On this day: Remembering historic events that happened on 10 February

Like every other day in the calendar, 10 February, has seen a number of historic happenings over the years. On this day in 1950, legendary American swimmer Mark Spitz was born in California. He went on to become one of the greatest in the sport. On the same day in 1962, US pilot Francis Gary Powers was released by the Soviet Union in exchange for their jailed agent Rudolf Abel. On 10 February 1990, the US space shuttle- Galileo- flew past Venus on its way to Jupiter, in an effort to gain more speed. On this very day in 1996, a six-round chess game began between IBM-designed computer Deep Blue and Russian grandmaster Garry Kasparov. 10 February- Historic Events: Swimming legend Mark Spitz was born; 1950: American swimmer Mark Spitz, who became the first athlete to bag seven gold medals in a single Olympic Games tournament, was born on 10 February 1950 in Modesto, California. Spitz created world records in each of the four individual men’s events he competed in at the Munich Olympics in 1972. As part of the U.S. men’s team that won and set world records, he added three more gold medals to his collection in the same edition. He held the record for the most gold medals won at a single Olympics up until 2008, when American swimmer Michael Phelps finally broke it. In 1983, Spitz was one of the first individuals to be inducted into the American Olympic Hall of Fame. Prisoner exchange between America and Soviet Union; 1962: After serving two years in prison, American airman Francis Gary Powers, on 10 February 1962, was exchanged for Soviet agent Rudolf Abel who was captured in the US. Powers was a downed U-2 pilot who was captured by the Soviet Union in 1960. He was jailed after being found guilty of espionage. After coming back to his home country, Powers wrote about the incident in a book named Operation Overflight (1970). Later in 1977, he was killed in a helicopter crash while working as a reporter for a Los Angeles television station. Spacecraft Galileo flew past Venus; 1990: On 10 February 1990, the US spacecraft Galileo- the first spacecraft to examine Jupiter and its moons- flew past Venus while on its journey towards Jupiter. It was launched from the Atlantis space shuttle’s payload compartment in 1989, picked up some speed by orbiting Earth twice and Venus once, before finally making its way to Jupiter in 1995. Galileo spent eight years circling the largest planet in the solar system and transmitted a lot of important data about it to Earth. On 21 September 2003, NASA purposefully launched Galileo on a suicide fall toward Jupiter when it was nearly out of fuel. IBM’s Deep Blue vs Garry Kasparov Chess game; 1996: The six-round chess match between Russian grandmaster Garry Kasparov and the IBM-designed computer, Deep Blue, officially began on 10 February 1996. During the face-off, Kasparov clinched a comfortable 4-2 victory. However, in the rematch the following year, the computer took just 19 moves to win the decisive sixth game. With its triumph, it marked the first time in history that a reigning world champion was defeated by a computer under tournament conditions. With 256 processors working in tandem in its final configuration, IBM’s Deep Blue computer was able to analyze 200 million chess positions each second. Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News, India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.