MINI SOLO
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Buckley Park College VCE DRAMA
Ned Kelly
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For other uses, see Ned Kelly (disambiguation).
Ned Kelly
Ned Kelly the day before his execution
Born
Died
June 1854/June 1855
Beveridge, Victoria, Australia
11 November 1880 (aged 25)
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Conviction(s)
Murder
Penalty
Death
Status
Executed by hanging
Occupation
Bushranger
Parents
John "Red" Kelly
Ellen Kelly (née Quinn)
Edward "Ned" Kelly (June 1854/June 1855 – 11 November 1880)[1] was an Irish Australian
bushranger. He is considered by some to be merely a cold-blooded cop killer — others,
however, consider him to be a folk hero and symbol of Irish Australian resistance against the
Anglo-Australian ruling class.[2]
Kelly was born in Victoria to an Irish convict father, and as a young man he clashed with the
Victoria Police. Following an incident at his home in 1878, police parties searched for him in
the bush. After he killed three policemen, the colony proclaimed Kelly and his gang wanted
outlaws.
A final violent confrontation with police took place at Glenrowan on 28 June 1880. Kelly,
dressed in home-made plate metal armour and helmet, was captured and sent to jail. He was
convicted of three counts of capital murder and hanged at Old Melbourne Gaol in November
1880. His daring and notoriety made him an iconic figure in Australian history, folklore,
literature, art and film.
In August 2011, anthropologists announced that a skeleton found in a mass grave in
KPentridge Prison had been confirmed as elly's. Kelly's skull, however, remains at large.[3]

Early life
Ned's father, John, was transported in 1841 from Tipperary to Tasmania for stealing two pigs,
and not for shooting at a landlord as the Victorian Royal Commission indicated in "an
unwarrantable piece of propaganda."[4]
After his release in 1848, Red Kelly moved to Victoria and found work at James Quinn's
farm at Wallan Wallan, where he worked as a bush carpenter. He subsequently turned his
attention to gold-digging, at which he was successful and which enabled him to purchase a
small freehold at Beveridge.[5]
At the age of 30 he married Ellen Quinn, his employer's 18 year old daughter. Their first
child, Mary Jane, died at 6 months in 1850, but Ellen then gave birth to a daughter, Annie, in
1853.
Their first son, Edward (Ned), was born in Beveridge, just north of Melbourne. His date of
birth is not known, but at Beveridge, he said to an officer, "Look across there to the left. Do
you see a little hill there?", "That is where I was born about 28 years ago. Now, I am passing
through it, I suppose, to my doom."[6]
Ned was baptised by an Augustinian priest, Charles O'Hea. As a boy, he obtained basic
schooling and once risked his life to save another boy, Richard Shelton, from drowning. As a
reward he was given a green sash by the boy's family, which he wore under his armour
during his final showdown with police in 1880.[7]
The Kelly's moved to Avenel, near Seymour, where Red became noted as an expert cattlestealer. In 1865 he was convicted of cattle duffing, and imprisoned. Red Kelly died at Avenel
on 27 December 1866 shortly after his release from Kilmore gaol. When John Kelly died he
was survived by his wife and seven offspring, Ned and Dan, James, Mrs. Gunn, Mrs.
Skillion, Kate and Grace.[8] Several months later the Kelly family acquired 80 acres (320,000
m2) of uncultivated farmland at Eleven Mile Creek near the Greta area of Victoria, which to
this day is known as "Kelly Country".
The Kellys were suspected many times of cattle or horse stealing, but never convicted. Ned
Kelly himself claimed that he had stolen over 280 horses as a boy.[9] Red Kelly was arrested
when he killed and skinned a calf claimed to be the property of his neighbour. He was found
innocent of theft, but guilty of removing the brand from the skin and given the option of a
twenty-five pound fine or a sentence of six months with hard labour. Unable to pay the fine,
Red served his sentence, which had an ultimately fatal effect on his health. The saga
surrounding Red, and his treatment by the police, made a strong impression on his son Ned.
In all, eighteen charges were brought against members of Ned's immediate family before he
was declared an outlaw, while only half that number resulted in guilty verdicts. This is a
highly unusual ratio for the time, and led to claims that Ned's family was unfairly targeted
from the time they moved to northeast Victoria. Perhaps the move was necessary because of
Ellen's squabbles with family members and her appearances in court over family disputes.[10]
Antony O'Brien argued that Victoria's colonial police practices treated arrest as equivalent to
proof of guilt.[11] Further, O'Brien argued, using the "Statistics of Victoria" crime figures that
the region's or family's or national criminality was determined not by individual arrests, but
rather by the total number of arrests.[12][clarification needed]
Rise to notoriety
Ned's first documented brush with the law was on 15 October 1869 at the age of 14 when he
was charged with the assault and robbery of Ah Fook, a pig and fowl trader from a Chinese
camp near Bright. According to Ah Fook, as he was passing the Kelly house, Ned approached
him with a long bamboo stick, announcing that he was a bushranger and would kill him if he
did not hand over his money. Ned then took him into the bush, beat him with the stick and
stole 10 shillings. According to Ned, his sister Annie and two witnesses, Bill Skilling and Bill
Grey, Annie was sitting outside the house sewing when Ah Fook walked up and asked a for a
drink of water. Given creek water, he abused Annie for not giving him rain water and Ned
came outside and pushed him. Ah Fook then hit Ned three times with the bamboo stick
causing him to run away. Ah Fook then walked away threatening to return and burn the house
down. Ned did not return until sundown. Historians find neither account convincing and
believe that Neds account is likely true up to being hit by Ah Fook but then Ned likely took
the stick from him and beat him with it.[13]
portrait of Ned Kelly taken by the Police Photographer at Pentridge after Ned's transfer from the
Beechworth Gaol in 1873 State Library of Victoria
Ned was arrested the following day for Highway Robbery and locked up overnight in
Benalla. He appeared in court the following morning but Sergeant Whelan, despite using an
interpreter to translate Ah Fook's account, requested a remand to allow time to find an
interpreter. Ned was held for four days. Appearing in court on 20 October he was again
remanded after the police failed to produce an interpreter. The charge was finally dismissed
on 26 October and Ned was released. Sergeant Whelan disliked Ned. Three months earlier
when he had prosecuted Yeaman Gunn for possession of stolen mutton, Ned testified that he
had sold several sheep to Gunn that same day. In a controversial judgement, the magistrate
found Gunn guilty and fined him £10. Furious that Ned was not convicted for the robbery,
Whelan now kept a careful watch on the Kelly family and, according to fellow officers,
became "a perfect encyclopedia of knowledge about them" through his "diligence".[13]
Following his court appearance, the Benalla Ensign reported, "The cunning of himself [Ned]
and his mates got him off", the Beechworth Advertiser on the other hand reported, "... the
charge of robbery has been trumped up by the Chinaman to be revenged on Kelly, who had
obviously assaulted him." Interestingly, Ah Fook had described 14 year old Ned as being
aged around 20 years. Some 12 months later a reporter wrote that Ned "gives his age as 15
but is probably between 18 and 20". Although 5' 8" in height, Ned was physically imposing.
When arrested, a 224 pounds (102 kg) trooper was purportedly unable to subdue the then 15
year old Ned until several labourers ran to assist him and even then Ned had to be knocked
unconscious.[13] Harry Power
On 16 March 1870, bushranger Harry Power and Ned Kelly stuck up and robbed Mr
M'Bean.[14] Later that year on 2 May, he was charged with robbery in company and accused
of being Power's accomplice.[15] The victims could not identify Ned and the charges were
dismissed. He was then charged with robbery under arms but the principal witness could not
be located and the charges were dismissed. He was then charged a third time, for a hold-up
with Power against a man named Murray. Although the victims for the third charge were
reported to have also failed to identify Ned they had in fact been refused a chance to identify
him by Superintendents Nicolas and Hare. Instead, superintendent Nicolas told the magistrate
that Ned fit the description and asked for him to be remanded to the Kyneton court for trial.
Instead of being sent to Kyneton, he was sent to Melbourne where he spent the weekend in
the Richmond lockup before transferring to Kyneton. No evidence was produced in court and
he was released after a month. Historians tend to disagree over this episode: some see it as
evidence of police harassment; others believe that Kelly’s relatives intimidated the witnesses,
making them reluctant to give evidence. Another factor in the lack of identification may have
been that the witnesses had described Power's accomplice as a "half-caste". However,
superintendent Nicholas and Captain Standish believed this to be the result of Ned going
unwashed.[13]
Ned's grandfather, James Quinn, owned a huge piece of land at the headwaters of the King
River known as Glenmore Station, where Power was ultimately arrested. Following Power's
arrest it was rumoured that Ned had informed on him and Ned was treated with hostility
within the community. Ned wrote a letter to police Sergeant Babington pleading for his help
in the matter. The informant was in fact Ned's uncle, Jack Lloyd.
In October 1870, Kelly was arrested again for assaulting a hawker, Jeremiah McCormack,
and for his part in sending McCormack's childless wife a box containing calves' testicles and
an indecent note. This was a result of a row earlier that day when McCormack accused a
friend of the Kellys, Ben Gould, of using his horse without permission. Gould wrote the note,
and Kelly passed it to one of his cousins to give to the woman. He was sentenced to three
months' hard labour on each charge.
Upon his release Kelly returned home. There he met Isaiah "Wild" Wright who had arrived in
the area on a chestnut mare. While he was staying with the Kellys, the mare had gone missing
and Wright borrowed one of the Kelly horses to return to Mansfield. He asked Ned to look
for the horse and said he could keep it until his return. Kelly found the mare and used it to go
to Wangaratta where he stayed for a few days but while riding through Greta on his way
home, Ned was approached by police constable Hall who, from the description of the animal,
knew the horse was stolen property. When his attempt to arrest Kelly turned into a fight, Hall
drew his gun and tried to shoot him, but Kelly overpowered the policeman and humiliated
him by riding him like a horse and driving his spurs into the back of his legs.[16] Hall later
struck Kelly several times with his revolver after he had been arrested. Ned always
maintained that he had no idea that the mare actually belonged to the Mansfield postmaster
and that Wright had stolen it. After just three weeks of freedom, 16-year-old Kelly, along
with his brother-in-law Alex Gunn, was sentenced to three years imprisonment with hard
labour for "feloniously receiving a horse". "Wild" Wright escaped arrest for the theft on 2
May following an "exchange of shots" with police, but was arrested the following day.
Wright received only eighteen months for stealing the horse.[17] After his release from
Pentridge Prison in February 1874, Ned allegedly fought and won a bare-knuckled boxing
match with 'Wild' Wright that lasted 20 rounds.
While Kelly was in prison, his brothers Jim (aged 12) and Dan (aged 10) were arrested by
Constable Flood for riding a horse that did not belong to them. The horse had been lent to
them by a farmer for whom they had been doing some work, but the boys spent a night in the
cells before the matter was cleared.
Two years later, Jim Kelly was arrested for cattle-duffing. He and his family claimed that he
did not know that some of the cattle did not belong to his employer and cousin Tom Lloyd.
Jim was given a five-year sentence, but as O'Brien pointed out the receiver of the 'stolen
stock' James Dixon was not prosecuted as he was 'a gentleman'.[18]
Shoemaker Shop Brawl
In September 1877 a drunk Ned was arrested for riding over a footpath and locked-up for the
night. The next day, while he was escorted by four policemen, he escaped and ran, taking
refuge in a shoemakers shop. The police and the shop owner tried to handcuff him but failed.
During the struggle Ned's trousers were almost ripped off. Trying to get Ned to submit,
Constable Lonigan, who Ned was to later shoot dead, "black-balled" him (grabbed and
squeezed his testicles). During the struggle, a miller walked in, and on seeing the atrocious
behaviour of the police said "You should be ashamed of themselves". The miller then tried to
pacify the situation and induced Kelly to put on the handcuffs.
Ned Kelly said about the incident "It was in the course of this attempted arrest Fitzpatrick
endeavoured to catch hold of me by the foot, and in the struggle he tore the sole and heel of
my boot clean off. With one well-directed blow, I sent him sprawling against the wall, and
the staggering blow I then gave him partly accounts to me for his subsequent conduct towards
my family and myself."[19]
Legend has it that Ned told Lonigan "If I ever shoot a man, Lonigan, it'll be you!".
In October 1877, Gustav and William Baumgarten were arrested for supplying stolen horses
to Kelly and were sentenced in 1878. William served time in Pentridge Prison, Melbourne.
Following Red Kelly's death, Ned's mother, Ellen, married a Californian named George King,
by whom she had three children. He, Ned and Dan became involved in cattle rustling.
Fitzpatrick Incident
On 15 April 1878 Constable Strachan, the officer in charge of the Greta police station,
learned that Kelly was at a certain shearing shed and went to apprehend him. As lawlessness
was rampant at Greta, it was recognised the police station could not be left without protection
and Constable Alexander Fitzpatrick[20] was ordered there for relief duty. He was instructed
to proceed directly to Greta but instead rode to the hotel at Winton, where he spent
considerable time. On resuming his journey he remembered that a couple of days previously
he had seen in The Police Gazette an arrest warrant for Dan Kelly for horse stealing. He went
to the Kelly house to arrest him. This violated the police policy that at least two constables
participate in visits to the Kelly homestead. Finding Dan not at home, he remained with Mrs.
