Chronopin: upcoming release dates, events and other important dates

The Daicon III Opening Animation screens at the Nihon SF Taikai convention in Osaka, the first of two self-funded fan short films that a young Hideaki Anno, Hiroyuki Yamaga, and Takami Akai made under the amateur group Daicon Film before founding Gainax.

In September 1982, Volvo Trucks built the first Volvo-branded truck ever assembled in North America, a Volvo F7, at its newly acquired New River Valley plant in Dublin, Virginia. The factory has produced every Volvo truck sold in North America ever since.

The Antonov An-124 Ruslan, still one of the largest cargo aircraft ever built, first flew over Kyiv on 26 December 1982, years before it entered airline service.

The first Spago opened in 1982 on the Sunset Strip and made Wolfgang Puck a name outside kitchens, largely by putting the wood-fired pizza oven where the dining room could see it and topping the pizzas with smoked salmon rather than tomato. The restaurant later moved to Beverly Hills, where it still trades, and the brand grew into a group.

Topcraft's Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind releases in Japanese theaters, Hayao Miyazaki's post-apocalyptic adventure adapting his own manga about Princess Nausicaä's struggle to bridge humanity and a poisoned, insect-guarded wilderness.

Studio Ghibli's Castle in the Sky opens in Japanese theaters, Hayao Miyazaki's adventure following orphaned engineer's apprentice Pazu and a girl named Sheeta as they search for the legendary floating city of Laputa.

A limnic eruption released 100,000-300,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide from a crater lake in northwestern Cameroon. Heavier than air, the cloud rolled downhill and suffocated everyone and everything within 25 km.

A biker-gang OVA following Eguchi Yousuke, leader of a high-school motorcycle gang who moonlights in the school's handicrafts club, and the misfits who ride with him.

Alain Passard bought the rue de Varenne dining room where he had once cooked as a young chef from its owner Alain Senderens in 1986, and reopened it under his own sign as Arpège - a musical name, from a family of musicians. He later did something close to unthinkable for a three-star French kitchen and took red meat off the menu, rebuilding the cooking around vegetables from his own gardens.

The driverless Docklands Light Railway opens to passengers, giving London's redeveloping docklands a low-cost automated metro built largely on disused rail viaducts.

The direct-to-video Legend of the Galactic Heroes begins release, an epic space-opera OVA chronicling the war between the Galactic Empire and the Free Planets Alliance through rival commanders Reinhard von Lohengramm and Yang Wenli.

Grave of the Fireflies opens in Japanese theaters, a Studio Ghibli war drama following two orphaned siblings, Seita and his young sister Setsuko, struggling to survive in the final months of World War II.

My Neighbor Totoro follows sisters Satsuki and Mei as they settle into a new countryside home and discover Totoro, a gentle forest spirit only children can see.

TMS Entertainment's Soreike! Anpanman, based on Takashi Yanase's picture books, began its decades-long run on Nippon TV, making the bean-bun superhero Japan's defining preschool anime.

Gainax's Gunbuster (Top wo Nerae!), the directorial debut of Hideaki Anno, follows aspiring pilot Noriko Takaya as she trains to crew a giant robot defending Earth from an advancing alien species.

The six-episode OVA Mobile Suit Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket begins release, following a boy on the neutral space colony Side 6 whose fascination with the One Year War turns serious once Zeon commandos infiltrate his home searching for a hidden Federation mobile suit program.

Toei Animation begins broadcasting Dragon Ball Z, the sequel series to Dragon Ball following an adult Goku, his son Gohan, and the Z Fighters against escalating threats like Frieza, Cell, and Majin Buu.

Kiki's Delivery Service follows a young witch, Kiki, as she leaves home at thirteen to complete her training year in a new city, opening a flying delivery service with her talking cat Jiji.

The 34-meter, five-loop Olympia Looping premiered at Munich's Oktoberfest on 17 September 1989, becoming the largest portable roller coaster ever built and the only one with five inversions.

In 1990, Orange County opened the Frank R. Bowerman Landfill in the hills above Irvine, California, which grew into the ninth-largest landfill in the United States.

The Rocky Mountaineer's first scheduled luxury rail journey left Vancouver for the Canadian Rockies with 200 guests aboard, launching what became one of the world's most iconic train trips.

The Exorcist III is a 1990 American supernatural psychological horror film written for the screen and directed by William Peter Blatty, based on his 1983 novel Legion. It is the third installment in The Exorcist film series and the final installment in Blatty's "Trilogy of Faith" after The Ninth Configuration (1980), serving as a follow-up and direct sequel of The Exorcist (1973).

Hours after announcing allied air attacks on Iraq, President Bush ordered the first emergency sale in the reserve's history. The Energy Department released its sales notice on 17 January 1991 and eventually sold 17.3 million barrels to 13 companies, half of what it offered: bids for sour crude came in too low to accept.

Crayon Shin-chan begins its television run on TV Asahi, an irreverent slice-of-life comedy following five-year-old Shinnosuke "Shin-chan" Nohara and his family in Kasukabe, Saitama.

Munich Airport opened at its current site on 17 May 1992, replacing Munich-Riem, and is one of only two European airports to hold Skytrax's 5-Star rating.