading to a larger six-month protest that results in the desegregation of the lunch counter by that summer.

1961: Berlin Wall built

• Date: Aug. 13

• Location: Berlin, East and West Germany

By the late summer of 1961, the loss of skilled workers such as teachers, engineers, and doctors to the West reaches crisis levels in East Germany. On Aug. 12, 2,400 East Germans cross into West Berlin, the most in a single day. The next day, with the approval of Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, East Germany builds a wall that would extend 27 miles through Berlin, dividing families and friends for the next 28 years. The wall would serve as an enduring symbol of the Cold War, used by presidents John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan to inspire a divided city.

1962: Cuban missile crisis

• Date: Oct.16-28

• Location: Multiple

When the United States learns that the Soviet Union is building nuclear missile installations 90 miles south of Miami in communist Cuba, the Kennedy administration starts a naval blockade around the island, which is at times tested, and Kennedy demands the removal of the missiles.The standoff is widely considered to be the closest the two nuclear superpowers come to direct military confrontation. Cooler heads prevail. The Soviet Union offers to remove the missiles in exchange for a guarantee that the United States will not invade Cuba. In secret, the administration also agrees to withdraw U.S. missiles from Turkey.

1963: JFK assassinated

• Date: Nov. 22

• Location: Dallas

As John F. Kennedy prepares for his re-election bid, the 34th president of the United States embarks on a multi-state tour in September 1963. He is murdered by a sharpshooter's bullet fired by Lee Harvey Oswald at about 12:30 p.m. as his motorcade passed through Dealey Plaza in Dallas. Oswald himself is murdered two days later by nightclub owner Jack Ruby.

1964: LBJ's "War on Poverty"

• Date: Jan. 8

• Location: Washington, D.C.

Bogged down by the Vietnam War, President Lyndon B. Johnson struggles constantly to pivot away from the war to focus on his stated goals of reducing poverty, ending segregation, and establishing the social programs many Americans rely on to this day, including the immensely popular Medicare program. During his "War on Poverty" State of the Union Address of Jan. 8, 1964, LBJ outlines the need for the country to reduce poverty, end racial discrimination, attend to the health needs of the elderly, and other progressive goals. LBJ later ushers in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Social Security Amendments of 1965.

1965: Civil rights turns violent

• Date: March 7

• Location: Selma, Alabama

The fatal shooting of protester Jimmy Lee Jackson by an Alabama state trooper sparks a march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. Hundreds of civil rights activists march in what becomes known as "Bloody Sunday." Police would confront the marchers, led by John Lewis (who is a House Democrat from Georgia) and others. As the activists cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge, police attack the protesters with tear gas and billy clubs, hospitalizing 50.

1966: Mao purges rivals

• Date: Aug. 13

• Location: Beijing

At the end of a week-long session of the Communist Party Central Committee of the People's Republic of China, Chairman Mao Zedong condemns the political elites, calling on China's youth to rebel against the entrenched political hierarchy. It is the beginning of the decade-long Cultural Revolution that fundamentally transforms Chinese society. Intellectuals, members of the former Nationalist government, and people with ties to Western powers are persecuted, sent to re-education labor camps, or killed by the factions of Red Guards formed in the wake of Mao's call to action.

1967: Six-Day War

• Date: June 5

• Location: Middle East

Amid escalating tensions with its neighbors, Israel launches a preemptive strike that destroys most of Egypt's air force. Syria, Jordan, and Iraq also attack Israel. As the war continues, Israel takes the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt, captures East Jerusalem and the West Bank from Jordan, and in heavy fighting seizes the Golan Heights from Syria. A ceasefire went into effect on June 10.

1968: Dream denied

• Date: April 4

• Location: Memphis, Tennessee

Martin Luther King Jr. is fatally shot by James Earl Ray as the civil rights icon stands on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel, a tragedy that sparks race riots nationwide. King's influence in words and actions touch and move not only the nation, but the world, and resonate to this day. Two months later, on June 4, Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy and brother of John F. Kennedy, is fatally shot by Sirhan Sirhan, an Arab Christian from Jerusalem, who believes Kennedy is "instrumental" in oppressing Palestinians.

1969: Landing on the moon

• Date: July 20

• Location: Merritt Island, Florida

President Kennedy's goal of a manned lunar landing before 1970 is realized six years after his assassination. Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins blast off from the Kennedy Space Center at 9:32 a.m. aboard the Saturn V rocket. After three days of travel, Armstrong and Aldrin land the Eagle module on the lunar surface as Collins remains in lunar orbit to pilot the module. Upon their return to Earth, the three astronauts are put in 21-day quarantine to ensure they do not bring back any lunar contagions.

1970: Vietnam War turns to Cambodia

• Date: April 29

• Location: Eastern Cambodia

Although the United States should be scaling back U.S. troop presence in Vietnam, President Richard Nixon approves an operation with the South Vietnamese to invade Cambodia to oust Northern Vietnamese forces there. The Cambodian incursion inflames anti-war protests in the United States as it is perceived to be an escalation of U.S. military involvement in Southeast Asia.

