The BBC's Tomas Fessy, in Gao, says Sunday's gun battle appears to have started around the main police station in the town centre, but there is now heavy gunfire coming from different areas.

BBC: Heavy gunfire in northern Mali town of Gao

Even after the departure of Duvalier, the military continued to harass and attack the radio station, to tear down transmitters and even to machine-gun the facade of the building.

UNESCO: Jean-transcript | United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Crews have also recorded incidents including a man breaking into a Cornwall ambulance station wielding a knife, and seeing a pedestrian produce a gun from his belt and waving it at the ambulance while it was sitting at traffic lights.

BBC: NEWS | UK | England | Cornwall | Ambulance assaults 'much higher'

Authorities found what appeared to be an open gun box on the seat of his car, which had been parked at the East Falls Church Metro station, according to the complaint.

CNN: STORY HIGHLIGHTS

After all, this was 1986: IBM had just unveiled its first laptop, the Soviet Union was launching the Mir Space Station and Tom Cruise kept daring us to fly ever higher in the hit film "Top Gun".

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