| 23551 | March 3 | Event | 1945 – World War II: A former Armia Krajowa unit massacres at least 150 Ukrainian civilians in Pawłokoma, Poland. |
| 23552 | March 3 | Event | 1945 – World War II: The RAF accidentally bombs the Bezuidenhout neighbourhood in The Hague, Netherlands, killing 511 people. |
| 23553 | March 3 | Event | 1951 – Jackie Brenston, with Ike Turner and his band, records "Rocket 88", often cited as "the first rock and roll record", at Sam Phillips' recording studios in Memphis, Tennessee. |
| 23554 | March 3 | Event | 1953 – A Canadian Pacific Air Lines De Havilland Comet crashes in Karachi, Pakistan, killing 11. |
| 23555 | March 3 | Event | 1958 – Nuri al-Said becomes Prime Minister of Iraq for the eighth time. |
| 23556 | March 3 | Event | 1969 – Apollo program: NASA launches Apollo 9 to test the lunar module. |
| 23557 | March 3 | Event | 1972 – Mohawk Airlines Flight 405 crashes as a result of a control malfunction and insufficient training in emergency procedures. |
| 23558 | March 3 | Event | 1974 – Turkish Airlines Flight 981 crashes at Ermenonville near Paris, France killing all 346 aboard. |
| 23559 | March 3 | Event | 1980 – The USS Nautilus is decommissioned and stricken from the Naval Vessel Register. |
| 23560 | March 3 | Event | 1985 – Arthur Scargill declares that the National Union of Mineworkers national executive voted to end the longest-running industrial dispute in Great Britain without any peace deal over pit closures. |
| 23561 | March 3 | Event | 1985 – A magnitude 8.3 earthquake strikes the Valparaíso Region of Chile, killing 177 and leaving nearly a million people homeless. |
| 23562 | March 3 | Event | 1991 – An amateur video captures the beating of Rodney King by Los Angeles police officers. |
| 23563 | March 3 | Event | 1991 – In concurrent referenda, 74% of the population of Latvia votes for independence from the Soviet Union, and 83% in Estonia. |
| 23564 | March 3 | Event | 1991 – United Airlines Flight 585 crashes on approach into Colorado Springs, Colorado, killing 25. |
| 23565 | March 3 | Event | 1997 – The tallest free-standing structure in the Southern Hemisphere, Sky Tower in downtown Auckland, New Zealand, opens after two-and-a-half years of construction. |
| 23566 | March 3 | Event | 2005 – Mayerthorpe tragedy: James Roszko murders four Royal Canadian Mounted Police constables during a drug bust at his property in Rochfort Bridge, Alberta, then commits suicide. It is the deadliest peace-time incident for the RCMP since 1885 and the No |
| 23567 | March 3 | Event | 2005 – Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly an airplane non-stop around the world solo without refueling. |
| 23568 | March 3 | Event | 2005 – Margaret Wilson is elected as Speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives, beginning a period lasting until August 23, 2006 where all the highest political offices (including Elizabeth II as Head of State), were occupied by women, making Ne |
| 23569 | March 3 | Event | 2009 – The Historical Archive of the City of Cologne collapses. |
| 23570 | March 3 | Event | 2012 – Two trains crash in the small Polish town of Szczekociny near Zawiercie, with 16 people killed and up to 58 people injured. |
| 23571 | March 3 | Event | 2013 – A bomb blast in Karachi, Pakistan, kills at least 45 people and injured 180 others in a predominately Shia Muslim area. |
| 23572 | March 3 | Event | 2014 – The trial of Oscar Pistorius begins in Pretoria. |
| 23573 | March 3 | Event | 2015 – Slovenia legalizes same-sex marriage. |
| 23574 | March 3 | Birth | 1455 – John II of Portugal (d. 1495) |
| 23575 | March 3 | Birth | 1520 – Matthias Flacius, Croatian theologian and reformer (d. 1575) |
| 23576 | March 3 | Birth | 1583 – Edward Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Cherbury, English-Welsh soldier, historian, and diplomat (d. 1648) |
| 23577 | March 3 | Birth | 1589 – Gisbertus Voetius, Dutch minister, theologian, and academic (d. 1676) |
| 23578 | March 3 | Birth | 1606 – Edmund Waller, English poet and politician (d. 1687) |
| 23579 | March 3 | Birth | 1631 – Esaias Boursse, Dutch painter and educator (d. 1672) |
| 23580 | March 3 | Birth | 1652 – Thomas Otway, English playwright and author (d. 1685) |