1971: Pentagon Papers

• Date: Feb. 8

• Location: Laos

The Pentagon Papers, a study by the U.S. Department of Defense about the country's involvement in the Vietnam War, are released and published first in The New York Times, then other newspapers. The documents expose several missteps and how several administrations have misled the American public regarding the war in Vietnam. They also reveal an expanded campaign in Cambodia and Laos, especially clandestine bombing in Laos, which today is considered the heaviest bombardment in history.

1972: Nixon goes to China

• Date: Feb. 21

• Location: Beijing

Nixon, a virulent anti-communist earlier in his political career, surprises the American public by traveling to Beijing for a week of talks in a historic first step toward normalizing relations between the United States and the People's Republic of China. Until this trip, the United States and communist China were de facto enemies, fighting proxy wars in the Korean Peninsula in the 1950s and South Vietnam at the time of Nixon's visit.

1973: Roe vs. Wade

• Date: Jan. 22

• Location: Washington D.C.

In a landmark 7-2 decision that will be known as Roe vs. Wade, the Supreme Court rules that under the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, states cannot completely bar a woman's decision to terminate her pregnancy. However, the court adds that as the pregnancy develops, the state can balance a woman's right to privacy with its interest in preserving the "potentiality of human life." As a result, states can ban abortion in the third trimester except in cases where a pregnancy affects a woman's health.

1974: Nixon resigns

• Date: Aug. 8

• Location: Washington, D.C.

President Richard Nixon announces his resignation amid impeachment proceedings stemming from the Watergate scandal and his administration's attempt resist a congressional investigation. The scandal exposes abuses of power by the White House after five burglars were busted breaking in to the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C. Nixon becomes the only president in U.S. history to resign.

1975: Saigon falls

• Date: April 30

• Location: South Vietnam

Two years after the last American troops leave Vietnam, communist troops from North Vietnam capture Saigon, ending nearly two decades of relentless war in the rice paddies and jungles of that Southeast Asian nation. The final tally of war dead for the United States is 58,220.

1976: The Concorde changes air travel

• Date: Jan. 21

• Location: London and Paris

Two supersonic Concorde jets take off simultaneously – one from London to Bahrain, operated by British Airways, and the other from Paris to Rio de Janeiro via Dakar in Senegal, operated by Air France – marking the first time paying passengers enjoy commercial travel at faster than the speed of sound. Though travel by one of the 16 Concordes ever put into service could slash travel time from New York to London in half, the high cost of maintenance, soaring ticket prices, as well as a fatal accident in 2000, sealed the fate of the narrow, slope-nosed aircraft.

1977: Rise of the personal computer

• Date: January

• Location: Chicago

Personal home computers began to emerge in the 1970s, but many of the earliest versions resembled calculators that would plug into televisions sets. By 1977, however, the desktop home computer begins to resemble their more modern versions – with an accompanying attached or separate computer screen and a magnetic tape or floppy disk storage device. The Commodore PET is unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago that year, while the first Apple II and Radio Shack's TRS-80 go on sale.

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1978: Cult's mass suicide

• Date: Nov. 18

• Location: Jonestown, Guyana

More than 900 people die in one of worst recorded acts of cult-related mass murder-suicide after most of the victims and perpetrators drink a powdered drink mix dosed with cyanide. Most of the victims are Americans, devotees of Peoples Temple cult leader Jim Jones, a former Methodist-trained preacher who built a following and led the flock to Guyana. Among the dead are 276 children who drink the poison. A small number of cult defectors are killed by Peoples Temple gunmen who also slay California congressman Leo Ryan, who had gone to Guyana to investigate Jonestown.

1979: Islamic Republic born in Iran

• Date: Feb. 11

• Location: Tehran

Worsening economic conditions, increasing discontent with the government, and wide support for religious leader in exile Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini end the reign of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi. The shah and his family flee Iran in January 1979. On Feb 11, the monarchy is dissolved, and on April 1, Khomeini declares Iran an Islamic republic. With support among the nation's clergy and their many followers, he begins rebuilding Iranian society based on conservative Shiite religious principles.

1980: Reagan elected

• Date: Nov. 4

• Location: Washington, D.C.

With the United States in an economic malaise and the Iranian hostage crisis hobbling the presidency of Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan is elected the 40th president in a landslide. Reagan, who would serve two terms, was the oldest man elected president at the time. Reagan's election changes the trajectory of American politics, ushering in an era of conservative leadership. During his tenure, he takes a more aggressive approach to the Soviet Union and increases defense spending. Reagan convinces Congress to cut taxes, a move that many economists credit with triggering an economic boom in the 1980s.

1981: AIDS impacts America

• Date: June 5

• Location: Los Angeles

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention publishes a report about five gay men who had been diagnosed by local physicians with a rare form of pneumonia – the first reported U.S. cases of what would later become known as HIV/AIDS. The autoimmune disease spread so fast that by the end of the 1982, 500 Americans had died from what now the CDC called acquired immune deficiency syndrome, or AIDS. The death toll would rise to 5,000 by 1985.

1982: Mexico triggers regional debt crisis

• Date: Aug. 12

• Location: Mexico City

Global economic stagnation in the 1970s and early 1980s, and excessive borrowing among Latin America's biggest economies, boils over when Mexico's Finance Minister Jesús Silva-Herzog tells the U.S. Federal Reserve his country can no longer service its debt to $80 billion. After the announcement, lenders realize virtually every country in Latin America, led by Brazil, Argentina and Mexico, are not able to pay back loans. The crisis would lead to years of eroding wages, weak-to-negative economic growth, sky-high unemployment, severe austerity measures, and political instability – known as the "lost decade" in Latin America.