Kelly and other family members, in conversation, for about an hour. Upon hearing someone
chopping wood he went to ensure that the chopping was licensed. The man proved to be
William "Bricky" Williamson, a neighbour, who said that he only needed a licence if he was
chopping on Crown land. Fitzpatrick then observed two horsemen making towards the house
he had just left. The men proved to be the teenager Dan Kelly and his brother-in-law,
Skillion. Fitzpatrick returned to the house and made the arrest. Dan asked to be allowed to
have dinner before leaving. The constable consented, and took a seat near his prisoner.[21]
In an interview Ned Kelly said that Mrs Kelly asked Fitzpatrick if he had a warrant and
Fitzpatrick said that he had only a telegram. Mrs Kelly then said Dan need not go. Fitzpatrick
then said, pulling out a revolver, "I will blow your brains out if you interfere." Mrs Kelly then
said, "You would not be so handy with that popgun of yours if Ned were here." Dan then
said, trying to trick Fitzpatrick "Here he (Ned) is coming along." While he was pretending to
look out of the window for Ned, Dan cornered Fitzpatrick, took the revolver and claimed that
he had released Fitzpatrick unharmed. Kelly denied that Fitzpatrick ever tried to take liberties
with his sister.
Fitzpatrick rode to Benalla where he claimed that he had been attacked by Ned, Dan, Ellen,
their associate Bricky Williamson and Ned's brother-in-law, Bill Skillion. Fitzpatrick claimed
that all except Ellen had been armed with revolvers and that Ned had shot him in the left
wrist and that Ellen had hit him on the helmet with a coal shovel. Williamson and Skillion
were arrested for their part in the affair. Ned and Dan were nowhere to be found, but Ellen
was taken into custody along with her baby, Alice. She was still in prison at the time of Ned's
execution. (Ellen would outlive her most famous son by several decades and died on 27
March 1923.)
Ned Kelly asserted that he was not present and that Fitzpatrick's wounds were self-inflicted.
Upon what Kelly claimed was Fitzpatrick's false evidence, his mother, Skillian and
Williamson were convicted. A reward of £100 was offered for Kelly's arrest. Kelly claimed
that this injustice exasperated him, and led to his taking to the bush.[22]
Trial at Beechworth
At the Benalla Police Court, on 17 May 1878, William Williamson, alias "Brickey", William
Skillion, and Ellen Kelly while on remand, were charged with aiding and abetting murder.[23]
Ellen Kelly, Skillion and Williamson appeared on 9 October 1878 before Judge Redmond
Barry charged with attempted murder. Despite Fitzpatrick's doctor reporting a strong smell of
alcohol on the constable and his inability to confirm the wrist wound was caused by a bullet,
Fitzpatrick's evidence was accepted by the police and the Judge. They were all convicted.
Skillion and Williamson both received sentences of six years and Ellen three years. Barry
stated that if Ned were present he would 'give him 15 years'.[24]
Fitzpatrick's legacy is coloured by the fact that he was later dismissed from the force for
drunkenness and perjury[25] and that after the trial Dr. Nicholson told Fitzpatrick that his
wound was never caused by a bullet.[19]
A confession
Just before Kelly was taken away from Benalla after the Glenrowan shootout, seniorconstable Kelly had a short interview with him in his cell. The senior-constable said, " Look
here, Ned, now that it is all over, I want to ask you one question before you go, and that is,
did you shoot constable Fitzpatrick at Greta when he went to arrest your brother?" Kelly
replied, " Yes, I did. I shot him in the wrist, and the statements which have been made that
Fitzpatrick inflicted the wound himself are quite false."[26]
Killings at Stringybark Creek
Monument erected in Mansfield, Victoria in honour of the three policemen murdered by Kelly's
gang, Lonigan, Scanlon and Kennedy
Dan and Ned Kelly doubted they could convince the police of their story. Instead they went
into hiding, where they were later joined by friends Joe Byrne and Steve Hart.
The police heard privately that the Kellys were in the Wombat Ranges at the head of the King
River. On Friday 25 October 1878, two parties of police were secretly despatched, one from
Greta, consisting of five men, with Sergeant Steele in command, and one of four from
Mansfield, with the intention of executing a pincer movement.
Sergeant Kennedy from the Mansfield party, in civilian dress, set off to search for the Kellys,
accompanied by Constables McIntyre, Lonigan, and Scanlon. The police set up a camp on an
disused diggings near two miners huts at Stringybark Creek in a heavily timbered area.
About six a.m. on Saturday, Kennedy and Scanlan went down the creek to explore, and they
stayed away nearly all day. It was McIntyre's duty to cook, and he attended closely to camp
duty. During the morning a noise was heard, and McIntyre went out to have a look, but found
nothing. He fired two shots out of his gun at a pair of parrots. This gunshot, he subsequently
learned, was heard by Kelly, who must have been on the lookout for the police. At about 5
p.m., McIntyre was at the fire making tea, with Lonigan by him, when they were suddenly
surprised with the cry, "Bail up; throw up your arms."
They looked up, and saw four armed men on foot. Three carried guns, and Ned Kelly two
rifles. Two of the men they did not know, but the fourth was the younger Kelly. They had
approached up the rises and long grass or rushes had provided them with excellent cover until
they got close. McIntyre had left his revolver at the tent door, and was unarmed. He therefore
held up his hands as directed, and faced them. Lonigan started for shelter behind a tree, and at
the same time put his hand upon his revolver. Before he had moved two paces, Edward Kelly
shot him in the temple. He fell at once, and as he laid on the ground said, "Oh Christ, I am
shot." He died in a few seconds. Kelly had McIntyre searched, and when they found he was
unarmed, they let him drop his hands. They got possession of Lonigan and McIntyre's
revolvers. Kelly remarked, "What a pity; what made the fool run?" The men helped
themselves to articles from the tent. Kelly talked to McIntyre, and expressed his wonder that
the police should have been so foolhardy as to look for him in the ranges. He made inquiries
about four men, and said he would roast each of them alive if he caught them. Steele and
Flood were two of the four. He asked McIntyre what he fired at and said they must have been
fools not to suppose he was ready for them. It was evident that he knew the exact state of the
camp, the number of men, and the description of the horses. He asked where the other two
were, and said he would put a hole through McIntyre if he told a lie. McIntyre told him and
hoped they would not be shot in cold blood. Kelly replied "No, I am not a coward. I'll shoot
no man if he holds up his hands."
One of the gang told McIntyre to take some tea and asked for tobacco. He gave them tobacco
and had a smoke himself. Dan Kelly suggested that he should be handcuffed, but Ned pointed
to his rifle and said, "I have got something better here. Don't you attempt to go; if you do I'll
track you to Mansfield and shoot you at the police station." McIntyre asked whether he was
to be shot. Kelly replied, "No, why should I want to shoot you? Could I not have done it half
an hour ago if I had wanted?" He added, "At first I thought you were Constable Flood. If you
had been, I would have roasted you in the fire." Kelly asked for news of the Sydney man, the
murderer of Sergeant Wallings. McIntyre said the police had shot him. "I suppose you came
out to shoot me?" "No," replied McIntyre, "we came to apprehend you." "What," asked Kelly,
" brings you out here at all? It is a shame to see fine big strapping fellows like you in a lazy
loafing billet like policemen." He told McIntyre if he was let go he must leave the police, and
McIntyre said he would. The best thing McIntyre could do was to get his comrades to
surrender, for if they escaped he would be shot. "If you attempt to let them know we are here,
you will be shot at once.
McIntyre asked what they would do if he induced his comrades to surrender. Kelly said he
would detain them all night, as he wanted a sleep, and let them go next morning without their
arms or horses. McIntyre told Kelly that he would induce his comrades to surrender if he
would keep his word, but he would rather be shot a thousand times than sell them. He added
that one of the two was father of a large family. Kelly said, "You can depend on us." Kelly
stated that Fitzpatrick, the man who tried to arrest his brother in April, was the cause of all
this; that his (Kelly's) mother and the rest had been unjustly "lagged" at Beechworth. Kelly
then caught sound of the approach of Kennedy and Scanlan, and the four men concealed
themselves, some behind logs, and one in the tent. They made McIntyre sit on a log, and
Kelly said, "Mind, I have a rifle for you if you give any alarm." Kennedy and Scanlan rode
into the camp. McIntyre went forward, and said, "Sergeant, I think you had better dismount
and surrender, as you are surrounded. Kelly at the same time called out, "Put up your hands."
Kennedy appeared to think it was Lonigan who called out, and that a jest was intended, for he
smiled and put his hand on his revolver case. He was instantly fired at, but not hit; and
Kennedy then realised the hopelessness of his position, jumped off his horse, and said, "It's
all right, stop it, stop it." Scanlan, who carried the Spencer rifle, jumped down and tried to
make for a tree, but before he could unsling his rifle, he was shot down. A number of shots
were fired.
McIntyre found that the men intended to shoot the whole of the party, so he jumped on
Kennedy's horse, and dashed down the creek. As he rode off he heard Daniel Kelly call out,
"Shoot that ******". Several shots were fired but none reached him. Apparently the rifles
were empty and only the revolvers available, or he would have been hit. He galloped through
the scrub for two miles, and then his horse became exhausted. It had evidently been wounded.
He took off the saddle and bridle, and wounded from a severe fall during his escape and with
his clothes in tatters, he concealed himself in a wombat hole until dark. At dark, he started on
foot, and walked for an hour with his boots off to make no noise before collapsing from
exhaustion at Bridge's Creek, After a rest, and using a bright star, and a small compass, he
took a westerly course to strike the Benalla and Mansfield telegraph line and on Sunday
afternoon at about 3pm after a journey of about 20 miles, he reached John McColl's place,
about a mile from Mansfield. A neighbouring farmer's buggy took him to the police camp at
the township, where be reported all he knew to Sub-Inspecter Pewtress.[27]
Two hours or so after McIntyre reported the murder of the troopers, Sub-Inspector Pewtress
set out for the camp, accompanied by McIntyre and seven or eight townspeople. They had
only one revolver and one gun. They reached the camp with the assistance of a guide, at halfpast 2 in the morning. There they found the bodies of Scanlan and Lonigan. They searched at
daylight for the sergeant, but found no trace of him. The tent had been burnt and everything
taken away or destroyed. The post-mortem, by Dr. Reynolds, showed that Lonigan had
received seven wounds, one through the eyeball. Scanlan's body had four shot-marks with the
fatal wound was caused by a rifle ball which went clean through the lungs. Scanlan was 33,
Lonigan 37 years of age. Three additional shots had been fired into Lonigan's dead body
before the men left the camp. The extra shots were fired so that all of the gang might be
equally implicated.[28]
During the search for Kennedy, on 29 October, two relatives of the Kellys known as
"Dummy Wright" and "Wild Wright" were arrested in Mansfield. Wild Wright had to be
threatened with a revolver before he consented to handcuffs. The two Wrights were brought
to the police court and charged with using threatening language towards members of the
search party. The older brother, Wild Wright, was remanded for seven days and the other
released.[29]
No trace had yet been discovered of Kennedy, and the same day as Scanlan and Lonigan's
funeral, another search party was started, which also failed. At four o'clock on the following
Wednesday another party started, headed by James Tomkins, president of the Mansfield
shire, and Sub-Inspector Pewtress, accompanied by several residents, and on the following
morning the body of the unfortunate sergeant was found by H. G. Sparrow.[30]
The exact place at Germans Creek where this occurred was identified in 2006.[31] On leaving
the scene Ned stole Sergeant Kennedy's handwritten note for his wife and his gold fob watch.
Asked later why he stole the watch, Ned replied, "What's the use of a watch to a dead man?"
Kennedy's watch was returned to his kin many years later.
In response to these killings, the reward was raised to £500 and the Victorian parliament
passed the Felons' Apprehension Act which outlawed the gang and made it possible for
anyone to shoot them. There was no need for the outlaws to be arrested or for there to be a
trial upon apprehension. The Act was based on the 1865 Act passed in New South Wales
which declared Ben Hall and his gang outlaws.[32][33]
Bank robberies
8000 pound reward notice for the capture of the Ned Kelly gang, 15 February 1879
Following the killings at Stringybark, the gang committed two major robberies, at Euroa,
Victoria and Jerilderie, New South Wales. Their strategy involved the taking of hostages and
robbing the bank safes.
Euroa
Midday on 9 December 1878, Ned Kelly walked into the homestead of Gooram Gooram
Gong Wool station, at Faithful's Creek, owned by Mr Younghusband. They assured the
people that they had nothing to fear and only asked for food for themselves and their horses.
An employee named Fitzgerald, who was eating his dinner at the time, looked at the
bushranger, and at the large revolver that he was nonchalantly toying with, and said, "Well, if
the gentlemen want food I suppose they have got to have it." The other three outlaws, having
attended to the horses, joined their chief, and the four imprisoned the men at the station in a
spare building used as a store. No interference was offered to the women. He assured the
male captives time after time that they had nothing whatever to fear. Late in the afternoon the
manager of the station, Mr. Macauley, returned and was promptly bailed up. He told Ned
Kelly that it was not much use coming to that station, because their own horses were better
than any he had. Ned, however, told him that he did not want horses, did not want anything
but food for themselves and for their cattle.
