On this day

December 5, 2005

Revisit the music, news, notable people, and historical moments connected to this date.

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Headlines from December 5, 2005

Back in the Great Ape's Embrace

By Glenn Collins

This time, the big ape is coming back to the right building with the biplanes and the blonde. When some 8,000 invited guests in Times Square attend tonight's world premiere of the three-hour, $207 million remake of ''King Kong,'' the Eighth Wonder of the World will meet his fate atop the Empire State Building -- not the World Trade Center, as he did in the 1976 version starring Jessica Lange. The managers of the building and the filmmakers at Universal Pictures are aware that the promotional frenzy for the film has the potential to clash with the poignancy of loss in a city still recovering from the attacks on the twin towers.

Metropolitan Desk1212 words
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In Today's India, Status Comes With Four Wheels

By Amy Waldman

Second of four articles on India's highway modernization, India Accelerating, examines car boom there; India, home to world's largest number of poor people, has middle class that has grown to estimated 250 million in past decade, and number of super-rich has grown sharply as well; it is one of world's fastest-growing markets for cars, considered biggest status symbol of all; foreign car companies have discovered Indian consumer and are setting up plants across India; car fever is in part triumph of marketing to people who did not grow up being marketed to; growing lust for cars also reflects India finally having roads decent enough to drive them on; country is making historic effort to upgrade its dismal, mostly two-lane national highway system into four- or six-lane interstates, largest infrastructure project since independence in 1947; there has been little planning for traffic, environmental or economic consequences of millions more Indians acquiring new cars; country has one of world's highest accident rates, with more than 80,000 traffic-related deaths a year; photos; maps; graphs (L)

Foreign Desk2612 words
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Music on My Birthday

Billboard 200

The Top 50 albums for the chart week of November 30, 2005, covering December 5, 2005.

  1. 1
    Album cover for Confessions On A Dance Floor by Madonna

    Confessions On A Dance Floor

    Madonna

    Last week
    —
    Peak
    1
    Weeks
    1
  2. 2
    Album cover for Some Hearts by Carrie Underwood

    Some Hearts

    Carrie Underwood

    Last week
    —
    Peak
    2
    Weeks
    1
  3. 3
    Album cover for The Road And The Radio by Kenny Chesney

    The Road And The Radio

    Kenny Chesney

    Last week
    1
    Peak
    1
    Weeks
    2
  4. 4
    Album cover for The Emancipation Of Mimi by Mariah Carey

    The Emancipation Of Mimi

    Mariah Carey

    Last week
    15
    Peak
    1
    Weeks
    32
  5. 5
    Album cover for NOW 20 by Various Artists

    NOW 20

    Various Artists

    Last week
    3
    Peak
    1
    Weeks
    3

Notable Deaths

2005Edward L. Masry, American lawyer and politician (born 1932)[†]

Edward Louis Masry was an American lawyer, a partner in the law firm of Masry & Vititoe, and also a mayor and city councilman for the City of Thousand Oaks, California. With the help of his legal assistant Erin Brockovich, Masry built a case against the Pacific Gas & Electric Company (PG&E) of California in 1993. Their successful lawsuit was the subject of the Oscar-winning film, Erin Brockovich (2000), starring Julia Roberts as Brockovich and Albert Finney as Masry.

Historical Events

Civil Partnership Act 2004

2005The Civil Partnership Act comes into effect in the United Kingdom, and the first civil partnership is registered there.[†]

The Civil Partnership Act 2004 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, introduced by the Labour government, which grants civil partnerships in the United Kingdom the rights and responsibilities very similar to those in civil marriage. Initially the Act permitted only same-sex couples to form civil partnerships. This was altered to include opposite-sex couples in 2019. Civil partners are entitled to the same property rights as married couples, the same exemption as married couples regarding social security and pension benefits, and also the ability to exercise parental responsibility for a partner's children, as well as responsibility for reasonable maintenance of one's partner and their children, tenancy rights, full life insurance recognition, next-of-kin rights in hospitals, and others. There is a formal process for dissolving civil partnerships, akin to divorce.

2005The 6.8 Mw  Lake Tanganyika earthquake shakes the eastern provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme), killing six people.[†]

The 2005 Lake Tanganyika earthquake occurred at 14:19:56 local time on 5 December with a moment magnitude of 6.8 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme). The shock occurred along the East African Rift, an active continental rift zone in East Africa that is characterized by normal faulting, and initiated at a depth of 22 kilometers (14 mi).

Historical Context for December 5, 2005

In 2005, the world population was approximately 6,586,970,132 people[†]