February 12

1404 - Italian professor Galeazzo di Santa Sophie performs the first post-mortem autopsy for the purposes of teaching and demonstration at the Heiligen–Geist Spital in Vienna.

1947 - The largest observed iron meteorite at the time creates an impact crater in Sikhote-Alin, in the Soviet Union.

1961 - U.S.S.R. launches Venera 1 towards Venus.

2001 - NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft touchdown in the "saddle" region of 433 Eros becoming the first spacecraft to land on an asteroid.