Towards evening a hawker named Gloster camped, as usual, on the station. When he went to
the kitchen, a station hand said, "the Kelly's are here." Gloster replied, "I wish they were, it
would be £2,000 in my pocket." Ned Kelly looked up and said, "What is that you say."
Gloster, without waiting to give an explanation, rushed towards the wagon, and Ned and Joe
Byrne followed. Mr. McCauley was for the safety of Gloster, and he followed them. Gloster
on reaching his wagon, was making a search for his revolver, but he was "covered" by the
bushrangers, and Mr. McCauley cried out, "Look out Gloster, you will be shot," at the same
time appealing to Kelly not to shoot him. Gloster turned and said, "Who are you." Ned
replied, "I am Ned Kelly, son of Red Kelly, as good a blood as any in the land, and for two
pins I would put a match to your wagon and burn it." The stationhands and Gloster were all
placed in the storeroom, under guard. The time passed quietly until two o'clock in the
morning, and at that hour the outlaws gave a peculiar whistle, and Steve Hart and Joe Byrne
rushed from the building. Mr. McCauley was surrounded by the bushrangers, and Ned Kelly
said, "You are armed, we have found a lot of ammunition in the house." After this episode the
outlaws retired to sleep.
On the afternoon of the second day, 10 December 1878, leaving Byrne in charge of the
prisoners, the other three started out to work what they called their new gold mine. First they
cut the telegraph wires, chopping the posts down to make sure, and were careful to rip off
more wire than an ordinary repairer would carry with him. Three or four railway men
endeavored to interfere, but they too joined the other prisoners in Younghusband's storeroom.
Carrying a cheque drawn by Mr. Macauley on the National Bank for a few pounds, the three
bushrangers, all heavily armed, went to the bank. In the meantime Byrne had apprehended a
telegraph-line repairer, who had begun to make trouble. The others reached the bank after
closing time, traveling in the hawker's cart. Kelly knocked at the door and persuaded the clerk
to open and cash the cheque he had. They balled up the unwise clerk and his manager, Mr.
Scott. The robbers took £700 in notes, gold, and silver. Ned Kelly insisted to the manager that
there was more money there, and eventually compelled him to open the safe, from which the
outlaws got £1,500 in paper, £300 in gold, about £300 worth of gold dust and nearly £100
worth of silver. The outlaws were polite and considerate to Mrs. Scott. Mr. Scott, invited the
outlaws to drink whisky with him, which they did. The whole party went to Younghusband's
where the rest of the prisoners were. The evening seems to have passed quite pleasantly.
McCauley remarked to Ned Kelly that the police might come along, which would mean a
fight. Ned Kelly replied, "I wish they would, of there is plenty of cover here."[34] In the
evening tea was prepared, and at half-past 8 the outlaws warned the prisoners not to move for
three hours, informing them that they were going. Just before they left Kelly noticed that a
Mr. McDougall was wearing a watch, and asked for it. McDougall replied that it was a gift
from his dead mother. Kelly declared that he wouldn't take it under any consideration, and
very soon afterwards the four of the outlaws left. What is unusual is that these stirring events
happened without the people in the town knowing of anything.[35]
In January 1879 police arrested all known Kelly friends and sympathisers and held them
without charge for three months. This action caused resentment of the government's abuse of
power that led to condemnation in the media and a groundswell of support for the gang that
was a factor in their evading capture for so long.[36]
The Kelly gang, as they were known, came into
existence by sheer misfortune. The young men
(Joe Byrne & Steve Hart) who were with Ned &
Dan at Stringybark Creek at the time of the
police shootings would become 'the Kelly gang'.
Up until this point they were merely four bush
larrikins.
Apart from the four above, there was a
man named Tom Lloyd Jr who was at pretty
much every gang activity and somehow despite
the police knowing this was to live a free mans
life. Another man, named Aaron Sherritt also
spent a lot of time with the gang, before being
killed by best friend and gang member Joe
Byrne.
As a gang, they robbed two banks,
whilst holding up entire towns in meticulously
planned raids. The raid on Glenrowan was to be
their downfall and would see the destruction of
the gang.
There were four 'official' gang members,
brothers Ned & Dan Kelly, Joe Byrne & Steve
Hart.
They were all young men and had been convicted
of minor crimes prior to the police killings at
Stringybark Creek.
The Kelly gang according to the Royal Commission.
Power, who is said to have given Ned Kelly his first lesson
in bushranging. Edward Kelly, the leader of the outlaws, was
born in 1854, at Wallan Wallan, and from an early age was
regarded by the Police as an incorrigible thief. In company
with Power the Bushranger he, on the 16th of March 1870,
robbed Mr. McBean; and on the 25th of April stuck up Mr,
John Murray of Lauriston. Kelly was arrested for the latter
offence on the 4th of May following, but escaped conviction
owing to want of identification. He was implicated in several
outrages; and at Beechworth, in 1871, he received a sentence
of three years for receiving a stolen horse. He led a wild and
reckless life, and was always associated with the dangerous
characters who infested the neighbourhood of Greta until the
shooting of Constable Fitzpatrick, on the 15th of April 1878,
when he took to the bush. Daniel Kelly was born in 1861, and
from the age of 16 years was, with his elder brother Ned, a
noted criminal. Joseph Byrne, the third outlaw, was born in
1857, and lived with his parents, who were Irish extraction
and respectable antecedents, at the woolshed, about seven
miles from Beechworth. When 16 years of age he was in
trouble, and from the first appears to have developed vicious
and cruel propensities. In 1876, along with Aaron Sherritt,
who figures so prominently throughout the Kelly campaign,
so to speak, and with whom he was on terms of the closest
intimacy, he was arrested and sentenced to six months'
imprisonment for having stolen meat in his possession; and he
was also believed to have been connected with numerous
cases of horse stealing in the North-Eastern district, which
ultimately led to his joining the Kelly gang. Steve Hart, the
fourth member of the gang, was born in 1860, and was the
second son of Richard Hart, of Three-mile Creek, near
Wangaratta. Stephen, at an early age, became the associate of
disreputable persons, and carried on a system of stealing
horses and planting them until such time as rewards were
offered by the owners for there recovery. He received a
sentence of imprisonment in July 1877, and subsequently was
sent to gaol for ten months for horse stealing. On his release
he returned to Wangaratta, and for a time appeared disposed
to lead a more honest and reputable life. One day, however,
while at work cutting timber, he suddenly threw down his axe,
exclaiming to his mate, "A short life and a merry one." He
then rode off, stating that he was going to New South Wales.
Nothing further was heard of him until the murders of the
police at Wombat, when it was reported that a man answering
to his description was seen near Greta; but it was not until the
Euroa bank robbery that his identity was established as one of
the accomplices of the murderers, Ned and Dan Kelly.
History of Australian Bushranging by Charles White:
HOW THE KELLY GANG WAS FORMED.
Mention has been made of the fact that Ned Kelly was at one
time associated with Power in his horse stealing and bushranging
exploits; but in the latter he appears to have served only as a scout
and occasional assistant, merely holding Power's horse during the
time he was overhauling his victims on the road. As a horse "lifter,"
however, he had even a greater reputation than Power; horsestealing was the calling to which he had devoted his life, and he
followed that calling with untiring assiduity. He commenced his
career by removing carriers' and travelers' horses during the night
to a safe "plant," where he would keep them until a reward was
offered for their recovery, and then he would hand them over in the
most innocent manner and claim the reward. Naturally, the next
step was to horse-stealing pure and simple, any stray animal worth
picking up being appropriated and kept in a secure place until an
opportunity presented itself of turning it into money. Before he had
fully grown a beard he became acquainted with prison life, and
served several short sentences for horse-stealing, being recognised
as a confirmed criminal by the authorities while yet in his teens—a
circumstance which is not to be considered wonderful when the
nature of his surroundings is taken into account. Although he was
known to be connected with the escaped convict and bushranger
who was causing such trouble, he was not called to account for any
offence committed in Power's company; and it was generally
believed that the police had obtained from him the information
which enabled them to track Power to his hiding place on the
mountain—Power himself at one time entertaining that opinion—but
the arresting Superintendents invariably denied any statement to
that effect.
Power had been in gaol for about eight years, however, before
what is known as the Kelly Gang of bushrangers was formed and
began to operate openly, and although the influence and example
of the older bushranger may have had something to do with
shaping the subsequent career of the leader of that gang, it cannot
be said that the one was the direct outcome of the other.
But before proceeding to narrate the extraordinary doings of
the gang, it is necessary that I should give a brief sketch of the
earlier life of the different members.
I have already mentioned that Ned Kelly had two brothers and
four sisters—Dan, Jim, Mrs. Gunn, Mrs. Skillian, Kate, and Grace.
Dan Kelly was seven years younger than Ned, having been born in
1861, but from the time he was able to sit upon a horse he was
more or less associated with his elder brother in criminal pursuits.
The boy "lifters" were the terror of carriers and drovers who had to
pass through the district in which they resided, and it is said that
persons in charge of stock not infrequently went many miles out of
the direct course in order to avoid Greta, fearing that some of their
cattle would miss their proper destination if they attempted to pass
through the "Kelly Country." Night and day young Dan would prowl
about looking for "game," and knowing the bush intimately, he could
at any time get away with that "game" when he found it, to some
spot where it would be beyond reach of the proper owners. It will
thus be seen that he was well qualified to act as his brother's
lieutenant, and, indeed, it was through him that the outbreak
occurred.
The third member of the gang was a young fellow named
Steve Hart, a native of Wangaratta, who had also made a name for
himself as a horse thief, indulging in night prowling in search of
stray animals. He was born in 1860, and was therefore a year older
than Dan Kelly, who was his closest "chum" during the campaign,
and his companion in
The fourth member of the gang was Joe Byrne, who was born
at the Woolshed, near Beechworth, in 1857. He was a splendid
sample of a young Australian, and had received a fairly good
education, but abandoning himself to criminal pursuits had joined
the Kelly boys in several of their horse-stealing raids. He had
served one sentence of six months in Beechworth Gaol before
joining the gang. Byrne acted as scribe to the party, reducing to
writing the plans for the attacks upon banks and other contemplated
robberies, which were rigidly adhered to.
These four formed the gang, but there were others associated
with them as scouts and "telegraphs" and harbourers, whose
names will appear as occasion arises for mentioning the service
rendered by them. Aaron Sherritt was one of the most active of
these assistants during one part of the campaign. He had attended
the same school as Joe Byrne, and the intimacy that had grown up
there was continued after school days were over, the two engaging
in horse-stealing raids together, and forming close criminal business
relationships with the Kellys. Sherritt was a native of Beechworth,
his parents being most respectable people.
In March, 1878, a warrant was issued for the arrest of Dan
Kelly on a charge of cattle stealing; and as it became known that he
was at his mother's house at Greta, a constable named Fitzpatrick,
stationed at Benalla, proceeded thither to arrest him. Fitzpatrick's
version of what took place was that when he got to the house he
found Dan Kelly there, and arrested him in the presence of his
mother and sisters. He was proceeding to take his prisoner to
Benalla, when he was asked to permit him first to take a meal, with
which request he complied. While the meal was in progress, Ned
Kelly, with Skillian, his brother-in-law, and a man named
Williamson, came in, and Ned at once demanded if Fitzpatrick had
a warrant for the arrest of Dan. The constable replied in the
negative, and then Ned drew a revolver and declared that his
brother should not be taken without one. Fitzpatrick pulled out his
revolver to protect himself, and ensure the safe custody of his
prisoner, when Ned Kelly fired and wounded him in the wrist, the
result being that the revolver fell out of his hand and was secured
by the Kellys. Fitzpatrick was then, according to his account,
secured, and it was proposed to shoot him; but upon his solemnly
promising to say nothing of the affair, he was allowed to go. The
wound in his wrist was very trivial, and the bullet had been picked
out with a knife before he reached Benalla. His promise of silence
was not kept, and warrants were immediately issued against Ned
Kelly for shooting with intent to murder, and against Dan Kelly,
Skillian, Williamson, and Mrs. Kelly for aiding and abetting. When it
was attempted to enforce these warrants, it was found that the
brothers Kelly had disappeared; but the others named were
arrested, tried, and sentenced each to lengthy terms of
imprisonment, Fitzpatrick's version of the occurrence at the house
being accepted as correct.
But the Kellys and their friends gave altogether different
versions of the story; they emphatically denied the truth of
Fitzpatrick's statements, and complained very bitterly that their
relations were unjustly cast into prison on his unsupported
evidence. One version was that no shooting at all took place, but
that Fitzpatrick had concocted the whole affair in a spirit of revenge,
because certain improper advances which he had made to one of
the female members of the family had been rejected with
considerable warmth; another was that Fitzpatrick never had Dan
Kelly in charge, and that the arrest was resisted because of the
absence of a warrant, and in a scuffle Fitzpatrick slightly wounded
himself with his own revolver; and a third was that Mrs. Kelly took
no part whatever in the affair, not being in the house at the time—
that Skillian and Williamson were miles away at the time, and that
Dan and Ned Kelly were alone concerned in what took place.
