• 1889 – First wireless message from a ship to the shore received.
• 1904 – The automobile tire chain is patented.
• 1944 – Freckleton Air Disaster—a United States Army Air Forces B-24 Liberator bomber crashes into a school in Freckleton, England killing 61 people.
• 1954 – First flight of the C-130 Hercules transport aircraft.
• 1966 – Lunar Orbiter 1 takes the first photograph of Earth from orbit around the Moon.
• 2000 – A Gulf Air Airbus A320 crashes into the Persian Gulf near Manama, Bahrain, killing 143.

More events: August 16 – August 17 – August 18