1983: The internet is born

• Date: Jan. 1

• Location: Multiple

The internet as we know it today – a seemingly endless collection of websites hosted on servers scattered across the globe – is still more than a decade away. But at the beginning of 1983, the the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) – a small network for academics and researchers – transitions to the standard TCP/IP protocol of the World Wide Web. The protocol would become the internet's cornerstone and technical foundation as it allows expanded available address space and decentralizes the network, thus also expanding accessibility.

1984: Chemicals kill thousands in India

• Date: Dec. 2

• Location: Bhopal, India

The chemical disaster in Bhopal is still considered history's worst industrial disaster. About 30 tons of methyl isocyanate, an industrial gas used to make pesticide, are released at a Union Carbide Corp. plant. About 600,000 poor residents of nearby shanty towns are exposed to a highly toxic compound that kills about 15,000 people and countless farm animals, according to Indian government estimates. The calamity leads to a generation of birth defects. To this day, locals claim the now-abandoned site is riddled with toxic materials left behind by Union Carbide, which was acquired by Dow Chemical in 2001.

1985: Reagan, Gorbachev meet

• Date: Nov. 19

• Location: Geneva

Despite his often bellicose criticisms of the Soviet Union, Reagan agrees to meet with his counterpart, Mikhail Gorbachev, in Geneva in the first meeting between leaders of the two Cold War foes in nearly a decade. Though the meeting yields little of substance, it starts a closer relationship between the two men who both seem committed to scaling back the nuclear arms race between the two nuclear superpowers.

1986: Shuttle tragedy

• Date: Jan. 28

• Location: Off the coast of Florida

The 25th mission of the U.S. space shuttle program ends with the tragic loss of seven astronauts as space shuttle Challenger exploded 73 seconds after takeoff from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Among those killed are Christa McAuliffe, who would have been the first teacher in space. The failure is later identified as a problem with the so-called O-rings used to form a seal in the seams of the shuttle's external fuel tanks.

1987: Stock market tanks

• Date: Oct. 19

• Location: Worldwide

Oct. 19, 1987, is called Black Monday because on that day the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunges 508 points, or more than 22%. The drop is worse than the crash in 1929. It is also worse than the market plunge after the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the 2008 financial crisis. Among the reasons cited for the drop are rising tensions in the Persian Gulf, concern over higher interest rates and the belief that the bull market is ending. Computerized trading, relatively new at the time, accelerates trade orders, which speeds up the market drop. As a result of the collapse, exchanges put in place so-called circuit breakers intended to halt trading when stocks fall too fast. This measure is designed to provide investors a cooling off period and avoid a panic.

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1988: When the U.S. armed Iran

• Date: March 16

• Location: Washington, D.C.

Lt. Col. Oliver North and Vice Adm. John Poindexter are indicted on charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States for their involvement in the so-called Iran-Contra affair. The scandal involved members of the Reagan administration who illegally sold arms to Iran to help facilitate the release of American hostages, and then transfer the proceeds of the sale to fund the Nicaraguan contras, a loose affiliation of right-wing militias. North is convicted, but his conviction is vacated and reversed, while Poindexter's convictions are also reversed on appeal.

1989: The Berlin Wall falls

• Date: Nov. 9

• Location: Berlin, East and West Germany

Cracks in the monolithic Soviet bloc are starting to appear in the 1980s, and the very symbol of communist repression comes crashing down in November, when the Berlin Wall is breached, ending a 28-year division of the city. During the day on Nov. 9, a spokesman for East Berlin's Communist Party says starting at midnight that day, citizens of East Germany are free to cross the country's borders. Almost immediately Berliners start slamming the wall with axes and sledgehammers. By nightfall, the celebration turns into what one observer calls "the greatest street party in the history of the world" and the city is reunited. East and West Germany would reunite one year later.

1990: Democracy in Poland

• Date: Jan. 28

• Location: Poland

With the hold of the Soviet Union and communism on East Europe loosening, Poland's ruling communist party votes to dissolve and become more moderate. In the following elections, Lech Wałęsa, leader of the Solidarity Movement and the 1983 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, wins the election and becomes president.

1991: America goes to war in Middle East

• Date: Jan. 17

• Location: Saudi Arabia and Kuwait

After Saddam Hussein's Iraq invades and occupies Kuwait on Aug. 2, 1990, the United States sends forces to defend neighboring Saudi Arabia from being overrun and to protect its vital oil assets in Operation Desert Shield. With Saudi Arabia secured, U.S. implements Operation Desert Storm to push Iraqi forces back across the border with Kuwait in a military operation that lasts until a ceasefire takes effect in April.

1992: Cold War ends

• Date: Feb. 1

• Location: Camp David Maryland

Just weeks after the dissolution of the Soviet Union on Dec. 26, 1991, President George H.W. Bush and his Russian counterpart, Boris Yeltsin, meet at Camp David to formally declare the end of the Cold War that began shortly after the end of World War II. The meeting comes days after both countries announce they would stop aiming nuclear missiles at each other. Russia declares its 11 former communist satellite republics – from Armenia to Uzbekistan – independent.