After the disappearance of Ned and Dan from the home at
Greta, nothing more was heard of them for some months, although
the Government offered £100 reward for their apprehension, and
every effort was made by the police to capture them. It was then
known that they had "taken to the bush" and there was a general
impression that they were concerned in several cases of road
robbery that took place about that time in remote portions of the
district; but, reckless and daring though they were known to be, it
was never for a moment thought that they were capable of the
fearful crimes by which they were shortly to make themselves
notorious.
JAMIESON TWINS
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_and_Terry_Jamison
Linda and Terry Jamison
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linda and Terry Jamison (born 1955) are a pair of American identical twins who claim to
be psychics who claim to have predicted the September 11th attacks two years ahead of
time.[1]
While being interviewed on the Art Bell radio show on November 2, 1999, they claimed that
through an automatic writing process, they were predicting that there would be a major Bin
Laden attack on the federal government and the World Trade Center in 2001. Also, according
to an article in Woman's Own magazine, and a documentary on A&E, they correctly predicted
that John F. Kennedy Jr. would die by plane.[2]
As of 2007, the twins work as psychics on local talkshows, making predictions about
celebrities and Academy Awards.[3]
Biography
They grew up in the small town of West Chester, Pennsylvania, attending East Bradford
Elementary School, and later Henderson High School. Their parents, Jane and Philip
Jamison, were writers and painters. According to a 2006 documentary on A&E, Philip is a
watercolor artist of worldwide renown.[4][5] The women have an older brother Flip, who has
not displayed any psychic abilities.
The women themselves obtained fine arts degrees from Temple University (Tyler School of
Art), and for a while worked as performance artists. They had their own performing arts
company, "Pop Theatrics," which would perform music, comedy, dance, and acrobatics in
New York and Washington D.C..
In their 40s, they began refocusing their career as psychics and convention speakers. Terry
has been married and divorced, and the twins presently share a home in Los Angeles.
Criticism
Critic Leon Jaroff, who generally refers to all psychics as "charlatans", has pointed out that
the Jamison twins are frequently incorrect.[6] For example, in December 2003, they
incorrectly predicted that Saddam Hussein would be killed by U.S troops in early 2004 (he
was actually executed after a trial in 2006), and that Pope John Paul II would die in June
2004 (he actually died in April 2005). They also incorrectly predicted that actress Jennifer
Lopez would announce that she was pregnant by 2004,[7] or June 2005[8] (she did not become
pregnant until November 2007).
THE AUSSIE ICON
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Irwin
Steve Irwin
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the Australian wildlife expert.
Stephen Robert Irwin
Steve Irwin in Australia
Born
Died
22 February 1962
Essendon, Victoria, Australia
4 September 2006 (aged 44)
Batt Reef, Queensland, Australia
Naturalist
Occupation
Zoologist
Conservationist
Television Personality
Spouse
Children
Terri Irwin
Bindi Sue Irwin
Robert (Bob) Clarence Irwin
Website
CrocodileHunter.com.au
Stephen Robert Irwin (February 22, 1962 – September 4, 2006), known simply as Steve
Irwin and nicknamed "The Crocodile Hunter", was an Australian wildlife expert and
television personality. He achieved world-wide fame from the television program The
Crocodile Hunter, an internationally broadcast wildlife documentary series co-hosted with
his wife Terri Irwin. Together, they also co-owned and operated Australia Zoo, founded by
his parents in Beerwah, Queensland. He died in 2006 after his chest was fatally pierced by a
stingray barb.
The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society ship MV Steve Irwin was named in his honour,
christened by his wife Terri, who said "If Steve were alive, he'd be aboard with them!"
Early years of life
Born on his mother's birthday[1] to Lyn and Bob Irwin in Essendon, a suburb of Melbourne,
Victoria, Irwin moved with his parents as a child to Queensland in 1970. Irwin described his
father as a wildlife expert interested in herpetology while his mother Lyn was a wildlife
rehabilitator. After moving to Queensland, Bob and Lyn Irwin started the small Queensland
Reptile and Fauna Park, where Steve grew up around crocodiles and other reptiles.
Irwin became involved with the park in a number of ways, including taking part in daily
animal feeding, as well as care and maintenance activities. On his sixth birthday he was given
a 12-foot (4 m) scrub python. He began handling crocodiles at the age of nine after his father
had educated him on reptiles from an early age.[2] Also at age nine he wrestled his first
crocodile, again under his father's supervision.[3] He graduated from Caloundra State High
School in 1979. He soon moved to Northern Queensland, where he became a crocodile
trapper, removing crocodiles from populated areas where they were considered a danger. He
performed the service for free with the quid pro quo that he be allowed to keep them for the
park. Irwin followed in his father's footsteps, becoming a volunteer for the Queensland
Government's East Coast Crocodile Management program.
Career
Rise to fame
Irwin feeding a crocodile at Australia Zoo.
Look up crikey in
Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
The park was a family run business, until it was turned over to Steve. He took over the
running of the park, now called Australia Zoo (renaming it in 1992). Also that year, he
appeared in a one-off reptile and wildlife special for television. In 1991, he met Terri Raines
at the park, while performing a demonstration. The two married in June 1992, in Terri's
hometown of Eugene, Oregon. The footage, shot by John Stainton, of their crocodile-trapping
honeymoon became the first episode of The Crocodile Hunter. The series debuted on
Australian TV screens in 1996, and by the following year had made its way onto North
American television. The Crocodile Hunter became successful in the United States and also,
after repackaging by Partridge Films for ITV, in the UK.[4] In 1998, he continued, working
with producer and director Mark Strickson, to present The Ten Deadliest Snakes in the World.
By 1999, he had become very popular in the United States, making his first appearance on
The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. By this time, the Crocodile Hunter series was now
broadcast in over 137 countries, reaching 500 million people. His exuberant and enthusiastic
presenting style, broad Australian accent, signature khaki shorts, and catchphrase "Crikey!"
became known worldwide.[5] Sir David Attenborough praised Irwin for introducing many to
the natural world, saying "He taught them how wonderful and exciting it was, he was a born
communicator."[6]
Under Irwin's leadership, the operations grew to include the zoo, the television series, the
Steve Irwin Conservation Foundation (renamed Wildlife Warriors), and the International
Crocodile Rescue. Improvements to the Australia Zoo include the Animal Planet Crocoseum,
the rainforest aviary and Tiger Temple. Irwin mentioned that he was considering opening an
Australia Zoo in Las Vegas, Nevada, and possibly at other sites around the world.[1]
Film
In 2001, Irwin appeared in a cameo role in the Eddie Murphy film Dr. Dolittle 2, in which a
crocodile warns Dolittle that he knows Irwin is going to grab him and is prepared to attack
when he does, but Dolittle fails to warn Irwin in time. Irwin's only starring feature film role
was in 2002's The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course, which was released to mixed reviews.
In the film Irwin (who portrayed himself and performed numerous stunts) mistakes some CIA
agents for poachers. He sets out to stop them from capturing a crocodile, which, unknown to
him, has actually swallowed a tracking transmitter. The film won the Best Family Feature
Film award for a comedy film at the Young Artist Awards. The film was produced on a
budget of about $12 million, and has grossed $33 million.[7] To promote the film, Irwin was
featured in an animated short produced by Animax Entertainment for Intermix.[8]
In 2002, the Irwins appeared in the Wiggles video/DVD release Wiggly Safari, which was set
in Irwin's Australia Zoo. It featured Irwin-themed songs written and performed by the
Wiggles such as "Crocodile Hunter", "Australia Zoo", "Snakes (You can look but you better
not touch)" and "We're The Crocodile Band". Irwin was featured prominently on the cover
and throughout the movie.
In 2006, Irwin provided his voice for the 2006 animated film Happy Feet, as an elephant seal
named Trev. The film was dedicated to Irwin, as he died during post-production.[9] Another,
previously incomplete scene, featuring Steve providing the voice of an Albatross and
essentially playing himself, was restored to the DVD release.
Animal Planet and later projects
Animal Planet ended The Crocodile Hunter with a series finale entitled "Steve's Last
Adventure." The last Crocodile Hunter documentary spanned three hours with footage of
Irwin's across-the-world adventure in locations including the Himalayas, the Yangtze River,
Borneo, and the Kruger National Park. Irwin went on to star in other Animal Planet
documentaries, including The Croc Files, The Crocodile Hunter Diaries, and New Breed
Vets.
As a part of the United States' "Australia Week" celebrations in January 2006, Irwin appeared
at the Pauley Pavilion, UCLA in Los Angeles, California. During an interview on The
Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Irwin announced that Discovery Kids would be developing a
show for his daughter, Bindi Sue Irwin.[10] The show, Jungle Girl, was tipped to be similar to
The Wiggles movies, with songs that surround a story. A feature-length episode of Australian
kids TV show The Wiggles entitled "Wiggly Safari" appears dedicated to Irwin, and he's
featured in it heavily with his wife and daughter. The show includes the song "Crocodile
Hunter, Big Steve Irwin".
In 2006, the American network The Travel Channel had begun to show a series of specials
starring Irwin and his family as they travelled on cross-country tours.
Media work
A poster from Irwin's Quarantine Matters! campaign.
Irwin was also involved in several media campaigns. He enthusiastically joined with the
Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service to promote Australia's strict quarantine/customs
requirements, with advertisements and posters featuring slogans such as, "Quarantine
Matters! Don't muck with it". His payments for these advertising campaigns were directed
into his wildlife fund.[11]
In 2004, he was appointed ambassador for The Ghan, the passenger train running from
Adelaide to Alice Springs in the central Australian outback, when the line was extended all
the way to Darwin on the northern coast that year. For some time he was sponsored by
Toyota.[12]
He was also a keen promoter for Australian tourism in general and Queensland tourism in
particular. In 2002, the Australia Zoo was voted Queensland's top tourist attraction.[13] His
immense popularity in the United States meant he often promoted Australia as a tourist
destination there.[14]
Honours
In 2001, Irwin was awarded the Centenary Medal for his "service to global conservation and
to Australian tourism".[15] In 2004, he was recognised as Tourism Export of the Year.[16] He
was also nominated in 2004 for Australian of the Year, an honour which was won by
Australian Cricket Captain Steve Waugh. Shortly before his death, he was to be named an
adjunct professor at the University of Queensland's School of Integrative Biology.[17] On 14
November 2007 Irwin was awarded the adjunct professorship posthumously by the
University of Queensland.[18] In May 2007, the Rwandan Government announced that it
would name a baby gorilla after Steve Irwin as a tribute to his work in wildlife
conservation.[19] The Crocodile Rehabilitation and Research Centre in Neyyar Wildlife
Sanctuary was named by the Kerala government after late Steve Irwin.[20].
Environmentalism
See also: Wildlife Warriors
Irwin was a passionate conservationist and believed in promoting environmentalism by
sharing his excitement about the natural world rather than preaching to people. He was
concerned with conservation of endangered animals and land clearing leading to loss of
habitat. He considered conservation to be the most important part of his work: "I consider
myself a wildlife warrior. My mission is to save the world's endangered species."[13] Irwin
bought "large tracts of land" in Australia, Vanuatu, Fiji and the United States, which he
described as "like national parks" and stressed the importance of people realising that they
could each make a difference.[21]
He had urged people to take part in considerate tourism and not support illegal poaching
through the purchase of items such as turtle shells or shark-fin soup.[22]
He founded the Steve Irwin Conservation Foundation, which was later renamed Wildlife
Warriors Worldwide, and became an independent charity. He was described after his death
by the CEO of RSPCA Queensland as a "modern-day Noah," and British naturalist David
Bellamy lauded his skills as a natural historian and media performer.[23] Irwin and his father
discovered a new species of turtle that now bears his name, Elseya irwini — Irwin's Turtle —
a species of turtle found on the coast of Queensland.[24]
He also helped to found a number of other projects, such as the International Crocodile
Rescue, as well as the Lyn Irwin Memorial Fund, in memory of his mother (who was in a
fatal car crash in 2000), with proceeds going to the Iron Bark Station Wildlife Rehabilitation
Centre.
Irwin, however, was criticised for having an unsophisticated view of conservation in
Australia that seemed more linked to tourism than to the problems Australia faces as a
continent.
In response to questions of Australia's problems with overgrazing, salinity, and erosion, Irwin
responded, "Cows have been on our land for so long that Australia has evolved to handle
those big animals." The Sydney Morning Herald concluded with the opinion that his message
was confusing and amounted to "eating roos and crocs is bad for tourism, and therefore more
cruel than eating other animals".[25]
According to Terri, Sir David Attenborough was an inspiration to Irwin. When presenting a
Lifetime Achievement Award to Attenborough after Irwin's death at the British National
Television Awards on October 31, 2006 Terri stated "If there's one person who directly
inspired my husband it's the person being honoured tonight." She went on to say "[Steve's]
real, true love was conservation - and the influence of tonight's recipient in preserving the
natural world has been immense."[26] Sir David reciprocated with praising Irwin for
introducing many to the natural world, saying "He taught them how wonderful and exciting it
was, he was a born communicator."[6]
Filmography



Dr. Dolittle 2 (cameo) (2001)
The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course (2002)
Happy Feet (2006)
Personal life
Family
Terri Raines Irwin, the widow of Steve Irwin
In 1992, Irwin married Terri Raines from Eugene, Oregon, United States. The pair had met a
few months earlier, when Terri had visited the zoo on a holiday; according to both of them, it
was love at first sight. Terri said at the time, "I thought there was no one like this anywhere in
the world. He sounded like an environmental Tarzan, a larger-than-life superhero guy."[27]
Together they had two children: a daughter, Bindi Sue Irwin (born July 24, 1998), and a son,
Robert Clarence "Bob" (named after Irwin's father) Irwin (born December 1, 2003). Bindi
Sue is jointly named after two of Steve Irwin's favourite animals: Bindi, a saltwater crocodile,
and Sui, a Staffordshire Bull Terrier who died in June 2004.
