Unix Timestamp: 1233360000
Saturday, January 31. 2009, 12:00:00 AM UTC

US Airways, the United States' largest low cost hub and spoke airline, announced that it was dropping its $9.8 billion bid for Delta Air Lines. The airline dropped the bid after Delta's creditors threw their support behind the airline's plan to emerge from bankruptcy on its own. //phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=196799p=irol-newsArticleID=956418highlight= (US Airways Press Release) //news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6318357.stm (BBC) //www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087sid=aTbDXjlE1qqwrefer=home (Bloomberg)

A large section of the AntarcticLarsen Ice Shelf begins disintegrating, consuming about over 35 days.

In the Netherlands a Scottish court convicts a Libyan and acquits another for their part in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 which crashed into Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988.

Sega officially announces that they've discontinued their Dreamcast system. They also said that they vowed never to make another video game system ever again and to make only video games.

Dr Harold Shipman is sentenced to life in prison for murder of at least 15 of his patients out of 365 suspected victims.

U.S. President Bill Clinton invokes emergency powers, to extend a $20 billion loan to help Mexico avert financial collapse.

Super Bowl XXVII: The Buffalo Bills become the first team to lose 3 consecutive Super Bowls as they are defeated by the Dallas Cowboys, 52–17.

The United States Coast Guard begins deporting the first of some 14,000 refugees from Haiti.

President of the United StatesGeorge H. W. Bush meets with President of RussiaBoris Yeltsin at C David, where they formally declare that the Cold War is over.

The heads of state of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and of most of the temporary members, meet in New York City to discuss the new world order in the post-Cold War world.

The last Ohrbach's department store closes in New York City after 64 years of operation.

British Airways is privatised and listed on the London Stock Exchange.

The new Constitution of the Philippines goes into effect.

Seatbelt use for drivers and front seat passengers becomes mandatory in the United Kingdom.

The Spanish Embassy in Guatemala is invaded and set on fire, killing 36 people. It is called Spain's own Tehran, similar to the 1979–80 Iran American U.S. Embassy Hostages of Americans.

The Centre Georges Pompidou is officially opened by French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing.

Pan American and Trans World Airlines cancelled their options to buy 13 Concorde airliners.

A bomb explodes at the British Yacht Club in West Berlin, killing Irwin Beelitz, a German boat builder.

Anti-British riots take place throughout Ireland. The British Embassy in Dublin is burned to the ground, as are several British-owned businesses.

The German militant group Movement 2 June announces its support of the Provisional Irish Republican Army.

King Birendra succeeds his father as King of Nepal.

Apollo program: "Apollo 14" (carrying astronauts Alan Shepard, Stuart Roosa, and Edgar Mitchell) lifts off on the third successful lunar landing mission.

West Germany and Romania establish diplomatic relations.

The United Kingdom ceases all trade with Rhodesia.

Ham the Chimp, a 37-pound (17-kg) male, is rocketed into space aboard Mercury-Redstone 2, in a test of the Project Mercury capsule, designed to carry United Statesastronauts into space.

The first successful American satellite, Explorer 1, is launched into orbit.

Three students on a junior high school playground in Pacoima, California, are among the 8 persons killed following a mid-air collision between a Douglas DC-7 airliner and a Northrop F-89 Scorpion fighter jet, in the skies above the San Fernando Valley section of Los Angeles, US.

February 1 – The North Sea flood of 1953 kills 1,836 people in the southwestern Netherlands (especially Zeeland), 307 in the United Kingdom in the Irish Sea.

Forces from the Communist Party of China enter Beijing.

The British crown colony of the Malayan Union, Penang and Malacca form the Federation of Malaya.Cabinet Memorandum by the Secretary of State for the Colonies (UK). 21 February 1956.

Percival Prattis becomes the first African-American news correspondent allowed in the United States House of Representatives and Senate press galleries.

The Government of the United Kingdom announces the £25 million Tanganyika groundnut scheme for cultivation of peanuts in the Tanganyika Territory.

The lowest air temperature in North America (-63 degrees Celsius) is recorded in Snag, Yukon Territory.

The Communists take power in Poland.

Bolesław Bierut becomes the President of Poland.

Eddie Slovik is executed by firing squad for desertion, the first American soldier since the American Civil War, and last to date to be executed for this offense.

WWII: American forces land on Kwajalein Atoll and other islands in the Japanese-held Marshall Islands.