1993: The EU becomes reality

• Date: Nov. 1

• Location: Brussels

The Treaty of the European Union, also known as the Maastricht Treaty, goes into effect in November, after a rough series of political wrangling that, among other concessions, allows the U.K. and Denmark to opt out of the common euro currency. The treaty opens the way to removing border controls among member states and invites new members to join the union.

1994: Amazon.com is born

• Date: July 5

• Location: Seattle

With an initial aim of becoming an online bookstore, Jeff Bezos and a handful of angel investors launch Amazon.com, just as e-commerce is about to take off . Twenty-four years later, after expanding from books to the so-called "Everything Store" and growing a business selling cloud services to companies like Netflix and Instagram, Bezos has become the world's richest man. Amazon.com, meanwhile is racing with Apple to become the world's first trillion-dollar American company.

1995: Domestic terror strikes Oklahoma

• Date: April 19

• Location: Oklahoma City

In the deadliest domestic terrorist attack in U.S. history, anti-government radicals Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols bomb the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. They time the truck-bomb attack for a weekday morning in order to maximize casualties. For the murder of at least 168 people, including 19 children who were in a child care center in the building, and the injury of hundreds of others, an unremorseful McVeigh is executed by lethal injection on June 11, 2001. Nichols is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole.

1996: The dawn of cloning

• Date: July 5

• Location: Midlothian, Scotland, U.K.

Dolly the Sheep enters the annals of bioengineering when scientists at Scotland's Roslin Institute become the first to not only successfully clone a mammal, but also the first to do so using an adult cell rather than an embryonic one. After 277 so-called cell fusions that created 29 embryos, the teams managed to turn an udder cell into a nearly complete biological carbon copy of the sheep from which it came.

1997: Machine tops chess champ

• Date: May 11

• Location: New York City

Artificial intelligence and machine learning have been serious areas of study (and hype) for over 60 years. In 1997, one of the most significant victories for silicon logic came when IBM's Deep Blue became the first machine to beat a world chess champion. The the refrigerator-sized computer beat Garry Kasparov twice and tied him three times in a six-game match.

1998: The age of Google begins

• Date: Sept. 4

• Location: Menlo Park, California

With seed money from Sun Microsystems co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, among others, Stanford University Ph.D. students Larry Page and Sergey Brin launch the search engine Google. The digital advertising behemoth Google Inc., now Alphabet Inc., is an $854 billion company with several subsidiaries, including YouTube, autonomous-car development company Waymo and X, the company's research and development division.

1999: NATO's first independent strike

• Date: March 24

• Location: Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

In order to get Yugoslav forces out of Kosovo during the Kosovo War, NATO forces initiate their first-ever military campaign against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (now Montenegro and Serbia) without U.N. Security Council authorization as Russia and China oppose the attack. The NATO airstrikes are aimed at stopping an onslaught against ethnic Albanians by the government of Slobodan Milošević. The NATO attacks last nearly three months, culminating in the withdrawal of Yugoslav forces from Kosovo.

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2000: International Space Station opens

• Date: Nov. 2

• Location: Low Earth orbit

Commanders Bill Shepherd from the United States and Yuri Gidzenko of Russia, along with Russian flight engineer Sergei Krikalev become the first temporary residents of the International Space Station two years after the first component of the research center was put into low-Earth orbit about 250 miles above sea level. Since that first crew, there have been 229 other visitors to the ISS,some of them multiple times, led by 146 from the United States and 47 from Russia.

2001: 9/11

• Date: Sept. 11

• Location: Multiple

In the worst attack on U.S. soil since the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941, 19 hijackers inspired by Islamist extremism kill nearly 3,000 people after crashing two passenger-laden commercial aircraft into the World Trade Center towers in lower Manhattan and one into the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia. A fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, crashes in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, after passengers and crew attempt to regain control of the plane headed toward Washington, D.C.

2002: Homeland Security

• Date: Nov. 25

• Location: Washington, D.C.

Following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Congress and President George W. Bush enact the Homeland Security Act, the biggest government reorganization of national security efforts since the Department of Defense was created in 1947. The sweeping legislation creates the massive Department of Homeland Security, which is responsible for everything from protecting infrastructure from cyberattacks to managing the new U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency.

2003: U.S. crushes Iraq

• Date: March 19

• Location: Iraq

With the help of British and other allied forces, the United States begins its invasion of Iraq with a rapid bombing "Shock and Awe" campaign with the intention of destroying Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction; the weapons are never found. Coalition forces manage to quickly topple the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein, but have to fight insurgent forces for years afterward.

2004: Facebook founded

• Date: Feb. 4

• Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts

Mark Zuckerberg, a 23-year-old Harvard University student, creates "The facebook," a local social networking site named after the orientation materials that profiles students and faculty and given to incoming college freshmen. Fourteen years later, Facebook has become a $510 billion digital advertising behemoth so integral to many people's lives that it has been criticized for helping foreign powers and propagandists influence the U.S. political system.

