2002 in the United States

Events from the year 2002 in the United States.

Political incumbents

President - George Walker Bush
Vice President - Dick Cheney
Senate Majority Leader - Tom Daschle
Secretary of State - Colin Powell
Secretary of Defense - Donald Rumsfeld
Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives - Dennis Hastert

Events

January–March

January 5 – Charles Bishop, a 15-year-old student pilot, crashes a light aircraft into a Tampa, Florida building, evoking fear of a copycat 9/11 terrorist attack.
January 8 – The No Child Left Behind Act is signed into law by U.S. President George W. Bush.
January 9 – The United States Department of Justice announces it will pursue a criminal investigation of Enron.
January 14 – The asylum case of Adelaide Abankwah is heard in New York.
January 16 – A student shoots six at the Appalachian School of Law in Grundy, Virginia, killing 3.
January 18 – A Canadian Pacific Railway train carrying anhydrous ammonia derails outside of Minot, North Dakota, killing one.
January 23 – Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl is kidnapped in Pakistan, accused of being a CIA agent by his captors.
January 29 - In his State of the Union Address, President Bush describes North Korea, Iran and Iraq as an "Axis of evil".
January 31 - US special forces deployed in the Philippines in Operation Enduring Freedom - Philippines, part of the War on Terrorism.
February 1 – Kidnapped Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl is murdered in Karachi, Pakistan.
February 3 – Super Bowl XXXVI: The New England Patriots beat the St. Louis Rams 20–17 in New Orleans.
February 8–February 24 - The Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City, Utah. The United States win 10 gold, 13 silver and 11 bronze medals.
February 12 – The U.S. Secretary of Energy makes the decision that Yucca Mountain is suitable to be the United States' nuclear repository.
February 13 – Queen Elizabeth gives former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani an honorary knighthood.
February 19 – NASA's Mars Odyssey space probe begins to map the surface of Mars using its thermal emission imaging system.
March 1 – STS-109: Space Shuttle Columbia flies the Hubble Space Telescope service mission, its last before STS-107.
March 1 – U.S. invasion of Afghanistan: In eastern Afghanistan, Operation Anaconda begins.
March 12 – In Houston, Texas, Andrea Yates is found guilty of drowning her five children on June 20, 2001. She is later sentenced to life in prison.
March 14 – 125 vehicles are involved in a massive pile up on Interstate 75 in Ringgold, Georgia.
March 19 – US war in Afghanistan: Operation Anaconda ends (started on March 1) after killing 500 Taliban and al Qaeda fighters, with 11 allied troop fatalities.
March 21 – In Pakistan, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh and three others are charged with the kidnapping and killing of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl.
March 24 – The 74th Academy Awards, hosted by Whoopi Goldberg, are held at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, California with the film A Beautiful Mind winning Best Picture.

April–June

April 1 – Maryland defeats Indiana 64–52 to win the NCAA Men's Basketball Championship at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, Georgia.
April 17 – Four Canadian infantrymen are killed in Afghanistan by friendly fire from two US F-16s.
April 19 - The Senate defeats President Bush's plan to authorize oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
April 27 – The Laughlin, Nevada River Run Riot kills three.
May 10 – FBI agent Robert Hanssen is sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for selling American secrets to Moscow for $1.4 million in cash and diamonds.
May 12 – Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter arrives in Cuba for a five-day visit with Fidel Castro, becoming the first U.S. President, in or out of office, to visit the island since Castro's 1959 revolution.
May 21 – The US State Department releases a report naming seven state sponsors of terrorism: Iran, Iraq, Cuba, Libya, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria.
May 22 – 16th Street Baptist Church bombing: A jury in Birmingham, Alabama convicts former Ku Klux Klan member Bobby Frank Cherry of the 1963 murders of four girls.
May 26 – A barge collides with the Interstate 40 bridge across the Arkansas River in eastern Oklahoma, killing 14.
June 11 – Antonio Meucci is recognized as the first inventor of the telephone by the United States Congress.
June 14 – In Karachi, Pakistan, a car bomb in front of the U.S. Consulate kills 12 Pakistanis and injures 50.

July–September

July 13 – A lightning strike sets off the Sour Biscuit Fire in Oregon and northern California, which burns 499,570 acres (2,022 km²).
July 15 – In Washington, D.C., "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh pleads guilty to aiding the enemy and possession of explosives during the commission of a felony; Lindh agrees to serve 10 years in prison for each charge.
July 21 – Telecommunications giant WorldCom files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, the largest such filing in United States history.
August 12 – In Arlington, Virginia, US Airways declares bankruptcy.
September 5 – The Sour Biscuit Fire in Oregon and northern California, which burned 499,570 acres (2,022 km²), is contained.
September 12 - Iraq disarmament crisis: U.S. President George W. Bush addresses the U.N., and challenges its members to confront the "grave and gathering danger" of Iraq, or stand aside as the United States and likeminded nations act.

