Big Stories of 2016

Here are the Top stories of 2016

1. Attack in Paris

A series of coordinated terrorist attacks occurred in Paris, France and the city's northern suburb, Saint-Denis. Beginning at 21:20 CET, three suicide bombers struck near the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, followed by suicide bombings and mass shootings at cafés, restaurants and a music venue in central Paris.

In response to the attacks, a three-month state of emergency was declared across the country to help fight terrorism, which involved the banning of public demonstrations, and allowing the police to carry out searches without a warrant, put anyone under house arrest without trial and block websites that encouraged acts of terrorism.

2. Germanwings Plane Crash

Germanwings Flight 9525, was a scheduled international passenger flight from Barcelona–El Prat Airport in Spain to Düsseldorf Airport in Germany. The flight was operated by Germanwings, a low-cost carrier owned by the German airline Lufthansa. An Airbus A320-211, crashed 100 kilometres (62 mi) north-west of Nice in the French Alps after a constant descent that began one minute after the last routine contact with air traffic control and shortly after it had reached its assigned cruising altitude. All 144 passengers and six crew members were killed. It was Germanwings' first fatal crash in the 18-year history of the company.

The crash was deliberately caused by the co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, who had previously been treated for suicidal tendencies and been declared "unfit to work" by a doctor. Lubitz kept this information from his employer and reported for duty. During the flight, he locked the pilot out of the cockpit before initiating a descent that caused the aircraft to crash into a mountain.

3. Amtrak Train Crash

A train derailment in Philadelphia killed eight and injured more than 200 Amtrak passengers in May after the Northeast Regional train sped around a curve and went off the track.  8 were killed and over 200 injured, 11 critically. The train was traveling at 102 mph (164 km/h) in a 50 mph (80 km/h) zone of curved tracks when it derailed. Some of the passengers had to be extricated from the crashed cars. Many of the passengers and local residents helped first responders during the rescue operation. Five local hospitals treated the injured. The derailment disrupted train service for several days.

4. Charleston Church Shooting

Target was African American churchgoers. That was a mass shooting that took place at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, United States, on the evening of June 17, 2015. During a prayer service, nine people were killed by a gunman, including the senior pastor, state senator Clementa C. Pinckney; a tenth victim survived. The morning after the attack, police arrested a suspect, later identified as 21-year-old Dylann Roof, in Shelby, North Carolina. Roof later confessed that he committed the shooting in hopes of igniting a race war.

5. Orlando nightclub shooting

On June 12, 2016, Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old American security guard, killed 49 people and wounded 53 others inside Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, United States.It was both the deadliest mass shooting by a single gunman and the deadliest incident of violence against LGBT people in U.S. history, as well as the deadliest terrorist attack in the U.S. since the September 11 attacks in 2001. It was also considered a hate crime. Initial reports said he may have been a patron of the nightclub and used gay dating websites and apps, but Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) officials said they have not found any credible evidence to substantiate these claims. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) also conducted an investigation and said it found no links between ISIL and Mateen.

6. European Refugee Crisis

Tens of thousands of people fleeing war-torn Syria and other areas in the Middle East and Africa spent much of this summer making the laborious, and dangerous, trek through Europe toward countries including Germany and Sweden in hopes of finding asylum. . The vast majority arrived by sea but some migrants have made their way over land, principally via Turkey and Albania.The conflict in Syria continues to be by far the biggest driver of migration. But the ongoing violence in Afghanistan and Iraq, abuses in Eritrea, as well as poverty in Kosovo, are also leading people to look for new lives elsewhere.

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