2005: Katrina overwhelms New Orleans

• Date: Aug. 29

• Location: U.S. Gulf Coast

After spending four days in the Gulf of Mexico bulking up to a Category 5 hurricane, Katrina slams into New Orleans, inundating the city and creating a humanitarian crisis that lasts for weeks. The catastrophe underscores the precarious situation not only in the Big Easy but also the surrounding area of the Gulf Coast. At least 1,833 people in the storm's path are killed, and the storm inflicts $161 billion in damages to the region, the costliest storm in U.S. history.

2006: Hussein executed

• Date: Dec. 30

• Location: Baghdad

Three years after U.S. soldiers pulled him from a hole in the ground where he had been hiding, Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein is hanged after he was convicted for crimes against humanity, specifically for ordering the massacre of 148 Shiites in 1982 following a failed assassination attempt against him.

2007: The iPhone

• Date: Jan. 9

• Location: San Francisco

Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who died in October 2011, first shows the world one of the most popular branded consumer electronic devices in history, the iPhone. Since the first-generation phone that Jobs introduced at the Consumer Electronics Show that year, there have been 18 versions of the mobile device, and more than 1.2 billion units have been sold globally through 2017. Only Samsung's Galaxy smartphone comes close to that volume.

2008: Dow plunges

• Date: Sept. 29

• Location: New York City

The Dow Jones Industrial Average records the largest-ever intraday drop, 777.68 points, after Congress rejects a massive $700 billion bailout of U.S. banks. The bill would pass days later. The market reacts also to months of global market turmoil amid the 2008 global financial crisis spurred by the U.S. subprime mortgage market crash. The Dow fell by more than half during the 2007-09 Great Recession, tumbling from 14,164 on Oct. 9, 2007, to 6,594 on March 5, 2009.

2009: America's first African-American president

• Date: Jan. 20

• Location: Washington, D.C.

After winning in a landslide against Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, amassing in 365 electoral votes and 53% of the popular vote, Barack Obama is sworn in as the first African-American president of the United States. Obama inherits the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, but with his party holding majorities in both houses of Congress at the time, the president is able to pass a stimulus package and his signature Affordable Care Act in March 2010.

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2010: Catastrophic oil spill

• Date: April 20

• Location: Gulf of Mexico, Louisiana

Eleven workers die and 17 are injured after an explosion and fire erupts on the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig 40 miles from the Louisiana coast. The explosion causes the largest environmental disaster in U.S. history, spewing 3 million barrels of crude over the three months it takes to stop the leak. British oil company BP says costs climbed to $65 billion in claims for the accident, including a $1.7 billion charge it took as recently as the fourth quarter of 2017.

2011: Bin Laden killed

• Date: May 2

• Location: Abbottabad, Pakistan

In an intense 40-minute nighttime firefight, 25 U.S. Navy SEALs hunt down and kill al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, mastermind of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, in a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Within hours, bin Laden's body is identified using DNA and then buried in the Arabian Sea.

2012: The "God Particle" is (probably) discovered

• Date: July 4

• Location: Near Geneva

Nearly 600 feet below the France-Switzerland border at CERN's Large Hadron Collider Facility, an international team of scientists discovers a new particle widely believed to be the elusive Higgs boson, known as the "God Particle," which is thought to be a fundamental component of the universe. Higgs boson has been an important element of particle physics theory for decades, but until 2012 there had been no physical evidence to support its existence.

2013: Snowden reveals secrets

• Date: June 6

• Location: Hong Kong

After surreptitiously leaving his job at U.S. National Security Agency contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, computer security consultant Edward Snowden meets secretly in Hong Kong with journalists Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras. He reveals the first of a series of secrets about numerous U.S. and European government surveillance operations. Hailed as a courageous whistleblower and privacy champion by some, and a traitor that compromised counterterrorism efforts by others, the American now resides in exile in Moscow.

2014: Russian bear bites Ukraine

• Date: March 16

• Location: Crimea

Exploiting political unrest in Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin orchestrates the annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. The action incites peals of condemnation from world leaders and a raft of economic sanctions against Moscow. This strategically important and predominantly Russian-speaking region on the Black Sea has been coveted by the Russians as part of their strategic efforts to check NATO expansion along Russia's western border.

2015: NASA flies by Pluto

• Date: July 14

• Location: 3 billion miles from Earth

NASA spacecraft New Horizons becomes the first human-made object to fly past and observe the dwarf planet Pluto. New Horizons sends back stunning photographs of this enigmatic and distant member of the solar system, including images of a mountain range and massive icebergs floating in frozen nitrogen. New Horizons is now en route to the Kuiper Belt, a massive asteroid belt at the far reaches of the solar system.

2016: Trump elected

• Date: Nov. 8

• Location: U.S.

Running on a populist agenda, Donald Trump is elected the 45th president of the United States and the fifth president in U.S. history (the second since the 2000) to win despite losing the popular vote. The real estate developer and television personality ran on a platform of putting "America First" in global trade and foreign policy negotiations and cracking down on undocumented immigrants.

2017: Hurricane triple-whammy

• Date: August-September

• Location: Multiple

Within just four weeks, three massive hurricanes – Harvey, Irma and Maria – strike Texas, Florida and the Caribbean, killing 228 people, inflicting a combined $265 billion in damages and displacing millions of homeowners. Hurricane Maria inflicts immense damage to the U.S. commonwealth of Puerto Rico, which was already struggling from economic insolvency.

