September 1970
The following events occurred in September 1970: September 1, 1970 (Tuesday) An assassination attempt was made in against King Hussein of Jordan as his motorcade approached a railway underpass in Amman. The King and his entourage were on their way to the airport to greet the arrival of his daughter, Princess Alia, and the attack happened a few minutes before she was scheduled to land. Hussein was unharmed, and was able to divert the incoming Jordanian airliner to neighboring Beirut The attempt on the monarch's life precipitated the Black September in Jordan crisis that would see more than 10,000 Palestinian Jordanians killed in less than a week. The cabinet of the government of Israel voted to promote the status of the 35,000 members of the Arabic-speaking Druze community, abolishing their classification as a minority group (which applied to Arab Muslims, Arab Christians, Samaritans and Circassians The reclassification of the Druze, many of whom had fought for the Israeli Army, was the next step to full Israeli citizenship. The U.S. Senate voted not to approve a resolution by Senators George S. McGovern (D-South Dakota) and Mark O. Hatfield (R-Oregon) to force U.S. President Nixon to withdraw all American troops from Indochina by December 31, 1971. The vote to curb an American president's war powers had 39 supporters (including seven Republicans) and 55 voting against it The "Agreement on the International Carriage of Perishable Foodstuffs and on the Special Equipment to be used for such Carriage", commonly called the ATP Treaty was signed in Geneva by seven Western European nations. Hapag-Lloyd AG, one of the world's largest shipping container companies, was created by the merger of the Hamburg America Line (Hamburg-Amerikanische Paketfahrt-Aktien-Gesellschaft or HAPAG) and North German Lloyd. Born: Hwang Jung-min, South Korean film star, in Masan, South Gyeongsang Province Max Pollak, Austrian dancer, in Vienna. Died: François Mauriac, 84, French novelist and 1952 laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature Agnes E. Meyer, 83, American journalist, philanthropist and activist September 2, 1970 (Wednesday) Astronauts would no longer be sent to the Moon after 1972, as NASA announced the cancellation of the Apollo 18 and Apollo 19 missions to the Moon, which had been scheduled for 1973 and 1974, respectively The Apollo 20 mission had been canceled on January 4, 1970. The original mission of Apollo 15, less than 24 hours at the Censorinus crater, was replaced by Apollo 18's schedule for an extended mission of three days on the Moon at the Hadley Rille. The scrubbing of the missions was estimated to save $42.1 million in the upcoming fiscal year, but also meant the layoff of 700 NASA employees. Britain attempted its first launch of an orbital satellite from the RAAF Woomera Range Complex in South Australia. The Black Arrow rocket lifted off successfully, but the second stage had a leak in its high-test peroxide (HTP) tank pressurization system and shut down 15 seconds too soon. The rocket and its payload (the Orba satellite) lacked sufficient propulsion to reach orbit, and