Beslan school siege, North Ossetia–Alania, Russia
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| Beslan monument tree of grief |
The Beslan school
siege (also referred to as the Beslan school hostage crisis or Beslan
massacre) started on 1 September 2004, lasted
three days and involved the capture of over 1,100
people as hostages (including 777
children), ending with the death of 385
people. The crisis began when a group of armed Islamic terrorists,
mostly Ingush and Chechen, occupied School Number One (SNO) in the town of
Beslan, North Ossetia (an autonomous republic in the North Caucasus region of
the Russian Federation) on 1 September 2004. The
terrorists hostage-takers were the Riyadus-Salikhin Battalion, sent by the
Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev, who demanded recognition of the independence of
Chechnya and the UN and Russian withdrawal from Chechnya. On the third day of
the standoff, Russian security forces stormed the building with the use of
tanks, incendiary rockets and other heavy weapons At least 385 hostages were killed, including 186 children with a significant number of people
injured and reported missing.
Kursk submarine disaster
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| Kursk wreckage |
The disaster took place during a major
Russian naval exercise in the Barents Sea on 12 August
2000. Two powerful explosions caused the sinking of the Oscar-class submarine
Kursk killing all 118 sailors, officers
and civilian contractors on board.The British government, along with France,
Germany, Israel, Italy, and Norway offered help, and the United States offered
the use of one of its two deep submergence rescue vehicles, but the Russian
government absolutely refused all foreign assistance. Over four days they used
four different diving bells and submersibles to try to attach to the escape
hatch without success. On the fifth day, the Russians accepted British and Norwegian
offers of assistance. Seven days after the submarine went down, Norwegian
divers finally opened a hatch to the rescue tube in the ship's ninth
compartment, hoping to locate survivors, but found it flooded.
Outcome:
Loss of the ship and crew. Deaths
118 people (all).
Outcome:
Loss of the ship and crew. Deaths
118 people (all).
Moscow theater
hostage crisis, 2002
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| Casualties: Deaths At least 170 in total (including 133 hostages and 40 militants), Non-fatal injuries Over 700. |
It
was the seizure of the 850 hostages in Dubrovka
Theater on 23 October 2002 by 40 to 50 armed Chechens
who claimed allegiance to the Islamist militant separatist movement in Chechnya
and demanded the withdrawal of Russian forces from Chechnya and an end to the
Second Chechen War. After a two-and-a-half day siege and the execution of two
female hostages, Special Forces pumped an undisclosed
chemical agent into the building's ventilation system and raided it. All
40 of the attackers were summarily executed,
presumably while unconscious, with no casualties among Special Forces; about 130 hostages died, including nine foreigners,
due to adverse reactions to the gas. All but two of the hostages who died
during the siege were killed by the toxic substance pumped into the theater to
subdue the militants. Physicians in Moscow condemned the refusal to disclose
the identity of the gas that prevented them from saving more lives. Some
reports said the drug naloxone was successfully used to save some hostages.
Till now most details regarding Moscow theater hostage crisis especially
gas contents being used during rescue operation are treated as state secrets.
Estonia Ferry disaster
MS Estonia cruise ferry
MS Estonia was a cruise ferry built in
1979/80 at the German shipyard Meyer Werft in Papenburg. The ship sank in 1994
in the Baltic Sea in one of the worst maritime disaster of the 20th century
within Europe in peacetime. The accident claimed 852 lives (501 Swedes, 285
Estonians, 17 Latvians, 10 Finns and 44 people of other nationalities: 1 from
each of Belarus, Canada, France, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Ukraine and the
United Kingdom, 2 from Morocco, 3 from Lithuania, 5 from Denmark, 6 from
Norway, 10 from Germany, 11 from Russia).
Till
memory fades and life departs, you live forever in our hearts.
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