EVENTS:
- 1818 – The British Institution of Civil Engineers is founded.
- 1959 – Luna 1, the first spacecraft to reach the vicinity of the Moon and to orbit the Sun, is launched by the Soviet Union.
- 1971 – The second Ibrox disaster kills 66 fans at a Rangers–Celtic association football (soccer) match.
- 1975 – A bomb blast at Samastipur, Bihar, India, fatally wounds Minister of Railways Lalit Narayan Mishra.
- 1976 – The Gale of January 1976 begins, which results in coastal flooding around the southern North Sea coasts, resulting in at least 82 deaths and US$1.3 billion in damage.
- 1999 – A brutal snowstorm smashes into the Midwestern United States, causing 14 inches (359 mm) of snow in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and 19 inches (487 mm) in Chicago, where temperatures plunge to -13 °F (-25 °C); 68 deaths are reported.
- 2006 – An explosion in a coal mine in Sago, West Virginia traps and kills 12 miners, leaving only one survivor.
- 2013 – Barack Obama signs the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012.
- 2019 – Adventist Health System and its subsidiaries rebranded to AdventHealth.
- 2022 – Massive nationwide protests and unrest break out in Kazakhstan over the sudden increase of liquefied petroleum gas prices, leaving over 200 people dead and thousands injured.
- 2024 – Two aircraft collide on a runway at Haneda Airport in Tokyo, killing 5 and injuring 15.
BIRTHS:
- 1878 – Mannathu Padmanabha Pillai, Indian activist, founded the Nair Service Society (d. 1970)
- 1905 – Jainendra Kumar, Indian author and translator (d. 1988)
- 1940 – S. R. Srinivasa Varadhan, Indian-American mathematician and academic
- 1947 – Calvin Hill, American football player
- 1959 – Kirti Azad, Indian cricketer and politician
- 1960 – Raman Lamba, Indian cricketer (d. 1998)
- 1961 – Craig James, American football player and sportscaster
- 1991 – Davide Santon, Italian footballer
- 1991 – Luis Pedro Cavanda, Belgian footballer
- 1992 – Paulo Gazzaniga, Argentinian footballer
- 1992 – Korbin Sims, Australian-Fijian rugby league player
HOLIDAYS and OBSERVANCES:
