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Events on October 23 in history

Blue Flame (automobile)
1970Oct, 23

Gary Gabelich sets a land speed record in a rocket-powered automobile called the Blue Flame, fueled with natural gas.

Blue Flame is a rocket-powered land speed racing vehicle that was driven by Gary Gabelich and achieved a world land speed record on Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah on October 23, 1970. The vehicle set the FIA world record for the flying mile at 622.407 mph (1,001.667 km/h) and the flying kilometer at 630.388 mph (1,014.511 km/h). Blue Flame's world records have since been broken.

Gary Gabelich (Croatian Gabelić; August 29, 1940 – January 26, 1984) was an American motorsport driver who set the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) Land Speed Record (LSR) with the rocket car Blue Flame on October 23, 1970, on a dry lake bed at Bonneville Salt Flats near Wendover, Utah.

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Events on 1970

  • 12Jan

    Nigerian Civil War

    Biafra capitulates, ending the Nigerian Civil War.
  • 28Apr

    Richard Nixon

    Vietnam War: U.S. President Richard Nixon formally authorizes American combat troops to fight communist sanctuaries in Cambodia.
  • 5Sep

    101st Airborne Division

    Vietnam War: Operation Jefferson Glenn begins: The United States 101st Airborne Division and the South Vietnamese 1st Infantry Division initiate a new operation in Thừa Thiên-Huế Province.
  • 28Sep

    Gamal Abdel Nasser

    Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser dies of a heart attack in Cairo. Anwar Sadat is named as Nasser's temporary successor, and will later become the permanent successor.
  • 8Oct

    Richard Nixon

    Vietnam War: In Paris, a Communist delegation rejects US President Richard Nixon's October 7 peace proposal as "a manoeuvre to deceive world opinion".