Oxalaia, a spinosaurid dinosaur, lived in what is now Brazil during the Late Cretaceous, sometime between 93.9 and 100.5 million years ago. The genus name comes from Oxalá, an African deity. Oxalaia's only known fossils, a partial snout and upper jaw bone, were found in 1999 in the Alcântara Formation. At an estimated 12 to 14 metres (39 to 46 feet) in length, it is the largest carnivorous dinosaur discovered from Brazilian fossils. The African genus Spinosaurus was its closest relative. Oxalaia bore two replacement teeth in each socket (similarly to sharks) and a very ornamented secondary palate, features which are not known in other theropod or spinosaurid dinosaurs. Its habitat was tropical and heavily forested, surrounded by dry regions. Since Oxalaia's skull and teeth resembled those of modern crocodilians, it may have largely hunted fish. Fossil evidence suggests spinosaurids also occasionally preyed on other animals such as small dinosaurs and pterosaurs. (Full article...)

Clay model of the statue of John of Nepomuk

• ... that Matthias Rauchmiller, the son of a butcher, designed both the Plague Column in Vienna and the oldest statue on Prague's Charles Bridge (clay model pictured)?
• ... that the first screening of Venom and Eternity ended early following director Isidore Isou's attempt after the first scenes to play only its soundtrack to a darkened theatre?
• ... that Ensign Robert Duncan was the first person to shoot down a Mitsubishi A6M Zero with a Grumman F6F Hellcat?
• ... that the Redneck Fishing Tournament has seen thousands of Asian carp caught by its participants without the use of fishing poles?
• ... that Telfair Hodgson was the original financial backer and first managing editor of The Sewanee Review, the oldest continuously published literary quarterly in the United States?
• ... that a pair of yellow "dolphin-like creatures" from a 7th-century hanging bowl finds its closest parallel in manuscript art?
• ... that Eric Rose performed the first successful paediatric heart transplant?
• ... that flying fox teeth are used as currency on Makira?

Kofi Annan

• Nobel Peace Prize winner and former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan (pictured) dies at the age of 80.
• The Asian Games open in Jakarta and Palembang, Indonesia.
• Former Prime Minister of India Atal Bihari Vajpayee dies at the age of 93.
• American soul singer and songwriter Aretha Franklin dies at the age of 76.
• In Afghanistan, hundreds are killed as the Taliban seize most of the strategic city of Ghazni for four days.
• A portion of the Ponte Morandi motorway bridge in Genoa, Italy, collapses, killing at least 41 people.

August 19

Fire damage at Cinema Rex

• 1745 – Bonnie Prince Charlie raised the Jacobite standard at Glenfinnan in the Scottish Highlands to begin the Jacobite rising of 1745.
• 1964 – Over 17,000 fans saw the Beatles on the opening date of the group's first nationwide U.S. tour.
• 1978 – The Cinema Rex in Abadan, Iran, was set on fire (damage pictured), leading to the death of at least 420 people.
• 1991 – A Hasidic man accidentally struck two Guyanese immigrant children with his car in the Crown Heights neighborhood of New York City, initiating three days of rioting.
• 2005 – Thunderstorms in southern Ontario, Canada, spawned at least three tornadoes that caused over C$500 million in damage.

Edward Boscawen (b. 1711) · Gustave Caillebotte (b. 1848) · Linus Pauling (d. 1994)