Portal:Physics/Anniversaries/May


 * May 1, 1960 - U-2 spy plane shot down
 * May 6, 1937 - Hindenburg fire
 * May 9, 1012 BC – Solar Eclipse seen at Ugarit, 6:09–6:39 PM.
 * May 9, 1904 – City of Truro, a steam locomotive exceeds 100 mph (160 km/h).
 * May 10, 1946 – V-2 rocket's first successful launch at White Sands Proving Ground
 * May 10, 1960 – The nuclear submarine USS Triton (SSRN-586) completes Operation Sandblast, the first underwater circumnavigation of the earth.
 * May 11, 1862 – American Civil War: The ironclad CSS Virginia is scuttled in Virginia.
 * May 11, 1995 – In New York City, over 170 countries extend Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty indefinitely, without conditions.
 * May 11, 1998 – India conducts three underground nuclear tests, including a thermonuclear device.
 * May 14, 2018 - Ennackal Chandy George Sudarshan died.
 * May 16, 1960 - Theodore Maiman operates the first optical laser, at Hughes Research Laboratories in Malibu, California.
 * May 16, 1969 – Venera 5, a Soviet spaceprobe, lands on Venus.
 * May 17, 1865 – The International Telegraph Union is established.
 * May 18, 1974 - India conducts underground nuclear tests, named Smiling Buddha.
 * May 18, 1998 - Microsoft sued by US Government
 * May 19, 1943 - RAF uses bouncing bombs in combat
 * May 20, 1932 - Amelia Earhart crosses Atlantic Ocean
 * May 26, 1972 - President Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev sign nuclear weapon non-proliferation pact.
 * May 24, 1844 - First official telegraph message is sent by Samuel Morse.
 * May 27, 1937 - Grand opening, Golden Gate Bridge
 * May 28, 1998 – Pakistan conducts five underground nuclear tests, named Chagai-I.

Births

 * May 6, 1872 - Willem de Sitter, physicist, mathematician, and astronomer
 * May 9, 1931 – Vance Brand, astronaut
 * May 10, 1746 – Gaspard Monge, mathematician
 * May 10, 1788 – Augustin-Jean Fresnel physicist
 * May 10, 1963 – Lisa Nowak, astronaut
 * May 11, 1918 – Richard Feynman, physicist
 * May 14, 1686 - Gabriel Fahrenheit, physicist and engineer
 * May 21, 1921 - Andrei Sakharov, nuclear physicist

Deaths

 * May 10, 1482 – Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli, mathematician and astronomer
 * May 16, 1830 – Joseph Fourier, French scientist
 * May 17, 1916 – Boris Borisovich Galitzine, Russian physicist