WWII: Battle of Malaya: The last organized Allied forces leave British Malaya, ending the 54-day caign.

"The Green Hornet" radio show debuts.

2 February - The Communist Party of Vietnam is established.

While studying photographs taken in January, Clyde Tombaugh confirms the existence of Pluto, a heavenly body considered a planet until 2006, when the term planet was officially defined. Pluto is now considered a Dwarf Planet.

Elm Farm Ollie becomes the first cow to fly in an airplane, and also the first cow to be milked in an airplane.

The 3M company markets Scotch Tape.

Trotsky is exiled to Alma Ata.

British and Belgian troops leave Cologne.

1919 Battle of George Square: British police battle strikers in Glasgow, Scotland.

Estonian Freedom War: The Red Army is expelled from the entire territory of Estonia.

WWI: Germany announces its U-boats will engage in unrestricted submarine warfare.

WWI: Germany's first large-scale use of poison gas as a weapon occurs when 18,000 artillery shells containing liquid xylyl bromidetear gas are fired on the Imperial Russian Army on the Rawka River west of Warsaw during the Battle of Bolimov however, freezing temperatures prevent it being effective.

Ecuador-Colombia earthquake (8.8 on the Moment magnitude scale) and associated tsunami.

The Portuguese republican revolution breaks out in the northern city of Porto.

Turkey agrees to an armistice at Adrianople.

Maronite nationalist leader Karam leaves Lebanon aboard a French ship for Algeria.

February ndash American Civil War: Columbia, South Carolina burns as Confederate forces flee from advancing Union forces.

American Civil War: Confederate General Robert E. Lee becomes general-in-chief.

Alvan Graham Clark makes the first observation of Sirius B, a white dwarf star, through an eighteen inch telescope at Northwestern University.

The Corn Laws are abolished the next year in the United Kingdom (following legislation in 1846).

John C. Fremont court-martialed on grounds of mutiny and disobeying orders. Verdict set aside by President, but Fremont retires to California Territory.

Construction of the Washington Monument begins.

John Henry Newman founds the first Oratory in the English-speaking world when he establishes the Birmingham Oratory at 'Maryvale', Old Oscott, England.

Mexican–American War formally ends, making the unincorporated, unorganized California Territory a provisional official possession: The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is signed, ending the war and ceding to the United States virtually all of what is today the southwest United States. California is never organized by congress as a territory, but passes the requirements directly for statehood in 1850. Some even today claim this treaty did not include Texas, over the annexation of which the quarrel began.

Gervasio Antonio de Posadas becomes Supreme Director of Argentina.

February ndash George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen, represents Britain at the Congress of Chatillon.

Henry Benedict Stuart becomes the new Stuart claimant to the throne of Great Britain as King Henry IX and the figurehead of Jacobitism.

The first venereal diseases clinic opens at London Lock Hospital.

In the Netherlands, undertakers revolt after funeral reforms in Amsterdam.

Bank of Amsterdam is established.

Guy Fawkes is executed.

King Henry I of Portugal dies with no direct heirs, precipitating a Succession crisis.

Battle of Gembloux: Spanish forces under Don John of Austria and Alexander Farnese defeat the Dutch. Alexander Farnese begins to recover control of the French-speaking Southern Netherlands.

The Edict of Orleans suspends the persecution of the Huguenots in France.

Treaty of Lyon: France cedes Naples to Ferdinand II of Aragon who becomes King of Naples as Ferdinand III.

In Korea, the Sambyeolcho Rebellion against the Goryeo Dynasty (a puppet government of the Yuan Dynasty) ends as rebel forces are defeated by combined Yuan and Goryeo forces.

The 6-year-long battle of Xiangyang ends as the commander of the Song Dynasty's forces surrender to Kublai Khan's Yuan Dynasty. The battle is the first in which firearms are used in combat.

Battle of Lena: Inferior Swedish forces defeat the invading Danes and king Sverker the Younger is deposed as king of Sweden. He is succeeded by his rival Erik Knutsson.

Athanasius of Alexandria returns from his fifth exile. He spent four months in his ancestral tomb outside Alexandria.

Buddhist monk Lè Zūn has a vision of golden rays of light shining down on 1,000 Buddha's, resulting in the creation of the Mogao Caves.

Pope Sylvester I succeeds Pope Miltiades as the 33rd pope.