2018 has been the year of historic centenaries, royal births and marriages, presidential visits, and dancing prime ministers. Here’s a review of this year in pictures.

January — the Super Moon

Visible in the night skies over Britain on January 31st, the super blue blood moon was a product of three lunar phenomena: a super moon, where the full moon is closer to the earth in its orbit; a blue moon, where it was the second full moon of the calendar month; and a blood moon, where the moon in total eclipse appears red. The event occurred last on December 30th, 1982, and is not expected to happen again until January 31st, 2037.

February — the Beast from the East

Caused by an arctic airmass stretching from eastern Russia to the British Isles and formed on February 24th, it combined with Storm Emma and brought snow, causing travel disruptions with dozens of roads closed, and flights and public transport cancelled. When the ‘Beast from the East’ returned the weekend of the 17th to 18th of March, the Met office issued a “danger to life” warning, with the weather fronts killing ten people over the near-month long stormy period.

March — The Novichok poisoning

On March 4th, former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, who was visiting from Russia, were found slumped on a bench in the cathedral city of Salisbury, England, after having been poisoned with the nerve agent Novichok.

Military specialists in chemical warfare were dispatched to investigate and decontaminate the area. Both the Skripals recovered, as well as a police officer who fell ill after visiting Mr Skripal’s home. Based on intelligence, Prime Minister Theresa May later that month blamed Russia for the attack, expelling 23 Russian diplomats that the British government claimed were “undeclared intelligence officers.”

To date, the Kremlin has not accepted responsibility for the poisoning.

April — the birth of Prince Louis

Louis Arthur Charles, the third child of Prince William and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, was born on April 23rd, the same date as St George’s Day, which celebrates the English saint, and the birthday of William Shakespeare.

Fifth in line to the throne, His Royal Highness Prince Louis of Cambridge was named after the Prince of Wales’s mentor and great-uncle Lord Louis Mountbatten who was murdered by the IRA in 1979. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge also paid tribute to Prince Charles in the second and third names, with the Prince of Wales also having Arthur as a middle name.

May — Wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markel

On May 19th, the younger son of Prince Charles the Prince of Wales Prince Harry married American television actress Meghan Markle. The wedding took place at St George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle, with Queen Elizabeth II later conferring on Harry the titles of Duke of Sussex, Earl of Dumbarton, and Baron Kilkeel while Markle became Duchess of Sussex.

A U.S. citizen, the Duchess of Sussex began the years-long process to become a British citizen, though it is not known if she will retain her American citizenship and be a dual national.

June — the ‘Free Tommy’ rally

June 9th saw massive crowds turn up to hear Dutch populist firebrand Geert Wilders give a speech demanding the release of citizen journalist and English Defence League founder Tommy Robinson, who was serving 13 months in prison for contempt of court after livestreaming on Facebook outside of a Muslim child rape gang trial. Supporters and free speech activists accused authorities of stifling freedom on the press, particularly after a period of enforced media blackout on the reporting of Robinson’s trial and imprisonment.

Appeals judges later ordered Robinson be freed after determining the process had been too hasty and due legal procedure had not been followed, giving “rise to unfairness.” A retrial is expected some time in the New Year.

July — Royal Air Force Centenary Flypast

On July 10th, marking one hundred days after the Royal Air Force’s birthday, civilians, RAF personnel, and the Royal Family gathered on the Mall for the parade, with World War Two Spitfires and Lancashire bombers, Chinook helicopters, Tornadoes, Typhoons, and Red Arrows taking part in the centenary flypast.

The RAF was formed on April 1st, 1918, towards the end of the Great War by merging the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service and according to the RAF marked the first time that any country had formed an entirely separate and independent air force.

July — U.S. President Donald J. Trump visits the United Kingdom

July also saw the visit of President Trump, an Anglophile who is keen to sign a bilateral free trade agreement with the United Kingdom post-Brexit. President and first lady Melania Trump arrived on the 12th, attending a black-tie dinner with Prime Minister Theresa May at Blenheim Palace, the birthplace of Anglo-American British wartime prime minister Winston Churchill.

On the 13th, the President and Mrs May visited military academy Sandhurst, followed by a press conference at Chequers while the first lady and Mr May visited a retirement home for elderly veterans. The Trumps then met Queen Elizabeth II at Windsor Castle to inspect the Guard of Honours military march before joining the monarch for tea. On Saturday, the President travelled to Scotland to play golf at his Turnberry resort in south Ayrshire; President Trump’s mother Mary Macleod Trump was born in Scotland.

August — BoJo’s Burqa Comments

An opinion piece for The Telegraph in which former foreign secretary said it was “absolutely ridiculous that people should choose to go around looking like letter boxes,” describing the Islamic modesty garment the burqa, sparked protest by leftists but also debate about whether the garment should be banned in the UK, with a majority of Britons backing a burqa ban.

An independent panel found in December that Mr Johnson had not breached Tory Party rules.

September — Nigel Farage returns to frontline politics

In August, the former UKIP leader Nigel Farage announced his return to politics in response to Prime Minister Theresa May’s soft Brexit plans and to stop the political elite from betraying the British electorate.

The veteran Eurosceptic politician, co-chairman of Leave Means Leave, launched the “rebirth of the People’s Army” on September 22nd, touring the country and speaking at rallies with cross-party colleagues including the Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party’s Sammy Wilson, Labour’s Kate Hoey, and the Tory’s Jacob Rees-Mogg.

October — Theresa May the Dancing Queen

Prime Minister Theresa May reprised her ‘May-Bot’ robot dancing routine to the tune of Abba’s “Dancing Queen” as she walked on stage before giving her leader’s speech at Tory Party conference on October 3rd, in self-deprecating reference to a peculiar dance the prime minister had made at an earlier event in South Africa.

Confounding political pundits and preceding an hour-long speech light in substance that avoided talk of leadership challenges, her dance moves nevertheless dominated the front pages.

I am convinced that the same person who wrote Theresa May's Brexit plan taught her to dance, given that both are equally shambolic and embarrassing.pic.twitter.com/X8hNjMLcNP — Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) October 3, 2018

November — Centenary of the First World War

2018 saw another centenary — that of the Great War. One commemoration installation, by film direct Danny Boyle, sought to connect communities with those they lost 100 years ago.

Thousands of volunteers etched in the sand on 32 beaches across the UK silhouettes and portraits of soldiers, munitions workers, and nurses who died in the Great War. Ephemeral in nature, ‘Pages of the Sea’ sought to create connections between the past and the present whereby the memory of the sacrifices of the dead would outlast what tides had washed away.

December — Gatwick on lockdown over drone sightings

Holidaymakers’ plans were put on hold after a number of drones were believed to have been sighted flying over Gatwick Airport on the evening of Wednesday the 19th of December, shutting down the airport for 36 hours, grounding 760 flights, and affecting 110,00 passengers.

The situation descended into farce when police wrongly arrested two people over the incident, admitted that many of the more than 90 drone sightings which kept the airport closed for a day and a half may have been of police drones, and said they were exploring the possibility that there may have been no drone at all.