October–December

October 2 – The Beltway sniper attacks begin with five shootings in Montgomery County, Maryland.
October 2 – The Congress of the United States passes a joint resolution, which authorizes the President to use the United States Armed Forces as he deems necessary and appropriate, against Iraq.
October 9 – The Dot-com bubble bear market reaches bottom, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average slips below 7,200.
October 9–October 10 – Congress passes the Iraq Resolution authorizing the Iraq War.
October 16 – Iraq War Resolution is authorized by a majority of the U.S. Congress.
October 24 – The Beltway sniper attacks, having killed 10 and wounded 3 others, end with the arrest of John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo.
October 25 – U.S. Senator Paul Wellstone, his family, and his staff are killed in a plane accident at Eveleth, Minnesota.
October 27 – The Anaheim Angels defeat the San Francisco Giants in Game 7 of the 2002 World Series to win the title.
November 2 – The Godless Americans March on Washington brings together 2,000 atheists, freethinkers, and humanists in a mile-long parade down the National Mall.
November 5 – Republicans gain a majority in the Senate and a larger majority in the House of Representatives following congressional elections.
November 6 – The U.S. Federal Reserve System drops its primary discount rate by 50 basis points to 0.75%, putting the real interest rate solidly below the inflation rate.
November 7 – Iran bans the advertising of United States products.
November 8 – The United Nations passes Resolution 1441 giving Iraqi President Saddam Hussein a final opportunity to cooperate with international weapons inspectors.
November 16 – A Campaign against Climate Change march takes place in London from Lincoln's Inn Fields, past Esso offices to the United States Embassy.
November 25 – U.S. President George W. Bush signs the Homeland Security Act into law, establishing the Department of Homeland Security, in the largest U.S. government reorganization since the creation of the Department of Defense in 1947.

Deaths

January 13 - Ted Demme, film and television director (born 1963)
January 16
Bobo Olson, boxer (born 1928)
Ron Taylor, actor (born 1952)
January 20 - Carrie Hamilton, actress (born 1963)
January 22 - Peggy Lee, singer and actress (born 1920)
January 23 - Robert Nozick, philosopher (born 1938)
January 28 - Dick "Night Train" Lane, football player (born 1928)
February 1 - Irish McCalla, actress (born 1928)
February 2 - Danielle Van Dam, murder victim (born 1994)
February 15 - Howard K. Smith, television journalist (born 1914)
February 19 - Virginia Hamilton, writer (born 1936)
February 20 - Willie Thrower, football player (born 1930)
February 22 - Chuck Jones, animator (born 1912)
February 24 - Leo Ornstein, composer and pianist (born 1892)
February 26 - Lawrence Tierney, actor (born 1919)
February 27 - Mary Stuart, actress (born 1926)
March 11 - James Tobin, economist, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1918)
March 27 - Milton Berle, comedian and actor (born 1908)
April 5 - Layne Staley, singer (Alice in Chains) (born 1967)
April 15 - Byron White, athlete and Supreme Court Justice (born 1917)
April 16 - Robert Urich, actor (cancer) (born 1946)
April 18 - Wahoo McDaniel, football player and wrestler (born 1938)
April 25 - Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes, rapper (TLC) (born 1971)
April 27 - George Alec Effinger, author (born 1947)
April 28 - Ruth Handler, toy manufacturer (born 1916)
May 20 - Stephen Jay Gould, paleontologist and author (born 1941)
May 23 - Sam Snead, golfer (born 1912)
May 24 - Wallace Markfield, writer (born 1926)
June 5 - Dee Dee Ramone, bassist (The Ramones) (born 1951)
June 10 - John Gotti, gangster (born 1940)
June 11 - Robbin Crosby, guitarist (Ratt) (born 1959)
June 12 - Bill Blass, fashion designer (born 1922)
June 17 - Willie Davenport, athlete (born 1943)
June 26 - Jay Berwanger, football player (born 1914)
June 29 - Rosemary Clooney, singer and actress (born 1928)
July 5 - Benjamin O. Davis Jr., general (born 1993)
July 6 - John Frankenheimer, film director (born 1930)
July 8 - Ward Kimball, animator (born 1913)
July 9
Laurence Janifer, writer (born 1933)
Rod Steiger, actor (born 1925)
July 16 - John Cocke, computer scientist (born 1925)
July 19 - Alan Lomax, folklorist and musicologist (born 1970)
July 23 - Chaim Potok, author and rabbi (born 1929)
August 5 - Chick Hearn, basketball announcer (born 1916)
August 11 - Galen Rowell, photographer, writer, and climber (born 1940)
August 14 - Dave Williams, singer (Drowning Pool) (born 1972)
August 15 - Kyle Rote, football player and coach (born 1928)
August 31 - Lionel Hampton, musician (born 1908)
September 11 - Johnny Unitas, football player (born 1933)
September 18 - Bob Hayes, athlete (born 1942)
September 21 - Robert Lull Forward, author and physicist (born 1932)
October 9 - Aileen Wournos, serial killer (born 1956)
October 10 - Teresa Graves, actress (born 1948)
October 12 - Ray Conniff, musician and bandleader (born 1916)
October 13 - Stephen Ambrose, historian and biographer (born 1936)
October 24 - Harry Hay, activist (born 1912)
October 25 - Paul Wellstone, Senator from Minnesota (born 1944)
November 21 - Hadda Brooks, jazz singer, pianist, and composer (born 1916)
November 24 - John Rawls, political theorist (born 1921)
November 26 - Verne Winchell, doughnut entrepreneur (born 1915)
December 6
Father Philip Berrigan, priest and political activist (born 1923)
Charles Rosen, pianist and pioneer in artificial intelligence (born 1927)
December 9 - Stan Rice, painter and poet (born 1942)

Translation of "2002 in the United States"

French: 2002 aux États-Unis.