Detailed findings & methodology

There is little doubt that in the last 100 years, mankind has progressed dramatically. People live longer, eat better, have greater access to improved medical care and are freer to express their opinions and associate with whomever they want.

That optimism can be seen in population growth. Despite the two most devastating wars in human history, the world population has nearly tripled, from 1.9 billion to 7.5 billion, since 1917.

One hundred years is an eye blink in history, yet 100 years ago, women did not have the right to vote in the United States. African-Americans were prevented from voting in the American South. Labor unions were in their infancy and were weak, and laws reforming child labor had yet to be passed by Congress. All that changed because of women’s suffrage, the inexorable march of civil rights and the strengthening labor unions.

One hundred years ago, a person anywhere in the world was more likely than not to be illiterate. And there was a good chance he or she was the subject of colonial rulers in South America, Africa and Asia. Two world wars would spell the end of imperial houses in Austria-Hungary, Germany and Russia, and weaken the grip of another, Great Britain. Independence movements sprouted in Europe, Africa and Asia, yearning for freedom and expressing national pride.

Nationalism had its dark side, though, with fascist governments ruling Italy and Germany. It would take a world war to remove their scourge. Another form of totalitarianism, communism, would dominate the USSR and Eastern Europe for several generations, as well as China and other countries in Asia, before the West would triumph over the Soviet Union and its allies in the Cold War.

Speaking of the Cold War, that conflict launched the space race and accelerated technological progress, hastening the use of personal computers and cell phones. These inventions have fundamentally changed our lives – from the way we communicate to the way we shop and socialize – and made billions of dollars for the companies that make them and their founders. These products and innovations are a major part of the culture today.

To determine the most important event the year you were born, 24/7 Wall St. drew on research materials and media sources to compile its list. Deciding the most important event in a given year by its nature is a subjective exercise. In reaching our decisions, we chose the event that had the most far-reaching impact and was not necessarily the most famous event in a given year.

24/7 Wall Street is a USA TODAY content partner offering financial news and commentary. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.

A history of the UK's honours scandals | The Week UK

The doling out of honours in the UK is never short of controversy. And the latest announcement is no different after critics responded with disbelief to the news that former education secretary Gavin Williamson is to receive a knighthood. “Headteachers and education union leaders expressed shock and surprise” when Downing Street yesterday said that the Queen had approved the honour for “political and public service”, The Telegraph reported. Explaining the unusual timing of the announcement, one government source told the paper it had been planned for the New Year Honours list but had been “delayed” after Williamson became entangled in the “Partygate” scandal. The question of whether the honours system is open to financial or other influence has haunted British public life for decades. Here are some of the most bitter disputes over honours in recent UK political history: Lloyd George’s ‘cash for patronage’ scandal David Lloyd George enjoyed an illustrious political career, including serving as prime minister from 1916 to 1922. But the Liberal PM found himself embroiled in a major “cash for patronage” scandal over his resignation honours list in 1922. Although the purchase of peerages was not illegal, Lloyd George was accused of raising funds for his party through the sale of peerages, as well as using the honours system to (unsuccessfully) avoid criticism from newspapers. It was the brazenness of Lloyd George’s “price list for peerages” that caused a scandal. They were arranged through political fixer Maundy Gregory, who sold peerages “ranging from £10,000 (more than £400,000 today) for a knighthood up to £40,000 for a baronetcy”, according to The Guardian. From 1917 to 1922, more than “120 hereditary peers alone were created”, said The Spectator. So many knighthoods were given out in Cardiff – Lloyd George had grown up in Wales and spoke Welsh as his first language – that “it became known as the ‘city of dreadful knights’”, said the magazine. Skip advert The scandal led to the passing of the Honours (Prevention of Abuses) Act in 1925, and Gregory would eventually become the only person to be convicted under the act, continuing to falsely offer honours to the wealthy and connected into the 1930s. Wilson’s Lavender List Allegedly handwritten on pastel-hued paper by Harold Wilson’s closest aide Marcia Williams, later Lady Falkender, the so-called “Lavender List” has become an infamous document in modern political history.

The list named businessmen Wilson had chosen to honour to mark his 1976 resignation, making way for James Callaghan as the next prime minister. The list was controversial as many felt it “sanctioned the ennobling and knighting of crooked and dubious businessmen”, according to The Times – many of whom held views antithetical to the values of the Labour Party. Names included a knighthood for Joseph Kagan, later convicted of false accounting, and businessman Eric Miller, who committed suicide while his firm was being investigated. But further controversy was fuelled by the suggestion that Lady Falkender was either the principal author of the list or had sought to add to the list in order to reward her friends and financially benefit from the list herself. The list was seen as “an indication of the sway she held over Wilson, her alleged lover”, reported the paper. Lady Falkender denied any involvement in compiling the list, maintaining she had “merely copied it from another list, on pink”, said the Financial Times in her 2019 obituary. And in 2007, the BBC was forced to pay her £75,000 in libel damages after a BBC Four docu-drama claimed she had conducted an affair with Wilson and had undue influence over the list. Blair’s ‘cash-for-honours’ scandal In 2006, Tony Blair became the first prime minister to be questioned by police as part of a political corruption inquiry that would drag on for 16 months, and overshadow the last days of his premiership. An investigation was launched after SNP MP Angus MacNeil complained that four wealthy businessmen were nominated by Tony Blair for peerages after lending the party a total of £5m. All four of the peerages were blocked by the House of Lords appointments commission, and MacNeil’s complaint launched a police investigation into whether laws banning the sale of honours had been broken. Skip advert The police inquiries would lead to 136 people being interviewed, according to the BBC, and Blair himself would be questioned three times, although not under caution and “as a witness rather than a suspect”. Labour’s chief fundraiser Lord Levy – nicknamed “Lord Cashpoint” by the tabloid press – was arrested twice on suspicion of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. In 2007, the police would hand a 216-page report on the scandal to the Crown Prosecution Service – which later announced it had insufficient evidence to bring charges against anyone. Cameron accused of cronyism David Cameron was accused of cronyism when he nominated almost 50 close aides, political allies and Conservative donors for honours as part of his resignation honours list.

