1990 Miracle Yearbook

Listufg th& pout On November 9, 1989, East Germany lifted restrictions on emigration and travel to the west, and within hours thousands of Germans celebrated on and around the Berlin Wall. By midnight, thousands of East Germans had en- tered the western part of the city which had been inaccessible only hours before. The Berlin Wall, which has divided East and West Ger- many since 1961,has finally begun to crumble. Leaving a trail of death and destruction across the Caribbean, Hurricane Hugo smashed into the coastal city of Charleston,South Carolina, on September 22, 1989. Hugo's 135-mile-an- hour windssnapped power lines,toppled trees and flooded the low-lying areas of South Car- olina, causing more than half a million people to flee and leaving thousands homeless. The Exxon Valdez,a987-foot tanker owned by Exxon Shipping Co., struck Bligh Reef about 25 miles from Valdez. Alaska, ripping holes in its hull, gushing mil- lions of gallons of thick crude oil into pristine Prince IIIUI I I JOUIIU. I IRV I ClUI I Wc.13 II IV IV!61v)i Ull 41JIII III history. A catastrophic earthquake rocked Northern Cali- fornia on October 17, killing at least 62 people and injuring hundreds, caving in bridges and freeways, igniting fires and causing widespread damage to buildings. The quake which struck during the evening rush hour, justas Game 3 of the World Series was about to begin, registered 6.9 on the Richter scale and was on the notorious San Andreas Fault. It was the second deadliest in the nation's history, ex- ceeded only by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake that destroyed much of the city and killed more than 700 people. 220 Current Events Iwo&