Irwin was as enthusiastic about his family as he was about his work. He once described his
daughter Bindi as "the reason [he] was put on the Earth." His wife once said, "The only thing
that could ever keep him away from the animals he loves are the people he loves even
more."[1]
Terri Irwin recently reported that Steve had an ongoing premonition that he would die before
he reached age 40.[28] She wrote about this in her book Steve and Me about their lives
together.[29]
Controversies
A controversial incident occurred during a public show on January 2, 2004, when Irwin
carried his one-month-old son, Bob, in his arm while hand-feeding a chicken carcass to
Murray, a 3.8-metre (12 ft 6 in) saltwater crocodile. The infant was close to the crocodile, and
comparisons were made in the press to Michael Jackson's dangling his son outside a German
hotel window.[30] In addition, child welfare groups, animal rights groups, and some of Irwin's
television viewers criticised his actions as irresponsible and tantamount to child abuse.[31]
Irwin apologised on the US NBC Today Show.[32] Both he and his wife publicly stated that
Irwin was in complete control of the situation, as he had dealt with crocodiles since he was a
small child, and based on his lifetime of experience neither he nor his son were in any danger.
He also showed footage of the event shot from a different angle, demonstrating that they were
much further from the crocodile than they had appeared in the publicised clip.[33] Terri Irwin
claimed their child was in no more danger than one being taught to swim. No charges were
filed; according to one journalist, Irwin told officials he would not repeat the action.[34] The
incident prompted the Queensland government to change its crocodile-handling laws,
banning children and untrained adults from entering crocodile enclosures.[35]
In June 2004, allegations were made that he disturbed wildlife (namely whales, seals and
penguins) while filming a documentary, Ice Breaker, in Antarctica. The matter was
subsequently closed without charges being filed.[36]
MV Steve Irwin approaching Melbourne in February 2008
After Irwin's death, the vessel MV Robert Hunter owned by the environmental action group
Sea Shepherd was renamed MV Steve Irwin in Steve's honor.[37] Sea Shepherd is a
controversial[38] [39] environmentalist group that conducts direct action operations including
the sinking of whaling ships, to protect marine species and environments. Shortly before his
death, Irwin had been investigating joining their 2007/08 voyage to Antarctica to disrupt
Japanese whaling activity. Following his death, as an alternative the renaming of the vessel
was suggested by Sea Shepherd and endorsed by his widow Terri.[40]
Politics
After questions arose about Irwin being paid $175,000 worth of taxpayers' money to appear
in a television advertisement and his possible political ties, Irwin told ABC that he was a
conservationist and did not choose sides in politics.
His comments describing Australian Prime Minister John Howard as the "greatest leader in
the world" earned him scorn in the media.[41]
Search and rescue effort in Mexico
In November 2003, Irwin was filming a documentary on sea lions off the coast of Mexico's
Baja California Peninsula when he heard via his boat's radio that two scuba divers were
reported missing in the area. Irwin and his entire crew suspended operations to aid in the
search. His team's divers searched with the rescue divers, and Irwin used his vessel to patrol
the waters around the island where the incident occurred, as well as using his satellite
communications system to call in a rescue plane. On the second day of the search, kayakers
found one of the divers, Scott Jones, perched on a narrow rock ledge jutting out from the side
of a cliff. Irwin and a crewmember escorted him to Irwin's boat. Jones did not recognise his
celebrity rescuer, as he had never seen Irwin on television. The other lost diver, Katie
Vrooman, was found dead by a search plane later the same day not far from Jones'
location.[42]
Death
On September 4, 2006, Irwin was fatally pierced in the chest by a stingray spine while
snorkeling at the Great Barrier Reef, at Batt Reef, which is located off the coast of Port
Douglas in Queensland. Irwin was in the area filming his own documentary, Ocean's
Deadliest, but weather had stalled filming. Irwin decided to take the opportunity to film some
shallow water shots for a segment in the television program his daughter Bindi was
hosting,[56] when, according to his friend and colleague, John Stainton, he swam too close to
one of the stingrays. "He came on top of the stingray and the stingray's barb went up and into
his chest and put a hole into his heart," said Stainton, who was on board Irwin's boat the Croc
One.
The events were caught on camera, and a copy of the footage was handed to the Queensland
Police.[57] After reviewing the footage of the incident and speaking to the cameraman who
recorded it, marine documentary filmmaker and former spearfisherman Ben Cropp speculated
that the stingray "felt threatened because Steve was alongside and there was the cameraman
ahead." In such a case, the stingray responds to danger by automatically flexing the serrated
spine on its tail (which can measure up to 25 cm/10 in in length) in an upward motion.
Cropp said Irwin had accidentally boxed the animal in. "It stopped and twisted and threw up
its tail with the spike, and it caught him in the chest. It's a defensive thing. It's like being
stabbed with a dirty dagger." The stinging of Irwin by the bull ray was "a one-in-a-million
thing," Cropp told Time magazine. "I have swum with many rays, and I have only had one do
that to me..."[58]
Initially, when Irwin's colleague, John Stainton, was interviewed by CNN's Larry King late
on September 4, 2006 he denied the suggestion that Irwin had pulled the spine out of his
chest, or that he had seen footage of the event, insisting that the anecdote was "absolute
rubbish."[59] The following day, when he first described the video to the media, he stated,
"Steve came over the top of the ray and the tail came up, and spiked him here [in the chest],
and he pulled it out and the next minute he's gone."[57]
It is thought, in the absence of a coroner's report, that a combination of the toxins and the
puncture wound from the spine caused Irwin to die of cardiac arrest, with most damage being
inflicted by tears to arteries or other main blood vessels.[60] A similar incident in Florida a
month later in which a man survived a stingray barb through the heart showed that Irwin's
removal of the barb may have caused his own death.[61] The coroner's report has not yet been
released.
Crew members aboard his boat called the emergency services in the nearest city of Cairns
and administered CPR as they rushed the boat to the nearby Low Islets to meet an emergency
rescue helicopter. However despite the best efforts of Irwin's crew, medical staff pronounced
him dead when they arrived a short time later.[56] According to Dr Ed O'Loughlin, who
treated Irwin, "it became clear fairly soon that he had non-survivable injuries. He had a
penetrating injury to the left front of his chest. He had lost his pulse and wasn't breathing."[62]
Cairns, Queensland
Irwin's body was flown to a morgue in Cairns. His wife, Terri Irwin, was on a walking tour in
Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park in Tasmania at the time, and returned via a
private plane from Devonport to the Sunshine Coast with their two children.[56]
Fatalities due to stingrays are infrequent and occurrences are not consistently collated.[63] The
attack on Irwin is believed to be the only fatality from a stingray ever captured on film.[64]
Stainton told CNN's Larry King "[The tape] should be destroyed".[65] In an ABC interview
with Barbara Walters, Irwin's wife Terri said she has not seen the film of her husband's
deadly encounter with the stingray and that it would not be shown on television.[66] On
January 3, 2007, the only video footage showing the events that led to Irwin's death was
handed over to Terri, who said that the video would never become public, and noted her
family has not seen the video either.[67] In a January 11, 2007 interview with Access
Hollywood, Terri said that "all footage has been destroyed."[68] Despite these statements,
numerous videos, including screamers, surfaced on sites such as YouTube claiming to be
footage of Irwin's death. Several pictures have also surfaced on Google Images.
Production was completed on Ocean's Deadliest, which aired for the first time on the
Discovery Channel on January 21, 2007. The documentary was completed with footage shot
in the weeks following the accident.[69] According to Stainton, "Anything to do with the day
that he died, that film is not available."[70] Perhaps to maintain the film's original purpose as a
nature documentary and prevent it from becoming a documentary of Irwin's final days, his
death is not mentioned in the film, aside from a still image of Irwin at the end alongside the
text "In Memory of Steve Irwin".
Reaction
News of his death prompted widespread worldwide shock. Australian Prime Minister John
Howard expressed his "shock and distress" at the death, saying that "Australia has lost a
wonderful and colourful son."[71] Queensland Premier Peter Beattie commented in a Channel
Seven television interview that Irwin "will be remembered as not just a great Queenslander,
but a great Australian".[72] Several Australian news websites went down because of high web
traffic and for the first time the top 10 list of most viewed stories for Fairfax Digital news
sites were swept by one topic.[73] Talk-back radio experienced a high volume of callers
expressing their grief.[74] Flags at the Sydney Harbour were lowered to half staff in honor of
Irwin.[75]
The U.S. feed of the Animal Planet cable television channel aired a special tribute to Steve
Irwin that started on Monday, 4 September 2006. The tribute continued with the Animal
Planet channel showing highlights of Irwin's more than 200 appearances on Discovery
Networks shows.[76]
On the evening of his death, Enough Rope re-broadcast an interview between Irwin and
Andrew Denton originally broadcast in 2003. CNN showed a repeat of his interview on Larry
King Live, originally recorded in 2004. The Australian federal parliament opened on
September 5, 2006 with condolence speeches by both the Prime Minister John Howard and
the Leader of the Opposition Kim Beazley. The Seven Network aired a television memorial
show as a tribute to Irwin on 5 September 2006,[77] as did the Nine Network on September 6,
2006.
Jay Leno delivered a tribute to Irwin, describing him as a great ambassador of Australia.
Irwin appeared on Leno's talk show on more than ten occasions.[78] There were also tributes
on Live with Regis & Kelly and Barbara Walters' The View; on the former show, Kelly Ripa
came close to tears with her praise of Irwin.[78]
Hundreds of people visited Australia Zoo to pay tribute to the deceased entertainer and
conservationist. The day after his death, the volume of people visiting the zoo to pay their
respects affected traffic so much that police reduced the speed limit around the Glass House
Mountains Road and told motorists to expect delays.[79] BBC reported on September 13, 2006
that thousands of fans have been to Australia Zoo since Irwin's death, bringing flowers,
candles, stuffed animals and messages of support.[80]
In the weeks after his death, Irwin's conservation foundation Wildlife Warriors reported that
thousands of people from around the world were offering their support via donations to the
conservation group.
Backlash against stingrays
In the weeks following Irwin's death, at least ten stingrays were found dead and mutilated,
with their tails cut off, on the beaches of Queensland, prompting speculation that they had
been killed by fans of Irwin as an act of revenge. Michael Hornby, a friend of the late
naturalist and executive director of Irwin's Wildlife Warrior fund, condemned any revenge
killings.
"We just want to make it very clear that we will not accept and not stand for anyone who's
taken a form of retribution. That's the last thing Steve would want," he said.[81]
Funeral and memorials
Queensland Premier Peter Beattie extended the offer of a state funeral to Irwin's family, an
honour also agreed to by Prime Minister John Howard. The family decided that such a
funeral wouldn't be appropriate, a sentiment echoed by many Australians outside media and
political circles. Steve Irwin's father, Bob Irwin, stated that his son would not have wanted
such an honour, and would want to be remembered as an "ordinary bloke."[82] Beattie stated
he would honour the decision of the Irwin family regarding their arrangements. Irwin was
farewelled by family and friends at a private funeral service held at Caloundra on the
afternoon of 9 September.[83]The naturalist was buried in a private ceremony at the zoo on the
same day.[80]
Memorial service
A public service was held at the 5,500-seat Crocoseum at Australia Zoo on Wednesday
morning September 20, 2006. The service was broadcast live, commercial free, in the eastern
states of Australia, by free-to-air channels Seven, Nine and the ABC in Australia, as well as
live on subscription channel Sky News Australia. In addition, it was broadcast live around the
world, particularly the United States, where the service was broadcast commercial free on
Animal Planet, as well as to Asia and Germany. A BBC camera crew was also sent especially
to Australia to cover the memorial service for the United Kingdom. It is estimated that over
300 million viewers worldwide watched the service.[84]. The memorial was also rebroadcast
on Animal Planet on January 1, 2007 as part of their New Year's Day celebration, and again
the following day.
The memorial service was held in the "Crocoseum" at Australia Zoo
Messages from around the world came from people including Hugh Jackman, Cameron Diaz,
Justin Timberlake, Kevin Costner, Russell Crowe, Kelly Ripa and Larry King. Costner called
him a "fearless" man who was brave enough to let people see him as he was.[85]
The Prime Minister John Howard made an early speech at the service, as did Irwin's father
Bob and his daughter Bindi.
Wes Mannion and John Stainton also made speeches and David Wenham read a poem.[85]
Anthony Field from The Wiggles partly hosted the service, often sharing the screen with
various animals, from koalas to elephants, and Australian music star John Williamson sang
True Blue, which was Irwin's favourite song. Professor Craig Franklin of the University of
Queensland told the crowd that the university was about to make Irwin an adjunct professor
for his contributions to the study of crocodiles.[86] In a symbolic finish to the service, Irwin's
truck was loaded up with gear and driven out of the arena for the last time as Williamson
sang.
