What was the first major news story you remember as a kid?

[igotbills]

Mine was the disappearance of Madeline Mccann in 2007 - I was 10

The Coronation. Elizabeth. We got a tv to watch it.

The death of Princess Diana

I was about 5

The Dunblane massacre

"how did you process that as a 4 year old?"

I don't think I really understood what had happened but I remember it being on the news and my parents talking about it - I grew up in Birmingham. I remember all the bomb scares that happened in the city centre in the years afterwards.

Oh gosh lots. I was born in 1977 and can remember a lot of world events from the 80s. The Cold War, Falklands, Northern Ireland. I can still remember being in my Grandma's house and seeing about Ceaucescus (not sure how to spell it) being assassinated. HIV and those tombstone warning adverts. Closer to home was the Miners Strikes and Hillsborough and the Zeebrugge/Marchioness boat disasters.

Same. Born 1975

Makes sense.
The power cuts were an adventure to us as kids but looking back as a parent to bakers' strikes, dustmen strikes etc it must have been a challenge,
My mum was really upset by Airey Neave's assassination, it was close to home. The anti terrorist bods came to our school to give us a talk or two, same with you?
It used to be unattended bags we watched for, at least the IRA gave warnings. (Till they started shooting squaddies on railway platforms.)

9/11, I was 6 and remember it vividly

I was at work, expecting my sister in law to Heathrow on an American flight. DP was at the wetlands centre on a boat wondering why the flight paths had suddenly gone quiet.

I can remember seeing the headline: The Queen is 50!!
Otherwise, bin strikes.

Lockerbie bombing. I’d not long turned 7.

Iranian hostages, John Lennon being shot and a British nurse who died aboard. I can remember her black and white photo being on TV a lot and having googled just now find her name was Helen Smith. I was 3-4 at the time of all these stories and very interested in the news the grownups were watching.

Also the Pindown scandal and the public inquiry. My mother and stepfather worked for Tony Latham so they had to give evidence.

The Zeebrugge ferry disaster..it scarred me.

1986 space shuttle Challenger explosion

Exactly the same first memory for me, I was 10 and remember seeing it on the news and couldn't believe children of my age could do that!

Another old one. Aberfan disaster & Churchill's funeral

I have no memory of it. I was 9.

I remember talking to my Grandma about Mary Bell, the child killer. It must have been around 1968, I was five.

I was 19 and knew nothing about it on the day. I got home from work late that evening and didn’t watch the news or chat to any of my housemates. When a colleague mentioned it to me the following day, I had no idea what she was talking about.

Miners Strike probably. I must have been about 7.

Maybe that was it. I thought it could have been they were searching or had found more bodies. In 1987 a third grave was found so that ties in with the dates. I remember the papers having the same mugshot type photo of MH. It had a real impact on me at the time and I remember searching the daily newspapers for more and more information. I'd have been finishing primary around the time and some of our homework involved writing about current affairs (in an attempt to encourage us to read the newspapers). At the time, everyone bought at least one newspaper every day. If my kids had to read the newspapers these days, we'd have to jump into the car to visit their grandparents!

James Bulger, I was 10 so the same age as the two boys who committed the murder and I was very aware of how terrible it was.

The Zuiderzee would be the catastrophic North Sea floods of 1953 I expect.

edit: though maybe not, you'd have been an infant. Maybe later flooding.