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The Yellowstone fires of 1988 together formed the largest wildfire in the recorded history of Yellowstone National Park, United States. Starting as many smaller individual fires, the flames spread quickly out of control with increasing winds and drought and combined into one large conflagration, which burned for several months. The fires almost destroyed two major visitor destinations and, on September 8, 1988, the entire park was closed to all non-emergency personnel for the first time in its history. Only the arrival of cool and moist weather in the late fall brought the fires to an end. A total of 793,880 acres (3,213 km²), or roughly 36 percent of the park was affected by the wildfires. Thousands of firefighters fought the fires, assisted by dozens of helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft which were used for water and fire retardant drops. At the peak of the effort, over 9,000 firefighters were assigned to the park. The Yellowstone fires of 1988 were unprecedented in the history of the National Park Service, and many questioned existing fire management policies. Media accounts of mismanagement were often sensational and inaccurate, sometimes wrongly reporting that most of the park was being destroyed. While there were temporary declines in air quality during the fires, no adverse long-term health effects have been recorded in the ecosystem. (more...)

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September 8: Independence Day in the Republic of Macedonia (1991); Victory Day in Malta; Our Lady of Meritxell Day in Andorra; International Literacy Day

• 1331Stefan Uroš IV Dušan (pictured) of the House of Nemanjić was crowned King of Serbia.
• 1541Muscovite–Lithuanian Wars: The combined forces of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland defeated the larger army of the Grand Duchy of Moscow in Orsha, present-day Belarus.
• 1941World War II: German forces severed the last land connection to Leningrad, beginning the Siege of Leningrad. Over 1 million of the city's civilians died from starvation before the siege ended on January 27, 1944, becoming one of the most lethal battles in world history.
• 1974Watergate scandal: U.S. President Gerald Ford gave recently-resigned U.S. President Richard Nixon a full and unconditional, but controversial, pardon for any crimes he committed while in office.
• 1978Iranian Revolution: After the government of the Iranian Shah declared martial law in response to protests, about eighty-eight demonstrators in Tehran were killed on Black Friday.

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