December 2024: five Sundays and a record flyby
Sunday 8 December 2024 deserves its own page. The Assad regime fell in Damascus after 54 years of family rule. Notre-Dame drew world leaders to Paris for its reopening weekend. The Eras Tour bowed out in Vancouver, and McLaren took Formula 1's constructors' title in Abu Dhabi. Around that crowded Sunday ran 31 days, from Sunday 1 December to Tuesday 31 December, holding 22 business days and week numbers 48 to 52, plus week 1.
The last count of the year
December 2024 held 31 days, of which 22 were business days and nine weekend ones. Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays each came five times; the remaining weekdays had four apiece. ISO weeks 48 to 52 carried the month, and its last days slipped into week 1 of 2025, next year's numbering arriving early.
All five moon phases fell inside the month: new on Sunday 1 December, first quarter on Sunday 8 December, full on Sunday 15 December, last quarter on Sunday 22 December and new again on Monday 30 December. Winter began at the solstice on Saturday 21 December, the year's shortest day in the north.
A Sunday with everything
In Damascus, the Assad regime collapsed and Bashar al-Assad fled to Moscow, where he was granted asylum. In Paris, the reopening ceremonies at Notre-Dame had begun the day before, on Saturday 7 December, with President Macron speaking inside the restored cathedral before dozens of heads of state and government, five years on from the fire.
In Vancouver, the Eras Tour reached its last stop, a two-year run that finished above 2 billion dollars on more than 10 million tickets, the first tour ever through that mark. In Abu Dhabi, McLaren took the Formula 1 constructors' championship for the first time since 1998. Seoul staged its own drama. Martial law was declared and lifted inside six hours on Tuesday 3 December, and an impeachment vote followed on Saturday 14 December.
A record near the Sun
On Tuesday 24 December, NASA's Parker Solar Probe skimmed 6.1 million kilometres from the Sun's surface at 394,700 mph, flying through the corona: the closest and fastest pass any spacecraft has made. On Friday 27 December it called home to say it had survived, and the data started the long journey back.
Bitcoin crossed 100,000 dollars on Thursday 5 December for the first time ever, and rose above 103,000 in Asian trading. Year-end sport filled the calendar: the Milwaukee Bucks took the NBA Cup on Tuesday 17 December, and college football's first 12-team playoff began on Friday 20 December.
A hard end to the year
Cyclone Chido, the strongest storm to hit Mayotte in more than 90 years, tore across the island on Saturday 14 December with winds over 220 km/h. Around 40 deaths were confirmed there, and the storm went on to kill more than 100 people in Mozambique.
Two airline disasters closed the year. Near Aktau in Kazakhstan, 38 of the 67 aboard died on Wednesday 25 December; at Muan in South Korea, 179 of the 181 aboard died on Sunday 29 December. The days were already lengthening after the solstice; the losses stayed.
The shortest day came on Saturday 21 December, and every day after it ran a little longer. That was the month's one quiet promise, and it kept it.