People of 2021: from Gareth Southgate to Angela Merkel | The Week ...

Days after Boris Johnson puts England into a third national lockdown, Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty warns that the UK is entering the “most dangerous” phase of the pandemic. But there is reassurance of a sort when Brian Pinker, 82, becomes the first person in the world (outside a clinical trial) to have the Oxford/AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine, at Oxford’s Churchill Hospital.

A mob of Donald Trump’s supporters storm the US Capitol in a failed attempt to stop Congress certifying Joe Biden’s election victory; the violence leads to the deaths of five people. Trump, who took several hours to call off his supporters, is charged by Congress with incitement to insurrection, but his Republican colleagues later acquit him.

Hundreds of the rioters are later identified and arrested, including Jacob Chansley, the “QAnon Shaman”; his lawyers argue that he was “groomed” by Trump and was only following the president’s orders, but he is convicted and sentenced to 41 months in prison.

Derbyshire Police agrees to refund two women who were fined for taking a country walk together. Jessica Allen and Eliza Moore, both 27, had received a penalty of £200 each, on the basis that the tea they had brought with them counted as an illegal “picnic”.

After giving a “cast-iron guarantee” that exams will go ahead in England in the summer, the Education Secretary Gavin Williamson announces that they’re being cancelled after all.

Biden is inaugurated as the 46th president of the US; the highlight of the pared-back ceremony is a recital of The Hill We Climb by the youth poet laureate Amanda Gorman.

The Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny flies back to Moscow to continue his campaign to unseat President Putin – and is promptly arrested and jailed.

The UK becomes the first country in Europe – and only the fifth in the world, after the US, Brazil, India and Mexico – to pass the milestone of 100,000 recorded coronavirus deaths.

Myanmar’s armed forces stage a dramatic early-morning coup, ousting the civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi and returning the fledgling democracy to military rule.

New U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May visits Scotland

Michael Settle, The (Glasgow, Scotland) Herald

GLASGOW — Theresa May visited Scotland on Friday in her first official engagement as Britain's new Prime Minister in a clear indication of the strength of her commitment to maintaining the “special Union” between the United Kingdom's four nations and people.

And the new Conservative Party leader will deliver a message to Scots, saying: “The government I lead will always be on your side.”

May is holding talks with Scottish leader Nicola Sturgeon in Bute House in Edinburgh, in which she will stress how she wants the Scottish government to form a central part of the Brexit process — Britain's exit from the European Union.

Ahead of her visit, May said: “I believe with all my heart in the United Kingdom; the precious bond between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. This visit to Scotland is my first as prime minister and I’m coming here to show my commitment to preserving this special union that has endured for centuries.

“I want to say something else to the people of Scotland too: the government I lead will always be on your side. Every decision we take, every policy we take forward, we will stand up for you and your family; not the rich, the mighty or the powerful.

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“That’s because I believe in a union, not just between the nations of the United Kingdom but between all of our citizens. Whether it’s reforming the economy or strengthening our society, we are going to build a better Britain and a nation that works for everyone; not just the privileged few,” she added.

However, the potential for an early intergovernmental clash is high as May has been adamant that “Brexit means Brexit” while Sturgeon has insisted, given Scotland voted strongly to stay in the EU, that from her perspective “Remain means Remain.”

Within the government the new prime minister is regarded as a tough, no-nonsense negotiator. She is thought to have believed David Cameron caved in too easily to demands by the pro-independence Scottish National Party before and after the 2014 referendum on whether Scotland should be an independent country.

One source, reflecting on the prospect raised by Sturgeon of a second independence referendum, said: “Theresa is a tough cookie and will not give ground as easily as David did.”

Sturgeon said she was hoping for a constructive discussion but stressed: “I respect how people in other parts of the U.K. voted; I hope the prime minister will respect how people in Scotland voted." Scotland voted to remain in the EU in the referendum last month. The U.K. overall voted to leave.

"My job is to seek to protect Scotland's interests and I've said I'm open to seeking to do that through the U.K. process. If I'm going to be able to do that, then she has to make the process open and flexible," Sturgeon said.

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Sturgeon said a second Scottish independence referendum could be the only way to secure Scotland's interests and protect its EU membership but stressed she wanted to "explore all options".

