2001 facts for kids

Kids Encyclopedia Facts

Millennium:	3rd millennium
Centuries:	20th century – 21st century – 22nd century
Decades:	1970s 1980s 1990s – 2000s – 2010s 2020s 2030s
Years:	1998 1999 2000 – 2001 – 2002 2003 2004

2001 (also known as MMI in Roman numerals) was a special year that started on a Monday. It was the very first year of the 3rd millennium and the 21st century.

Important Events
Births
Deaths
Movies Released
Hit Songs
Nobel Prize Winners
Images for kids
See also

Important Events

January 1 – Many people around the world celebrated the start of the new millennium and the 21st century. An artist in Seattle placed a large rock in Magnuson Park, similar to one seen in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.
January 13 – A strong earthquake hit El Salvador, sadly causing at least 800 deaths.
January 15 – Wikipedia, a free online encyclopedia that anyone can help write, officially started. This day is sometimes called Wikipedia Day.
January 20 – Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo became the 14th President of the Philippines.
January 20 – George W. Bush became the 43rd President of the United States, taking over from Bill Clinton.
January 24 – The last two members of a group known as the "Texas 7" were found by police in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
January 26 – An old DC-3 airplane crashed near Ciudad Bolívar, Venezuela, and 24 people died.
January 26 – A big earthquake happened in Gujarat, India, and more than 20,000 people died.
January 29 – Thousands of students in Indonesia asked President Abdurrahman Wahid to leave his job due to concerns about his actions.
January 31 – A court made a decision about the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. One person from Libya was found responsible, and another was found not responsible.
February 5 – Actors Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman announced they were separating.
February 6 – Ariel Sharon, leader of the Likud Party, won the election to become Prime Minister of Israel.
February 9 – The American submarine USS Greeneville accidentally hit and sank a Japanese fishing ship called Ehime-Maru.
February 12 – The NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft successfully landed on the asteroid 433 Eros. This was the first time a spacecraft had ever landed on an asteroid.
February 13 – Another earthquake hit El Salvador, causing at least 400 deaths.
February 16 – British and U.S. forces carried out bombing raids in Iraq.
February 18 – During the Daytona 500 race, NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt was tragically killed in a car crash.
February 18 – FBI agent Robert Hanssen was arrested for being a spy.
February 19 – A museum was opened at the Oklahoma City National Memorial to remember the Oklahoma City bombing.
February 26 – The Treaty of Nice was signed.
March 24 – Apple Computer released its new operating system, Mac OS X version 10.0.
April 1 – An American spy plane collided with a Chinese fighter jet. The American plane had to make an emergency landing in Hainan, China. The U.S. crew was held for 10 days, and the Chinese pilot, Wang Wei, went missing.
April 1 – Former president of Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milosevic, surrendered to police. He was to be tried for war crimes.
April 26 – Junichiro Koizumi became Prime Minister of Japan.
April 28 – American Dennis Tito became the first person to travel to space as a tourist.
May 1 – The Japanese cities of Urawa, Omiya, and Yono joined together to form the new city of Saitama.
May 10 – In Ghana, a sudden rush at a soccer game caused over 120 deaths.
May 24 – Sherpa Temba Tsheri, who was 16 years old, became the youngest person to reach the top of Mount Everest.
May 25 – Erik Weihenmayer from Boulder, Colorado, became the first blind person to reach the top of Mount Everest. Also, 64-year-old Sherman Bull became the oldest person to reach the top.
June 5-9 – Houston, Texas was hit by severe flooding from Tropical Storm Allison. Many years of research and data were lost at the Texas Medical Center. Twenty-two people died, and the damage cost more than five billion American dollars.
June 7 – Tony Blair's Labour Party won the UK General Election for a second time.
June 11 – Timothy McVeigh was executed for his role in the Oklahoma City bombing.
June 19 – An American missile hit a soccer field in northern Iraq, killing 23 people.
June 21 – There was a total solar eclipse.
June 23 – A strong earthquake, measuring 7.9, hit the south of Peru.
July 2 – The world's first self-contained artificial heart was put into a patient named Robert Tools.
July 16 – The FBI arrested Dmitry Sklyarov at a meeting in Las Vegas.
July 18 – In Baltimore, Maryland, a 60-car train went off its tracks in a tunnel. This caused a fire that lasted for days and almost shut down downtown Baltimore.
July 19 – UK politician and writer Jeffrey Archer was sentenced to four years in prison for lying in court.
July 23 – Megawati Sukarnoputri became the new president of Indonesia.
August 9 – US President George W. Bush announced his support for federal money to be used for limited research on embryonic stem cells.
August 9 – In the Comoros, the military took control of the island of Anjouan, which had declared independence. They planned to rejoin the Comoros.
September 6 – The U.S. Justice Department announced that it would no longer try to break up the software company Microsoft. Instead, they would seek a smaller penalty related to antitrust laws.
September 9 – Ahmed Shah Massoud, a leader in Afghanistan, was assassinated.
September 11 – Almost 3,000 people died in the September 11, 2001 attacks. These attacks happened at the World Trade Center in New York City, The Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, and in rural Pennsylvania.
September 14 – The Nintendo GameCube video game console was released in Japan.
September 15 – President George W. Bush stated that the United States of America was at war against terror.
October 4 – The first case of anthrax in the U.S. was announced by federal officials.
October 7 – The U.S. Attack on Afghanistan began.
October 10 – War on Terrorism: US President George W. Bush presented a list of 22 most wanted terrorists.
October 15 – NASA's Galileo spacecraft flew very close to Jupiter's moon Io.
October 23 – Apple Inc. released the first iPod.
October 25 – Microsoft released Windows XP.
November – The Doha Declaration made some changes to international intellectual property law.
November 4 – Hurricane Michelle hit Cuba, causing damage to crops and many homes.
November 7 – The super-sonic commercial airplane Concorde started flying again after being grounded for 15 months.
November 10 – The People's Republic of China became a member of the World Trade Organization.
November 12 – In New York City, an Airbus A300 airplane crashed shortly after taking off from John F. Kennedy International Airport. All 260 people on board died.
November 12 – U.S. Attack on Afghanistan: Taliban forces left Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, as Northern Alliance troops approached. (Northern Alliance fighters took Kabul on November 14).
November 13 – Doha Round: The World Trade Organization finished a four-day meeting in Doha, Qatar.
November 13 – War on Terrorism: For the first time since World War II, US President George W. Bush signed an order allowing special military trials for foreigners suspected of being involved in terrorist acts against the United States.
November 16 – The first Harry Potter movie, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, was released. It earned a lot of money, becoming one of the highest-earning movies worldwide at that time, only behind Titanic.
November 24 – Melanie Thornton, a German-American pop singer, died in a plane crash on her way to Zürich, Switzerland.
November 29 – George Harrison, who was the lead guitarist for The Beatles, died at age 58.
December 2 – The company Enron filed for bankruptcy. At the time, this was the largest bankruptcy in the history of the United States.
December 13 – The United States decided to leave the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
December 13 – Tuanku Syed Sirajuddin, the Raja of Perlis, became the 12th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia.
December 14 – There was an annular solar eclipse.
December 22 – U.S. Attack on Afghanistan: Hamid Karzai became the head of the temporary government in Afghanistan.
December 27 – The People's Republic of China was given permanent normal trade status with the United States.