10 Strange Events That Occurred In 2021

2021 will be over in five days time, it was supposed to be the year for recuperation from the negative effect of Covid-19 that struck the World in 2020.  But it wasn’t quite so as some bizarre and strange events took over the baton from where Covid-19 stopped.

Ending the year on a reflective note we have decided to compile a list of 10 strange events that occurred in 2021.

1. Donald Trump supporters attacked the United States Capitol

Barely six days into the new year, Supporters of the outgoing United States President, Mr Donald Trump attacked The United States Capitol seeking to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election by disrupting the certification of the 2020 presidential election and forcing Congress to evacuate.

According to Wikipedia the attack was classified as a domestic terrorist attack  and drew international condemnation as it led to the death of five people including a police officer

2. Pope Francis meets Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in Iraq.

The Pope meeting with the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani the leader of Shite Muslim in Iran is not as bizarre as other events on this list but was strange and historic.   The pope met with Ali al Sistani to deliver a message of peaceful coexistence, urging Muslims to embrace Iraq’s Christian minority.

The meeting was not only the first of its kind but also took a painstaking process as every detail of the meeting was discussed and negotiated for months, between the ayatollah’s office and the Vatican prior to the main meeting its self.

3. European biggest team break away to form their own European Super League

It was a shock to the football world, when twelve of the leading European football clubs, AC Milan, Arsenal FC, Atlético de Madrid, Chelsea FC, FC Barcelona, FC Internazionale Milano, Juventus FC, Liverpool FC, Manchester City, Manchester United, Real Madrid CF and Tottenham Hotspur announced the formation of their own mid-week competition, the European Super League to rival the UEFA Champions League

The announcement however generated criticisms and international condemnation from supporters, other clubs and major stakeholders in the game prompting the clubs to withdraw from the league.

4. Israel-Gaza conflict

2021 cannot be detailed in history without the Isreal-Gaza Conflict, The conflict began on the 10th of May 2021, when the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hama, an Islamic Resistance Movement in Gaza launched some rocket attack into Israel.  The rocket attack hit some residential buildings and a school and led to the death of at least 13 people and 2 children

The attack was because Isreal refuse to honour the Hama’s ultimatum where they demanded that Israel withdraw their security forces from the Temple Mount complex and Sheikh Jarrah, an area annexed by Israel, but occupied by Palestinians.

Isreal responding to Hama’s Attack began a campaign of airstrikes against Gaza. The airstrike led to the destruction of over  94 buildings in Gaza and reportedly killed at least 256 Palestinians, including 66 children, with over 1900 injured and 72,000 more displaced.

5.  Assassination of Haitian President

The assassination of the Haitian President Jovenel Moïse was one of the bizarre news that shook the world in 2021. According to a report, a group of gunmen broke into the home of the Haitian President killing him and critically injuring his wife.

The identities of the perpetrators are still unknown although four suspects were killed in a shoot-out with police, and two others were arrested.

6. Taliban Takes Over The Government in Afghanistan

One of the major highlights of 2020 is when the Taliban capture Kabul and took over the government in Afghanistan, a few days after the United State government announced that it will withdraw its troops from the country, hereby ending 20 years of operations.

7. Jeff Bezos Flies into space with  Oliver Daemen and Wally Funk

The American Billionaire Jeff Bezos flew into space alongside his brother Mark Bezos, 18-year-old Oliver Daemen (who becomes the youngest person to go into space), and 82-year-old aviator and Mercury 13 member Wally Funk (who becomes the oldest person to go into space).

Bezos Journey into space was the first human test flight conducted by Blue Origin with a reusable New Shepard rocket delivering four crew members into space.

8. Elon Musk overtakes Jeff Bezos as the richest person in the world.

In the early days of 2021 the Founder and CEO of Space X and Tesla, Elon Musk overtakes Jeff Bezos as the richest in the World. Elon musk gained $13 billion in the space of one week due to Tesla’s increase in share price.

As at that time the Bloomberg Billionaires Index stated that Jeff Bezos has a net worth of $197 billion, while Elon Musk had a net worth of $213 billion.

9. Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram Shut down for over six hours.

The Giant Social Media company, Facebook and its other platforms, including Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, went down globally for close to six hours in the early days of October 2021.

The company later issued a statement on Tuesday confirming that the cause of the outage was a configuration change to the backbone routers that coordinate network traffic between the company’s data centres, which had a cascading effect, bringing all Facebook services to a halt.

10. Facebook Inc Changes to Meta.

Another Shocker we got in 2021 was when the Social media Giant Company Facebook Inc changed its name to Meta. The company announced the name change at the Facebook Connect augmented and virtual reality conference.

The name change by Facebook was to signify a rebrand that focuses on building the “metaverse,” a shared virtual environment that is projected to be the successor to the mobile internet.

As stated earlier 2021  wasn’t as turbulent as 2020 but these 10 events have made it a year never to be forgotten in several parts of the world.