In a final tribute, Australia Zoo staff spelled out Irwin's catchphrase "Crikey" in yellow
flowers as Irwin's truck was driven from the "Crocoseum" for the last time to end the service.
Flags on the Sydney Harbour Bridge flew at half mast on the day of the memorial service.
Other Australian memorials



Several permanent memorials for Irwin have already been considered or announced.
Premier Peter Beattie suggested a national park be named after Irwin or a permanent
memorial might be constructed in his honour, though the details of the structure would
depend on Irwin's family.[79]
On January 1, 2007, Glasshouse Mountains Road, the road that runs by Steve and Terri
Irwin's Australia Zoo, was officially renamed to "Steve Irwin Way".[87]
There will be a nature park in Australia named after Irwin, the Australian federal government
announced in July 2007.[88]
American memorials

Animal Planet will rename the garden in front of Discovery's world headquarters in Silver
Spring, Montgomery County, Maryland, U.S., to the "Steve Irwin Memorial Sensory
Garden".[89]

Animal Planet is also creating the Steve Irwin Crocodile Hunter Fund called the "The Crikey
Fund" to "provide a way for people from across the globe to make contributions in Irwin's
honor to support wildlife protection, education and conservation".[89]

Animal Planet ran a The Crocodile Hunter Diaries marathon on air to pay tribute to Irwin.

There is presently a resolution under consideration in the Kentucky General Assembly to
make February 22, 2007 Steve Irwin Day in honor of what would have been his 45th
birthday.[90]

On the Happy Feet DVD, there is a deleted scene where the main character Mumble meets
an albatross voiced by Irwin and a blue whale. The scene was unfinished at first but was
included on the DVD release to honor Irwin's memory as Irwin had insisted on being in a film
that contained a message about the environment. However, they took this scene off the
movie and decided to let Irwin play an elephant seal named Trev.
Indian memorial

A crocodile research centre in Neyyar Wildlife Sanctuary was named by the Kerala
government after Steve Irwin.
The state's forest and wildlife department is perhaps the first government body in the world to
name a memorial after Irwin, whose documentaries on wildlife and reptiles endeared him to
thousands of viewers. The centre is now called the Steve Irwin Crocodile Rehabilitation and
Research Centre.
Death anniversary
On September 4, 2007, Australian fans gathered at the Irwin family zoo on the Gold Coast,
Queensland to commemorate the first anniversary of Irwin's death. State Premier Peter
Beattie described Irwin as one of the state's greatest cultural ambassadors. On November 15,
Irwin's widow Terri and children, Bindi and Bob, remembered his life and achievements on
"Steve Irwin Day."[91]
Criticism
Dan Mathews, vice-president of animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of
Animals, said it was "no shock at all that Steve Irwin should die provoking a dangerous
animal". He added that "Irwin made his career out of antagonising frightened wild animals,
that's a very dangerous message to send to children." He also made a comparison with
another well known conservationist: "If you compare him with a responsible conservationist
like Jacques Cousteau, he looks like a cheap reality TV star."[92][93] The son of Jacques
Cousteau, Jean-Michel Cousteau, also a producer of wildlife documentaries, also took issue
with Irwin's hands-on approach to nature television. Cousteau said, "You don't touch nature,
you just look at it." Although it "goes very well on television", Irwin's approach would
"interfere with nature, jump on animals, grab them, hold them, and have this very, very
spectacular, dramatic way of presenting things" which Cousteau felt is "very misleading".[94]
Jacques Cousteau's grandson, Philippe Cousteau Jr., however, was himself working with
Irwin on the "Ocean's Deadliest" documentary at the time of Irwin's death, and later described
him as "a remarkable individual." Describing their project, he said, "I think why Steve was so
excited about it that we were looking at these animals that people think of as, you know,
dangerous and deadly monsters, and they're not. They all have an important place in the
environment and in the world. And that was what his whole message was about."[95]
SOLO PERFORMANCE STRUCTURE 4
THE SPIRIT OF MEL BOURNE
Melbourne
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
This article is about the Australian metropolis. The name may also refer to the Melbourne City Centre
(also known as the "Central Business District" or "CBD") or the City of Melbourne (the Local
Government Area within which the Melbourne City Centre is situated). For all other uses, see
Melbourne (disambiguation).
Melbourne ([ˈmelbən, -bn̩, ˈmæl-],[3][4] rhotically /ˈmɛlbərn/) is the capital and most
populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia.[2] The
Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical
division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2010, the greater
geographical area had an approximate population of four million.[1] Inhabitants of Melbourne
are called Melburnians or Melbournians.[5]
The metropolis is located on the large natural bay known as Port Phillip, with the city centre
positioned at the estuary of the Yarra River (at the northernmost point of the bay).[6] The
metropolitan area then extends south from the city centre, along the eastern and western
shorelines of Port Phillip, and expands into the hinterland. The city centre is situated in the
municipality known as the City of Melbourne, and the metropolitan area consists of a further
30 municipalities.[7]
Melbourne was founded in 1835 (47 years after the European settlement of Australia) by
settlers from Launceston in Van Diemen's Land.[8] It was named by governor Richard Bourke
in 1837, in honour of the British Prime Minister of the day, William Lamb—the 2nd
Viscount Melbourne.[8] Melbourne was officially declared a city by Queen Victoria in
1847.[9] In 1851, it became the capital city of the newly created colony of Victoria.[9] During
the Victorian gold rush of the 1850s, it was transformed into one of the world's largest and
wealthiest cities.[10] After the federation of Australia in 1901, it then served as the interim seat
of government of the newly created nation of Australia until 1927.[11]
Often referred to as the "cultural capital of Australia",[12] Melbourne is the birthplace of
cultural institutions such as Australian film (as well as the world's first feature film),[13][14]
Australian television,[15] Australian rules football,[16] the Australian impressionist art
movement (known as the Heidelberg School)[17] and Australian dance styles such as New
Vogue and the Melbourne Shuffle.[18][19] It is also a major centre for contemporary and
traditional Australian music.[18]
Melbourne was ranked as the world's most liveable city in the World's Most Livable Cities
ratings by the Economist Group's Intelligence Unit in August, 2011.[20][21][22][23] It was also
ranked in the top ten Global University Cities by RMIT's Global University Cities Index
(since 2006)[24][25][26] and the top 20 Global Innovation Cities by the 2thinknow Global
Innovation Agency (since 2007).[27][28][29][30] The metropolis is also home to the world's
largest tram network.[31] The main airport serving Melbourne is Melbourne Airport. Avalon
Airport is currently being developed into Melbourne's second international airport.

[edit] History
For more details on this topic, see History of Melbourne.
See also: Timeline of Melbourne history and History of Victoria
[edit] Early history and foundation
Further information: Foundation of Melbourne
Melbourne Landing, 1840; watercolour by W. Liardet (1840)
Before the arrival of European settlers, the area was occupied for an estimated 31,000 to
40,000 years[32] by under 20,000[33] hunter-gatherers from three indigenous regional tribes:
the Wurundjeri, Boonwurrung and Wathaurong.[34] The area was an important meeting place
for the clans of the Kulin nation alliance, as well as a vital source of food and water.[35][36]
The first European settlement in Victoria was established in 1803 on Sullivan Bay, near
present-day Sorrento, but this settlement was abandoned due to a perceived lack of resources.
It would be 30 years before another settlement was attempted.[37]
In May and June 1835, the area which is now central and northern Melbourne was explored
by John Batman, a leading member of the Port Phillip Association in Van Diemen's Land
(now called Tasmania), who negotiated a purchase of 600,000 acres (2,400 km2) with eight
Wurundjeri elders.[35][36] Batman selected a site on the northern bank of the Yarra River,
declaring that "this will be the place for a village".[citation needed] Batman then returned to
Launceston in Tasmania. In early August 1835 a different group of settlers, including John
Pascoe Fawkner, left Launceston on the ship Enterprize. John Pascoe Fawkner was forced to
disembark at Georgetown, Tasmania because of outstanding debts. The remainder of the
party continued and arrived at the mouth of the Yarra River on 15 August, 1835. On 30
August 1835 the party disembarked and established a settlement at the site of the current
Melbourne Immigration Museum. John Batman and his group arrived on 2 September 1835
and the two groups ultimately agreed to share the settlement.
Batman's Treaty with the Aborigines was annulled by the New South Wales government
(which at the time governed all of eastern mainland Australia), which compensated the
association.[35] In 1836, Governor Bourke declared the city the administrative capital of the
Port Phillip District of New South Wales, and commissioned the first plan for the city, the
Hoddle Grid, in 1837.[38] Later that year the settlement was named "Melbourne" after the
British Prime Minister, William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, whose seat was Melbourne
Hall in the market town of Melbourne, Derbyshire. On 13 April 1837, the settlement's general
post office was officially opened with that name.[39]
Between 1836 and 1842, Victorian Aboriginal groups were largely dispossessed of territory
bigger than England.[40] By January 1844, there were said to be 675 Aborigines resident in
squalid camps in Melbourne.[41] Although the British Colonial Office appointed 5
"Aboriginal Protectors" for the entire Aboriginal population of Victoria, arriving in
Melbourne in 1839, they worked ". . . within a land policy that nullified their work, and there
was no political will to change this".[42] "It was government policy to encourage squatters to
take possession of whatever [Aboriginal] land they chose, . . . that largely explains why
almost all the original inhabitants of Port Phillip's vast grasslands were dead so soon after
1835".[43] By 1845, fewer than 240 wealthy Europeans held all the pastoral licences then
issued in Victoria and became the patriarchs " . . . that were to wield so much political and
economic power in Victoria for generations to come".[44]
Melbourne was declared a city by letters patent of Queen Victoria, issued on 25 June 1847.[9]
The Port Phillip District became the separate Colony of Victoria in 1851, with Melbourne as
its capital. With the Aboriginal population dispossessed of their lands and their management
of fire having been disrupted for almost 15 years, the Colony experienced for the first time its
largest-ever bushfires, burning about 25% of the land area of Victoria on Black Thursday on
6 February 1851.
[edit] Victorian gold rush
Further information: Victorian gold rush
"Canvas Town", South Melbourne in the 1850s. Temporary accommodation for the thousands who
poured into Melbourne each week during the gold rush.
Lithograph of the Royal Exhibition Building (now a World Heritage site) built to host the World's Fair
of 1880
The Federal Coffee Palace; one of many temperance hotels erected in the late 19th century
The discovery of gold in Victoria in 1851 led to the Victorian gold rush, and Melbourne,
which served as the major port and provided most services for the region, experienced rapid
growth. Within months, the city's population had increased by nearly three-quarters, from
25,000 to 40,000 inhabitants.[45] Thereafter, growth was exponential and by 1865, Melbourne
had overtaken Sydney as Australia's most populous city.[46]
An influx of interstate and overseas migrants, particularly Irish, German and Chinese, saw the
development of slums including a temporary "tent city" established on the southern banks of
the Yarra. Chinese migrants founded a Chinatown in 1851, which remains the longest
continuous Chinese settlement in the Western World.[47] In the aftermath of the Eureka
Rebellion, mass public support for the plight of the miners in Melbourne resulted in major
political changes to the colony. The various nationalities involved in the Eureka Stockade
revolt and Burke and Wills expedition give some indication of migration flows in the second
half of the nineteenth century.[48]
The population growth and flow of gold into the city helped stimulate a program of grand
civic building beginning with the design and construction of many of Melbourne's surviving
institutional buildings including Parliament House, the Treasury Building and Treasury
Reserve, the Old Melbourne Gaol, Victoria Barracks, the State Library, Supreme Court,
University, General Post Office, Government House, Customs House the Melbourne Town
Hall, St Paul's, St Patrick's cathedrals and several major markets including the surviving
Queen Victoria Market. The city's inner suburbs were planned, to be linked by boulevards
and gardens. Melbourne had become a major finance centre, home to several banks, the
Royal Mint to Australia's first stock exchange in 1861.[49] Grand private buildings also were
built in this era, including the Athenaeum Hall and several large hotels. Before the arrival of
white settlers, the indigenous population in the district was estimated at 15,000, but following
settlement the number had fallen to less than 800,[50] and continued to decline with an
estimated 80% decrease by 1863, due primarily to introduced diseases, particularly
smallpox,[33] frontier violence and dispossession from their lands.
[edit] Land boom and bust
The economic boom of the Victorian gold rush peaked during the 1880s, by which time
Melbourne had become the richest city in the world,[10] and the largest after London in the
British Empire.[51] Melbourne hosted two international exhibitions at the large purpose-built
Exhibition Building between 1880 and 1890, spurring the construction of several prestigious
hotels including the Menzies, Federal and the Grand (Windsor).
In 1855 the Melbourne Cricket Club secured possession of its now famous ground, the MCG.
Australian Football commenced in earnest about 1858, and Yarra rowing clubs and "regattas"
became popular about the same time. In 1861 the Melbourne Cup was first run. In 1864
Melbourne acquired its first public monument—the Burke and Wills statue.
In 1880 a telephone exchange was established and in the same year the foundations of St.
