Goodbye to 2014, a year of tragedy and terrorism
© MAXIM ZMEYEV / Reuters/REUTERS Kremlin-backed separatists in Ukraine blasted Malaysia Air Flight 17 out of the sky, killing 298 people. It was 52 wild and madcap weeks of hijinks and lowlights, comedy and tragedy, terrorism and heroism.
There was Bridgegate at the start, and “The Interview” at the end. The Central Park Five settled, Donald Sterling spewed and Bill Cosby stewed. Excellent riddance, 2014: You were a year to remember.
JANUARY
Bill de Blasio was sworn in as the city’s 109th mayor, two months after soundly defeating Republican Joe Lhota, the former head of the MTA.
Internal memos revealed gridlock at the George Washington Bridge was ordered by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s underlings as payback for the refusal of Fort Lee’s mayor to endorse him.
Authorities finally made an arrest in the 1978 Lufthansa heist, the $ 6 million Kennedy Airport robbery immortalized by director Martin Scorsese in “GoodFellas.”
James Keivom/New York Day after day News A gas explosion hurt two buildings in East Harlem in 2014. Eight people died and 58 were injured. FEBRUARY
Oscar-winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman died of a drug overdo in his West Village apartment. He was just 46.
Let it snow: City schools stayed open despite 10 inches of powder. As parents, teachers and weatherman Al Roker grumbled, new Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña existing her take: “It’s absolutely a gorgeous day out there.”
NFL running back Ray Rice was trapped on video punching out his then-fiancée in an Atlantic City hotel elevator. The attack set off a series of missteps by the league, as it grappled with the issue of domestic violence.
MARCH
Eight people were killed and 58 injured in a gas explosion that leveled two East Harlem buildings.
Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 departed after taking off from Kuala Lumpur with 239 people on the teach. It has still not been found.
Mick Jagger’s longtime paramour, fashion designer L’Wren Scott, committed suicide by hanging herself with a scarf in her Chelsea apartment.
Bruce Glikas/FilmMagic The world lost Robin Williams and Joan Rivers in 2014. 
Mel Evans/AP Bridgegate turned into a disaster for New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. 
Danny Moloshok/AP Donald Sterling’s career as title-holder of the Los Angeles Clippers came to an end in 2014 when he was exposed as a racist. He eventually sold the team.
Previous Next
Enlarge
APRIL
NYPD Officer Dennis Guerra died three days after rushing into an arson fire at a Coney Island apartment building. The teen suspect clarified his motivation: “I was bored.”
Los Angeles Clippers title-holder Donald Sterling was exposed as a racist in taped conversations with his much-younger girlfriend — and mandatory to sell the team.
MAY
The long-awaited National September 11 Memorial & Museum opened at Ground Zero.
Deranged misogynist gunman Elliot Rodger went on a killing spree near University of California, Santa Barbara in California, murdering six and wounding 13 more.
Video recorded on a cellphone trapped the final moments of Eric Garner, who died from a chokehold as NYPD cops tried arresting him. It sparked outrage and protests. JUNE
Comedian Tracy Morgan survived a New Jersey Turnpike crash that left one of his closest confidants dead. The comic filed suit against Walmart, the company whose truck rear-finished his vehicle.
The Central Park Five, 25 years after their arrests, agreed to a $ 41 million agreement with the city. The quintet had been wrongfully convicted of the 1989 rape and beating of a runner.
JULY
The NYPD chokehold death of Eric Garner during a Staten Island arrest for peddling untaxed cigarettes sparked widespread protests. The demonstrations ramped up again in December when a grand jury opted not to indict Officer Daniel Pantaleo.
Kremlin-backed separatists in Ukraine were blamed for the surface-to-air missile that killed 298 people on the teach Malaysia Air Flight 17.
AUGUST
The world was stunned when funnyman Robin Williams committed suicide in his California home at 63.
A white cop in Ferguson, Mo., shot and killed Michael Brown, an exposed black teen. A grand jury in December voted not to indict Officer Darren Wilson, setting off days of protests.
ISIS terrorists released a savage video showing the beheading of James Foley, an American journalist abducted 22 months earlier by the bloodthirsty jihadists. The U.S., backed by an global coalition, started air strikes targeting the terrorists in Iraq and Syria.
SEPTEMBER
A routine doctor’s visit left comedienne Joan Rivers in a coma for eight days before the 81-year-ancient star died, surrounded by family and accurate friends.
The perfect ending: Derek Jeter wrapped up his storied career in pinstripes with a game-winning release — to right field, in the bottom of the ninth, of course — in his last Yankee Stadium at-bat.
Victoria Will/VICTORIA WILL/INVISION/AP Actor Philip Seymour Hoffman died of a drug overdo in 2014. He was 46. OCTOBER
Ebola in New York! Dr. Craig Spencer, a humanitarian who worked with the ill in West Africa, contracted the disease and was diagnosed after returning to Harlem. The physician made a full recovery.
Malala Yousafzia became the youngest Nobel laureate ever when the 17-year-ancient Pakistani girl wins the Peace Prize two years after Taliban terrorists shot her in the head.
Matt Rourke/AP November was the start of a nightmare for Bill Cosby, as a steady spill of women accused him of sexual assault. NOVEMBER
High anxiety: Two window washers were rescued from 68 floors above Lower Manhattan at 1 World Trade Focal point. The FDNY pulled the pair to safety.
Bill Cosby was implicated in a series of sexual attacks by steady spill of women — and, in a Day after day News exclusive, by his former fixer at NBC during “The Cosby Show” years.
Republicans swept the midterm elections, giving the GOP control of both chambers of Congress.
DECEMBER
Kim Jong Un-real: The FBI said North Korea hacked into the computers of Sony Pictures Entertainment as payback for “The Interview,” the Seth Rogen-James Franco comedy.
Head Obama announced the U.S. would reestablish diplomatic ties with Cuba.
A cop-hating killer came to Brooklyn from Baltimore to murder city police Officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu in their patrol car, reheating the tensions between police unions and City Hall.