David Davis, the new secretary of state for Brexit, suggested Britain could quit the EU by December 2018, noting how a “brisk but measured approach to Brexit” was achievable.

Earlier this week, David Mundell, the reappointed Scottish Secretary, suggested he was open to Scotland having a different Brexit deal to the rest of the UK if it was “doable”.

But Philip Hammond, the new Treasury chief, made clear this would not happen, pointing out how the people of the U.K. had voted “collectively” to leave the EU.

Sturgeon described these comments as "deeply disappointing," adding: "I hope the new prime minister,Hammond and all of the U.K. government will understand that we are absolutely serious when it comes to achieving our goal of protecting Scotland's vital interests."

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She spoke after the first meeting of the Standing Council on Europe, which she set up to advise the Scottish government following the vote to leave the EU on June 23.

The body is made up of 18 legal, economic and diplomatic specialists and chairman Anton Muscatelli said they would examine how best to secure Scotland's place in the EU.

May spent Thursday appointing and firing ministers from the Cabinet. One insider said: “This is not a reshuffle but a completely new government.”

Those ministers who were sacked, including Michael Gove, Nicky Morgan, John Whittingdale and Theresa Villiers, were told their services were no longer needed in early morning private meetings.

Later in Downing Street, the procession of promoted ministers and those who survived the chop took place before television cameras. Among the winners were a string of women and Brexiters.

These included Justine Greening promoted to the education brief, Liz Truss, who succeeds Gove as justice secretary, and leading Leave campaigner Andrea Leadsom, who takes on the environment portfolio.

May's office made clear that the new premier had created “a bold cabinet, which was hitting the ground running” with ministers already having met some of their foreign counterparts for talks.

“What you have seen with the appointments today is that commitment to putting social reform at the heart of her government," declared May’s spokeswoman.

The creation of specific Cabinet posts for exiting the EU and boosting international trade "underlines the commitment to delivering on the decision of the British people," she added.

But the opposition Labour Party said the promotion of a string of right-wingers contradicted the new premier’s "warm words" on her entry into Downing St. about seeking to govern "not for a privileged few but for every one of us".

Meantime, the prime minister, who has already taken telephone calls from Germany’s Angela Merkel and France’s Francois Hollande, had a 15-minute congratulatory telephone call from President Obama.

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The weekend that was

• Sixty people are feared dead following an airstrike yesterday on a school in Ukraine where 90 people were sheltering, according to a local official. Separately, the Ukrainian government said "all women, children and elderly people" have been evacuated from the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol.

• Northern Ireland is on the cusp of having a nationalist leader for the first time in its history after Sinn Fein, once considered the political wing of the IRA, emerged as the largest party in regional elections yesterday.

• The Biden administration is issuing a new warning that the US could potentially see 100 million Covid-19 infections this fall and winter , as officials publicly stress the need for more funding from Congress to prepare the nation.

• Women in Afghanistan must cover their faces in public, ideally wearing the traditional burqa, according to a decree issued by the Taliban yesterday . If a woman does not follow the rules, her "male guardian" will be visited and advised, and eventually jailed and sentenced.

• An explosion rocked the historic Hotel Saratoga in the center of Cuba's capital of Havana on Friday, killing at least 30 people, Cuban officials say, and leaving more than 60 hospitalized for injuries.

The week ahead

Monday

There is speculation that Russian President Vladimir Putin could formally declare war on Ukraine on Monday, which a symbolic day for Russia. May 9 is known as "Victory Day" and commemorates the country's defeat of the Nazis in 1945. Western officials have long believed that Putin would leverage the symbolic significance and propaganda value of the day to announce either a military achievement in Ukraine, a major escalation of hostilities -- or both. Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, and since then, Putin has insisted that his troops are carrying out a "special military operation" instead of a war.

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Tuesday

Primary elections are set to kick off across Nebraska and West Virginia Tuesday. In Nebraska, eyes are on a Republican candidate for governor -- but not for positive reasons. Charles Herbster, a rancher and businessman who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump, is facing multiple allegations he inappropriately touched women . Trump stood by him even after the Nebraska Examiner reported in mid-April that seven women, including Republican state Sen. Julie Slama, had accused Herbster of groping them at political events or beauty pageants, with an additional woman accusing him of kissing her forcibly. In six cases, at least one eyewitness corroborated the women's allegations, the publication reported. Herbster has denied the allegations, calling them "100% false."

Donald Trump Jr. is also scheduled to be deposed Tuesday as part of a class-action lawsuit alleging some members of the Trump family collaborated with a fraudulent marketing company. Donald Trump and his two adult sons have agreed to sit for depositions in May and June. The former President agreed to be deposed on June 16 while Eric Trump will sit for questioning on May 12, according to a letter filed with the court.

Tuesday also marks three years since the death of Ronald Greene in police custody . Greene died on May 10, 2019, after police said he resisted arrest and struggled with officers. His family has said they were told Greene died in a car crash after a police chase. Video of the incident released two years later showed officers kicking, punching and using a taser on Greene before he died in their custody.

Thursday

Thursday is International Nurses Day! The day honors nurses for their contributions worldwide and marks the conclusion of National Nurses Week , which began on May 6. Thursday is also the birthday of the notable nurse Florence Nightingale . The International Council of Nurses has celebrated the day since 1965.

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