Year 2011 Schedule of Important Events

January 2011

• January 1 – Start of the Hungarian presidency of the Council of the European Union.
• January 1 – Estonia is set to adopt the euro.
• January 2 – Conjunction between Jupiter and Uranus at 13:41 UTC, with Jupiter 34 minutes of arc to the south; the third conjunction of a triple conjunction.
• January 4 – Partial solar eclipse visible over most of Europe, the Arabian peninsula, North Africa, and Western Asia.
• January 9 – Southern Sudan will hold a referendum on independence.
• The United States extradition treaty with El Salvador goes into effect.

February 2011

• 19 February – 2 April – 2011 Cricket World Cup will be held in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

March 2011

• March 18 – NASA's Messenger spacecraft is scheduled to arrive in orbit around Mercury.
• March 18 – NASA's Pluto probe New Horizons will cross the orbit of Uranus, after a five-year journey. This will be faster than Voyager 2, which took eight years.

April 2011

• April 1 – The Space Shuttle will undertake its final mission before retirement.
• April 29 – 2011 Men's World Ice Hockey Championships will start in Slovakia.
• April 29 – Wedding of Prince William of Wales and Kate Middleton will take place in Westminster Abbey on St. Catherine's Day.
• Pakistan is scheduled to launch its first space satellite.
• The Universal House of Justice will announce the new Five Year Plan.

May 2011

• Jupiter, Venus, Mercury, and Mars all visible within a roughly 6° area of sky.

June 2011

• June 1 – Partial solar eclipse in the Arctic.
• June 15 – Total lunar eclipse, mainly visible in Africa, India, and the Middle East.

July 2011

• The Dawn spacecraft is scheduled to arrive at the minor planet 4 Vesta during July. The exact date remains uncertain.
• July 1 – Start of the Polish presidency of the European Union
• July 1 – Partial solar eclipse off the coast of Antarctica.
• July 6 – The International Olympic Committee will decide the host city of the 2018 Winter Olympics.
• July 10 – Neptune completes its first full orbit since its discovery in 1846.
• July 27 – August 7 – Sweden will host the 22nd World Scout Jamboree

August 2011

• August 15 – The comet 45P/Honda-Mrkos-Pajdušáková will pass within 0.0601 astronomical units (about 5,589,300 miles (8,995,100 km)) of Earth.
• August 15–21 – XXVI World Youth Day will be held in Madrid, Spain.
• August 31 – Analog television stations in Canada are required to complete the transition to digital.

September 2011

• September 9 – October 23 – New Zealand will host the 2011 Rugby World Cup.

October 2011

• October 23 – New Zealand will host the Closing ceremony of 2011 Rugby World Cup.

November 2011

• November 25 – Partial solar eclipse in Antarctica.

December 2011

• December 10 – Total lunar eclipse, visible mainly in Asia, Australia and Alaska.
• December 31 – All United States troops are scheduled to leave Iraq.