Paul's Cathedral were laid; in 1881 electric light was installed in the Eastern Market building,
and in the following year a generating station capable of supplying 2,000 incandescent lamps
was in operation.[52]
In 1885 the first cable tram in Melbourne was built. Cable tramways were in general use until
the 1920s, when they were superseded by electric motors. Electric trams were introduced into
the suburbs in 1906.[53]
During a visit in 1885 English journalist George Augustus Henry Sala coined the phrase
"Marvellous Melbourne", which stuck long into the twentieth century and is still used today
by Melburnians.[54] Growing building activity culminated in a "land boom" which, in 1888,
reached a peak of speculative development fuelled by consumer confidence and escalating
land value.[55] As a result of the boom, large commercial buildings, coffee palaces, terrace
housing and palatial mansions proliferated in the city.[55] The establishment of a hydraulic
facility in 1887 allowed for the local manufacture of elevators, resulting in the first
construction of high-rise buildings;[56] most notably 1889's APA (The Australian) Building,
the world's tallest office building upon completion and Melbourne's tallest for over half a
century.[55] This period also saw the expansion of a major radial rail-based transport
network.[57]
A brash boosterism that had typified Melbourne during this time ended in 1891 with a severe
depression of the city's economy, sending the local finance and property industries into a
period of chaos[55][58] during which 16 small banks and building societies collapsed and 133
limited companies went into liquidation. The Melbourne financial crisis was a contributing
factor in the Australian economic depression of the 1890s and the Australian banking crisis of
1893. The effects of the depression on the city were profound, although it recovered enough
to grow slowly during the early twentieth century.[59][60]
[edit] Federation of Australia
Further information: Federation of Australia
The Big Picture, the opening of the first Parliament of Australia on 9 May 1901, painted by Tom
Roberts
At the time of Australia's federation on 1 January 1901, Melbourne became the seat of
government of the federation. The first federal parliament was convened on 9 May 1901 in
the Royal Exhibition Building, subsequently moving to the Victorian Parliament House
where it was located until 1927, when it was moved to Canberra. The Governor-General of
Australia resided at Government House in Melbourne until 1930 and many major national
institutions remained in Melbourne well into the twentieth century.[61] Flinders Street Station
was the world's busiest passenger station in 1927 and Melbourne's tram network overtook
Sydney's to become the world's largest in the 1940s.
[edit] Post-war period
In the immediate years after World War II, Melbourne expanded rapidly, its growth boosted
by Post war immigration to Australia, primarily from Southern Europe and the
Mediterranean.[62] While the "Paris End" of Collins Street began Melbourne's boutique
shopping and open air cafe cultures,[63] the city centre was seen by many as stale, the dreary
domain of office workers, something expressed by John Brack in his famous painting Collins
St., 5 pm (1955).[64]
Height limits in the Melbourne CBD were lifted after the construction ICI House,
transforming the city's skyline with the introduction of skyscrapers. The eyes of the world
were on the city when it hosted the 1956 Summer Olympics. Suburban expansion then
intensified, serviced by new indoor malls beginning with Chadstone Shopping Centre.[65] The
post-war period also saw a major renewal of the CBD and St Kilda Road which significantly
modernised the city.[66] New fire regulations and redevelopment saw most of the taller prewar CBD buildings either demolished or partially retained through a policy of facadism.
Many of the larger suburban mansions from the boom era were also either demolished or
subdivided.
Melbourne features an extensive juxtaposition of modern and Victoria era buildings.
To counter the trend towards low-density suburban residential growth, the government began
a series of controversial public housing projects in the inner city by the Housing Commission
of Victoria, which resulted in demolition of many neighbourhoods and a proliferation of
high-rise towers.[67] In later years, with the rapid rise of motor vehicle ownership, the
investment in freeway and highway developments greatly accelerated the outward suburban
sprawl and declining inner city population. The Bolte government sought to rapidly
accelerate the modernisation of Melbourne. Major road projects including the remodelling of
St Kilda Junction, the widening of Hoddle Street and then the extensive 1969 Melbourne
Transportation Plan changed the face of the city into a car-dominated environment.[68]
Australia's financial and mining booms between 1969 and 1970 resulted in establishment of
the headquarters of many major companies (BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, among others) in
the city. Nauru's then booming economy resulted in several ambitious investments in
Melbourne, such as Nauru House.[69] Nauru, which had become incredibly wealthy thanks to
the selling of phosphate, began the Nauru Phosphate Royalties Trust (NPRT) to re-invest
profits in international real-estate.[70] Melbourne remained Australia's main business and
financial centre until the late 1970s, when it began to lose this primacy to Sydney.[71]
As the centre of Australia's "rust belt", Melbourne experienced an economic downturn
between 1989 to 1992, following the collapse of several local financial institutions. In 1992
the newly elected Kennett government began a campaign to revive the economy with an
aggressive development campaign of public works coupled with the promotion of the city as
a tourist destination with a focus on major events and sports tourism.[72] During this period
the Australian Grand Prix moved to Melbourne from Adelaide. Major projects included the
construction of a new facility for the Melbourne Museum, Federation Square, the Melbourne
Exhibition and Convention Centre, Crown Casino and the CityLink tollway. Other strategies
included the privatisation of some of Melbourne's services, including power and public
transport, and a reduction in funding to public services such as health, education and public
transport infrastructure.[73]
[edit] Contemporary Melbourne
Since the mid-1990s, Melbourne has maintained significant population and employment
growth. There has been substantial international investment in the city's industries and
property market. Major inner-city urban renewal has occurred in areas such as Southbank,
Port Melbourne, Melbourne Docklands and more recently, South Wharf. According to the
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Melbourne sustained the highest population increase and
economic growth rate of any Australian capital city in the three years ended June 2004.[74]
These factors have led to population growth and further suburban expansion through the
2000s.
A panoramic view of the Melbourne Docklands and the city skyline from Waterfront City looking
across Victoria Harbour.
The Docklands viewed at night in 2005.
From 2006, the growth of the city extended into "green wedges" and beyond the city's urban
growth boundary. Predictions of the city's population reaching 5 million people pushed the
state government to review the growth boundary in 2008 as part of its Melbourne @ Five
Million strategy.[75] In 2009, Melbourne was less affected by the Late-2000s financial crisis
in comparison to other Australian cities. At this time, more new jobs were created in
Melbourne than any other Australian capital—almost as many as the next two fastest growing
cities, Brisbane and Perth, combined,[76] and Melbourne's property market remained
strong,[77] resulting in historically high property prices and widespread rent increases.[78]
[edit] Geography
[edit] Topography
Further information: Geology of Victoria
Map of greater Melbourne and Geelong
Melbourne is located in the south-eastern part of mainland Australia, within the state of
Victoria. Geologically, it is built on the confluence of Quaternary lava flows to the west,
Silurian mudstones to the east, and Holocene sand accumulation to the southeast along Port
Phillip. The southeastern suburbs are situated on the Selwyn fault which transects Mount
Martha and Cranbourne.
Melbourne extends along the Yarra River towards the Yarra Valley and the Dandenong
Ranges to the east. It extends northward through the undulating bushland valleys of the
Yarra's tributaries—Moonee Ponds Creek (toward Tullamarine Airport), Merri Creek,
Darebin Creek and Plenty River—to the outer suburban growth corridors of Craigieburn and
Whittlesea.
The city sprawls south-east through Dandenong to the growth corridor of Pakenham towards
West Gippsland, and southward through the Dandenong Creek valley, the Mornington
Peninsula and the city of Frankston taking in the peaks of Olivers Hill, Mount Martha and
Arthurs Seat, extending along the shores of Port Phillip as a single conurbation to reach the
exclusive suburb of Portsea and Point Nepean. In the west, it extends along the Maribyrnong
River and its tributaries north towards Sunbury and the foothills of the Macedon Ranges, and
along the flat volcanic plain country towards Melton in the west, Werribee at the foothills of
the You Yangs granite ridge and Geelong as part of the greater metropolitan area to the
south-west.
Melbourne's major bayside beaches are located in the south-eastern suburbs along the shores
of Port Phillip Bay, in areas like Port Melbourne, Albert Park, St Kilda, Elwood, Brighton,
Sandringham, Mentone and Frankston although there are beaches in the western suburbs of
Altona and Williamstown. The nearest surf beaches are located 85 kilometres (53 mi) southeast of the Melbourne CBD in the back-beaches of Rye, Sorrento and Portsea.[79][80]
[edit] Climate
Further information: Extreme Weather Events in Melbourne
Autumn in suburban Canterbury
Melbourne has a moderate oceanic climate (Köppen climate classification Cfb)[81][82] and is
well known for its changeable weather conditions. This is mainly due to Melbourne's location
situated on the boundary of the very hot inland areas and the cold southern ocean. This
temperature differential is most pronounced in the spring and summer months and can cause
very strong cold fronts to form. These cold fronts can be responsible for all sorts of severe
weather from gales to severe thunderstorms and hail, large temperature drops, and heavy rain.
Port Phillip is often warmer than the surrounding oceans and/or the land mass, particularly in
spring and autumn; this can set up a "bay effect" similar to the "lake effect" seen in the
United States where showers are intensified leeward of the bay. Relatively narrow streams of
heavy showers can often affect the same places (usually the eastern suburbs) for an extended
period of time, whilst the rest of Melbourne and surrounds stays dry. Overall, Melbourne is,
owing to the rain shadow of the Otway Ranges, nonetheless drier than average for southern
Victoria. Within the city and surrounds, however, rainfall varies widely, from around 425
millimetres (17 in) at Little River to 1,250 millimetres (49 in) on the eastern fringe at
Gembrook.
Melbourne is also prone to isolated convective showers forming when a cold pool crosses the
state, especially if there is considerable daytime heating. These showers are often heavy and
can contain hail and squalls and significant drops in temperature, but they pass through very
quickly at times with a rapid clearing trend to sunny and relatively calm weather and the
temperature rising back to what it was before the shower. This occurs often in the space of
minutes and can be repeated many times in a day, giving Melbourne a reputation for having
"four seasons in one day",[83] a phrase that is part of local popular culture and familiar to
many visitors to the city.[84]
Melbourne is colder than other mainland Australian state capital cities in the winter. The
lowest temperature on record is −2.8 °C (27.0 °F), on 4 July 1901.[85] However, snowfalls are
rare: the most recent occurrence of sleet in the CBD was on 25 July 1986 and the most recent
snowfalls in the outer eastern suburbs and Mount Dandenong were on 10 August 2005.[86][87]
More commonly, Melbourne experiences frosts and fog in winter.
Melbourne summers are notable for occasional days of extreme heat.[citation needed] This occurs
when the synoptic pattern is conducive to the transportation of very hot air from central
Australia over to the south east corner of the continent. The inland deserts of Australia are
amongst the hottest areas on earth, particularly the inland parts of north-west Australia. Every
summer, intense heat builds starting in the Pilbara district of Western Australia around
October/November and spreading widely over the tropical and subtropical inland parts of the
continent by January. In the summer months, the southern part of the continent straddles the
westerly wind belt to the south and the subtropical high pressure ridge to the north. The
intense heat buildup occurs where high pressure is highly dominant in the upper levels of the
atmosphere over the tropics and subtropics of Australia in summer allowing for a huge area
of stable atmospheric conditions to predominate. On occasion a strong cold front will develop
in summer and bring the westerlies further north than their mean summer position. On these
occasions, north-west winds will develop ahead of the cold front's passage and sometimes
these can be very strong, even gale force. When this occurs the hot air from the inland is
dragged right down over south east Australia, occasionally even as far as southern Tasmania.
As this air mass is carried entirely over the continental land mass it remains unmodified, i.e.
it does not pick up additional moisture from a body of water and retains most if not all of its
heat. On these occasions, the normally temperate parts of southern Victoria, including
Melbourne, can experience the full fury of the desert climate albeit only briefly as the cold
front responsible usually passes through relatively quickly allowing cool southerly winds
from the southern ocean to replace the hot desert air. The highest temperature recorded in
Melbourne city was 46.4 °C (115.5 °F), on 7 February 2009.[88]
[hide]Climate data for Melbourne
Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep
Month Jan Feb
Oct Nov Dec Year
Record
45.6 46.4 41.7 34.9 28.7 22.4 23.1 26.5 31.4 36.9 40.9 43.7
46.4
high °C
(114.1) (115.5) (107.1) (94.8) (83.7) (72.3) (73.6) (79.7) (88.5) (98.4) (105.6) (110.7) (115.5)
(°F)
Average
25.9 25.8 23.9 20.3 16.7 14.1 13.5 15.0 17.2 19.7 22.0 24.2
19.9
high °C
(78.6) (78.4) (75.0) (68.5) (62.1) (57.4) (56.3) (59.0) (63.0) (67.5) (71.6) (75.6) (67.8)
(°F)
Average
14.3 14.6 13.2 10.8 8.6
6.9
6.0
6.7
8.0
9.5
11.2 12.9
10.2
low °C
(57.7) (58.3) (55.8) (51.4) (47.5) (44.4) (42.8) (44.1) (46.4) (49.1) (52.2) (55.2) (50.4)
(°F)
Record
5.5
4.5
2.8
1.5 −1.1 −2.2 −2.8 −2.1 −0.5
0.1
2.5
4.4
−2.8
low °C
(41.9) (40.1) (37.0) (34.7) (30.0) (28.0) (27.0) (28.2) (31.1) (32.2) (36.5) (39.9) (27.0)
(°F)
Rainfall 47.6 48.0 50.3 57.4 55.8 49.0 47.5 50.0 58.1 66.4 60.4 59.5 650.0
mm (1.874) (1.89) (1.98) (2.26) (2.197) (1.929) (1.87) (1.969) (2.287) (2.614) (2.378) (2.343) (25.591)
(inches)
Avg.
rainy
days
8.4
7.5
9.4
11.8
14.6
15.4
16.1
16.1
14.9
14.2
11.8
10.4
150.6
Mean
monthly
254.3 228.8 192.1 158.2 110.2 101.7 104.5 132.8 161.0 178.0 197.8 211.9 2,031.3
sunshine
hours
Source: Bureau of Meteorology"[83]
[edit] Urban structure
See also: Melbourne city centre, List of heritage listed buildings in Melbourne, Lanes and arcades of
Melbourne, and Parks and gardens of Melbourne
A panoramic view of Melbourne's CBD with urban sprawl towards Mount Dandenong.
