Today in History: August 31, Diana, Princess of Wales, dies in Paris crash

Today is Monday, Aug. 31, the 243rd day of 2026. There are 122 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On Aug. 31, 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales, was killed after the car she was riding in crashed in Paris; her partner Dodi Fayed and driver Henri Paul (who was found to have been intoxicated at the time of the accident) also died.

Also on this date:

In 1881, the first U.S. tennis championships (for men only) began in Newport, Rhode Island.

In 1886, an earthquake with an estimated magnitude of up to 7.3 devastated Charleston, South Carolina, killing at least 60 people.

In 1962, the Caribbean nation of Trinidad and Tobago became independent of British colonial rule.

In 1972, the charismatic Soviet gymnast Olga Korbut, 17, won individual gold medals on the balance beam and floor exercise at the Summer Olympics in Munich; she also won gold for the team all-around competition and a silver in the uneven parallel bars.

In 1980, Poland’s Solidarity labor movement was born with an agreement signed in Gdansk (guh-DANSK’) that ended a 17-day-old strike.

In 1992, white separatist Randy Weaver surrendered to authorities in Idaho, ending an 11-day siege by federal agents that had claimed the lives of Weaver’s wife, son and a deputy U.S. marshal.

In 1994, Russia officially ended its military presence in the former East Germany and the Baltics after half a century.

In 2006, Edvard Munch’s painting “The Scream” was recovered by Norwegian authorities after being stolen nine days earlier.

In 2010, President Barack Obama announced the end of the U.S. combat mission in Iraq, declaring no victory after seven years of bloodshed and telling those divided over the war in his country and around the world: “it’s time to turn the page.”

In 2019, a gunman carried out a shooting rampage that stretched 10 miles between the Texas communities of Midland and Odessa, leaving seven people dead before police killed the shooter outside a movie theater in Odessa.

In 2025, a landslide wiped out an entire village in Sudan's western region of Darfur, killing an estimated 1,000 people in one of the deadliest natural disasters in the African country's recent history.

Today’s Birthdays: World Golf Hall of Famer Isao Aoki is 84. Violinist Itzhak Perlman is 81. Singer Van Morrison is 81. Rock musician Rudolf Schenker (The Scorpions) is 78. Actor Richard Gere is 77. Actor Stephen McKinley Henderson is 77. Attorney and author Marcia Clark is 73. Olympic gold medal hurdler Edwin Moses is 71. Rock singer Glenn Tilbrook (Squeeze) is 69. Rock musician Gina Schock (The Go-Go’s) is 69. Singer-composer Deborah Gibson is 56. Queen Rania of Jordan is 56. Golfer Padraig (PAH’-drig) Harrington is 55. Actor Chris Tucker is 55. Actor Sara Ramirez is 51. Former NFL wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald is 43. NBA All-Star Jalen Brunson is 30. Actor Jaylen Barron is 29. Actor Jason Maybaum is 19.