Portal:Current events/2017 August 16
August 16, 2017 (Wednesday)
Arts and culture
- Removal of Confederate monuments and memorials
- Several Confederate monuments are taken down overnight in the city of Baltimore, Maryland, including the Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee Monument, Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Monument, Confederate Women's Monument and the Roger B. Taney sculpture. The Baltimore City Council unanimously voted to remove the monuments on August 14. (NBC News)
Business and economy
- Aftermath of the Unite the Right rally
- 3M CEO Inge Thulin and Campbell CEO Denise Morrison resign from the American Manufacturing Council in protest of Trump's reaction to the alt-right's actions at Charlottesville, Virginia, bringing the total number of resignations this week to 8. (CNBC) (CNBC)
- President Donald Trump disbands both the Strategic and Policy Forum and American Manufacturing Council in response to the CEO resignations. (BBC) (Business Insider)
Disasters and accidents
- 2017 Sierra Leone mudslides
- A mass burial of victims of the landslide is held in Freetown to free up space in mortuaries. Nearly 400 people are confirmed dead with at least 600 missing. (BBC)
- 2017 DR Congo landslide
- A landslide in a village along Lake Albert in the Democratic Republic of the Congo leaves at least 60 dead. (Al Jazeera)
- Accidents and incidents involving helicopters
- A United States Army Combat Aviation Brigade UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter crashes off the coast of Hawaii, with five people on board. A United States Coast Guard-led search for the missing is underway. (Sky News)
Law and crime
- Philippine Drug War
- At least 32 people are killed in a series of police raids near Manila, Philippines, allegedly due to the ongoing drug war. (The Guardian)
- Crisis in Venezuela
- Venezuelan security forces raid a prison in Puerto Ayacucho, Amazonas State, killing at least 37 inmates. Amazonas Governor Liborio Guarulla describes the killings as a "massacre". (Reuters)
Science and technology
- Evolution
- Researchers from the University of Cambridge suggest that the Chilesaurus may be the so-called "missing link" between the Stegosaurus and the Tyrannosaurus. (CNN)