Defining Moments of the Decade: WTF, 2010s

2017: The Total Solar Eclipse

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The corona of the 2017 Total Solar Eclipse, photographed in Madras, Ore.

Source: Total Solar Eclipse | Penelope Peru Photography

Approximately 500 million people in North America were starstruck by the 2017 Total Solar Eclipse on Aug. 21, 2017, according to NASA.

Although the total solar eclipse was visible throughout all of North America, only 14 states caught a glimpse of totality.

“Extremely Active” Atlantic Hurricane Season

17 named storms, six major hurricanes, and four additional hurricanes occurred during the 2017 Atlantic hurricane season, the NOAA reported.

Three major hurricanes made landfall: Harvey in Texas; Irma in the Carribean and the southeastern United States; and Irma in the Carribean and Puerto Rico.

Hurricane Harvey was the first major hurricane to make landfall in the United States since Hurricane Wilma hit Florida in 2005.

According to the National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster, Hurricane Harvey damaged 204,000 homes, flooding forced 39,000 to flee their homes, 25 percent of gas production was forced to shut down in the region, 200 million cubic yards of debris was left in the wake, and $125 million in damages occurred.

13 million people were affected by Hurricane Harvey and at least 88 lost their lives.

The Opioid Epidemic

About 68 percent of the lives lost to overdose in 2017 (more 70,200 total overdoses) were due to opioids, according to the CDC. By 2017, the number of overdoses due to opioids was six times higher than they were in 1999.

Now, it’s estimated that 130 Americans die every day due to an opioid overdose.

#MeToo Movement

The #MeToo Movement, founded in 2006 to help survivors of sexual violence, was TIME magazine’s 2017 Person of the Year as celebrities came forward and broke the silence on sexual abuse in the industry.

Actress Alyssa Milano began her #MeToo campaign with a single tweet on Oct. 15, 2017.

#MeToo had been tweeted over 19 million times as of Sept. 2018, according to Pew Research Center.

Women’s March

Women’s Marches in support of gender equality and civil rights happened globally on Jan. 21, 2017, says Encyclopedia Britannica.

It’s estimated that 4.6 million people participated throughout the United States and other countries.

Las Vegas Mass Shooting

58 people lost their lives and 800 were injured when gunman Stephen Paddock opened fire on the last night of a country music festival in Las Vegas, Nev., according to HISTORY.

“Although the shooting only lasted 10 minutes, the death and injury tolls made this massacre the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history at the time of the attack,” HISTORY said.

Paddock targeted the crowd from the 32-floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel using an arsenal of 23 guns.

“Within the 10-minute period, he was able to fire more than 1,100 rounds of ammunition.”

It took an hour for authorities to breach into Paddock’s hotel room, where he was found dead by a self-inflicted gun wound.

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