The centre of Melbourne's central business district is formed by the Hoddle Grid (dimensions
of 1 by 0.5 miles (1.6 by 0.80 km)). The grid's southern edge fronts onto the Yarra River.
Office, commercial and public developments in the adjoining districts of Southbank and
Docklands have made these redeveloped areas into extensions of the CBD in all but name.
The city centre is well known for its historic and attractive lanes and arcades (the most
notable of which are Block Place and Royal Arcade) which contain a variety of shops and
cafés[89] and are a byproduct of the city's layout.[90]
Melbourne is known for the "laneway culture" of its extensive network of lively city lanes which
include Centre Place (pictured).
Melbourne's urban structure features large parks and gardens and wide avenues.
Melbourne's CBD, compared with other Australian cities, has comparatively unrestricted
height limits and as a result of waves of post-war development contains five of the six tallest
buildings in Australia, the tallest of which is the Eureka Tower, situated in Southbank. It has
an observation deck near the top from where you can see above all of Melbourne's
structures.[91] The Rialto tower, the city's second tallest, remains the tallest building in the old
CBD; its observation deck for visitors has recently closed.[92]
The CBD and surrounds also contain many significant historic buildings such as the Royal
Exhibition Building, the Melbourne Town Hall and Parliament House.[93][94] Although the
area is described as the centre, it is not actually the demographic centre of Melbourne at all,
due to an urban sprawl to the south east, the demographic centre being located at Glen Iris.[95]
Melbourne is typical of Australian capital cities in that after the turn of the 20th century, it
expanded with the underlying notion of a 'quarter acre home and garden' for every family,
often referred to locally as the Australian Dream. This, coupled with the popularity of the
private automobile after 1945, led to the auto-centric urban structure now present today in the
middle and outer suburbs. Much of metropolitan Melbourne is accordingly characterised by
low density sprawl, whilst its inner city areas feature predominantly medium-density, transitoriented urban forms. The city centre, Docklands, St. Kilda Road and Southbank areas
feature high-density forms.
Melbourne is often referred to as Australia's garden city, and the state of Victoria was once
known as the garden state.[96][97][98] There is an abundance of parks and gardens in
Melbourne,[99] many close to the CBD with a variety of common and rare plant species amid
landscaped vistas, pedestrian pathways and tree-lined avenues. There are also many parks in
the surrounding suburbs of Melbourne, such as in the municipalities of Stonnington,
Boroondara and Port Phillip, south east of the central business district. The extensive area
covered by urban Melbourne is formally divided into hundreds of suburbs (for addressing and
postal purposes), and administered as local government areas[100] 31 of which are located
within the metropolitan area.[101]
[edit] Housing
Main article: Housing in Victoria, Australia
Pin Oak Court, Vermont South (famous as the fictional "Ramsay Street" in the cult soap opera
Neighbours) is typical of the majority of suburban Melbourne.
"Melbourne Style" Victorian terrace houses are common in the inner suburbs and have been the
subject of gentrification.
Housing in Melbourne is characterised by minimal and lack of public housing and high
demand for, and largely unaffordable, rental housing.[102][103][104] Public housing is usually
provided by the Housing Commission of Victoria and operates within the framework of the
Commonwealth-State Housing Agreement, by which funding for public housing is provided
by both federal and state governments.[citation needed]
At present, Melbourne is experiencing high population growth, generating high demand for
housing. This has created a housing boom, pushing housing prices up and having an effect on
rental prices as well as availability of all types of housing. Subdivision regularly occurs in the
far outer areas of Melbourne with Display homes from numerous developers offering house
and land packages.
[edit] Environment
See also: Environmental issues in Australia
Like many urban environments, Melbourne faces some significant environmental issues,
many of them relating to the city's large urban footprint and urban sprawl and the demand for
infrastructure and services. One such issue is water usage, drought and low rainfall. Drought
in Victoria, low rainfalls and high temperatures deplete Melbourne water supplies and
climate change may have a long-term impact on the water supplies of Melbourne.[105]
Melbourne has been in a drought since 1997.[106] In response to low water supplies and low
rainfall due to drought, the government implemented water restrictions and a range of other
options including: water recycling schemes for the city, incentives for household water tanks,
greywater systems, water consumption awareness initiatives, and other water saving and
reuse initiatives; also, in June 2007, the Bracks Government announced that a $3.1 billion
Wonthaggi desalination plant would be built on Victoria's south-east coast, capable of
treating 150 billion litres of water per year,[107] as well as a 70 km (43 mi) pipeline from the
Goulburn area in Victoria's north to Melbourne and a new water pipeline linking Melbourne
and Geelong. Both projects are being conducted under controversial Public-Private
Partnerships and a multitude of independent reports have found that neither project is
required to supply water to the city and that Sustainable Water Management is the best
solution. In the meantime, the drought must be weathered.[108]
In response to Attribution of recent climate change, the City of Melbourne, in 2002, set a
target to reduce carbon emissions to net zero by 2020[109] and Moreland City Council
established the Zero Moreland program, however not all metropolitan municipalities have
followed, with the City of Glen Eira notably deciding in 2009 not to become carbon
neutral.[110] Melbourne has one of the largest urban footprints in the world due to its low
density housing, resulting in a vast suburban sprawl, with a high level of car dependence and
minimal public transport outside of inner areas.[111] Much of the vegetation within the city are
non-native species, most of European origin, and in many cases plays host to invasive species
and noxious weeds.[112] Significant introduced urban pests include the Common Myna,[113]
Feral Pigeon,[114] Brown Rat,[115][116] European Wasp,[117] Common Starling and Red Fox.[118]
Many outlying suburbs, particularly towards the Yarra Valley and the hills to the north-east
and east, have gone for extended periods without regenerative fires leading to a lack of
saplings and undergrowth in urbanised native bushland. The Department of Sustainability and
Environment partially addresses this problem by regularly burning off.[119][120] Several
national parks have been designated around the urban area of Melbourne, including the
Mornington Peninsula National Park, Port Phillip Heads Marine National Park and Point
Nepean National Park in the south east, Organ Pipes National Park to the north and
Dandenong Ranges National Park to the east. There are also a number of significant state
parks just outside Melbourne.[121][122] Responsibility for regulating pollution falls under the
jurisdiction of the EPA Victoria and several local councils. Air pollution, by world standards,
is classified as being good. Summer and autumn are the worst times of year for atmospheric
haze in the urban area.[96][123]
Another recent environmental issue in Melbourne was the Victorian government project of
channel deepening Melbourne Ports by dredging Port Phillip Bay—the Port Phillip Channel
Deepening Project. It was subject to controversy and strict regulations among fears that
beaches and marine wildlife could be affected by the disturbance of heavy metals and other
industrial sediments.[80][124] Other major pollution problems in Melbourne include levels of
bacteria including E. coli in the Yarra River and its tributaries caused by septic systems,[125]
as well as litter. Up to 350,000 cigarette butts enter the storm water runoff every day.[126]
Several programs are being implemented to minimise beach and river pollution.[80][127] In
February 2010, The Transition Decade, an initiative to transition human society, economics
and environment towards sustainability, was launched in Melbourne.[128]
[edit] Culture
Main article: Culture of Melbourne
La Trobe Reading Room in the State Library of Victoria
Princess Theatre
The stained glass ceiling of the Great Hall of the National Gallery of Victoria
Melbourne is an international cultural centre, with cultural endeavours spanning major events
and festivals, drama, musicals, comedy, music, art, architecture, literature, film and
television. It was the second city after Edinburgh to be named a UNESCO City of
Literature[129] and has thrice shared top position in a survey by The Economist of the world's
most liveable cities on the basis of a number of attributes which include its broad cultural
offerings.[130]
The city celebrates a wide variety of annual cultural events and festivals of all types,
including the Melbourne International Arts Festival, Melbourne International Film Festival,
Melbourne International Comedy Festival and the Melbourne Fringe Festival. The Australian
Ballet is based in Melbourne, as is the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. Melbourne is the
second home of Opera Australia after it merged with "Victoria State Opera" in 1996. The
Victorian Opera had its inaugural season in 2006 and operates out of various venues in
Melbourne.
Notable theatres and performance venues include the Victorian Arts Centre (which includes
the State Theatre, Hamer Hall, the Playhouse and the Fairfax Studio), Melbourne Recital
Centre, Sidney Myer Music Bowl, Princess Theatre, Regent Theatre, Forum Theatre, Palace
Theatre, Comedy Theatre, Athenaeum Theatre, Her Majesty's Theatre, Capitol Theatre,
Palais Theatre and the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art. There are more than 100
galleries in Melbourne.[131] Most notably it is home to Australia’s oldest and largest art
gallery, the National Gallery of Victoria.[132]
Melbourne is the birthplace of television in Australia,[15] Australian rules football,[16]
Australian impressionist art movement known as the Heidelberg School,[133] and Australian
contemporary dance (including the Melbourne Shuffle and New Vogue styles).[134] The city
has an extensive cinematic history. Indeed, the world's first feature films were produced in
Melbourne and its outer suburbs. Limelight Department's 1900 Soldiers of the Cross, the
world's first religious epic,[135] anticipated the early 1900s golden age of Melbourne film
production—an era marked by the exploration of local history and Australia's emerging
identity. The 1854 civil insurrection of Ballarat was brought to life on the screen in Eureka
Stockade, and The Story of the Kelly Gang (the world's first feature length narrative film and
precedent of the "Bushranging drama"[136]) followed the escapades of Ned Kelly and his gang
of outlaws. Melbourne filmmakers continued to produce bushranger and convict films, such
as 1907's Robbery Under Arms and 1908's For the Term of His Natural Life, up until 1912,
when Victorian politicians banned the screening of bushranger films for what they perceived
as the promotion of crime.[136]
Melbourne's and Australia's film industries declined soon after and came to a virtual stop in
the 1960s. A notable film shot and set in Melbourne during this lull is 1959's On the Beach.
The 1970s saw a major renaissance of Australian film, giving rise to the Australian New
Wave, as well as the Ocker and Ozploitation genres, instigated by Melbourne-based
productions Stork and Alvin Purple respectively. Other 70s Melbourne films, such as Picnic
at Hanging Rock and Mad Max, would achieve worldwide acclaim. 2004 saw the
construction of Melbourne's largest film and television studio complex, Docklands Studios
Melbourne, which has hosted many domestic films and television shows, as well as
international features Ghost Rider, Knowing, Charlotte's Web, Nightmares and Dreamscapes
and Where the Wild Things Are, among others.[137] Melbourne is also home to the
headquarters of Village Roadshow Pictures, Australia's largest film production company.
Famous modern day actors from Melbourne include Cate Blanchett, Rachel Griffiths, Olivia
Newton-John, Guy Pearce and Eric Bana. Artist Banksy, from the United Kingdom, hailed
street art in Melbourne as "[Australia]'s most significant contribution to the arts since the
Aborigines' pencils were stolen".[138] The city is often placed alongside New York and Berlin
as one of the world's great street art meccas,[139][140] and its extensive street art-laden
laneways, alleys and arcades were voted by Lonely Planet readers as Australia's top cultural
attraction.[138] The Melbourne Shuffle is a rave and club dance that originated in the late
1980s in the underground rave music scene in Melbourne, and has since grown in
popularity.[141] The city is also admired for its exciting mix of vigorous modern architecture
which intersects with an impressive range of nineteenth and early twentieth century
buildings.[142]
[edit] Sport
Main article: Sport in Victoria
Large cricket crowd at the Melbourne Cricket Ground
Melbourne is a notable sporting location as the host city for the 1956 Summer Olympics
games (the first Olympic Games ever held in the southern hemisphere), along with the 2006
Commonwealth Games. The city is home to three major annual international sporting events:
the Australian Open (one of the four Grand Slam tennis tournaments), the Melbourne Cup
(horse racing), and the Australian Grand Prix (Formula One). Melbourne was proclaimed the
"World's Ultimate Sports City", for the second time, in 2008.[143] The city is home to the
National Sports Museum, which until 2003 was located outside the members pavilion at the
Melbourne Cricket Ground and reopened in 2008 in the Olympic Stand.[144]
Australian rules football and cricket are the most popular sports in Melbourne and also the
spiritual home of these two sports in Australia and both are mostly played in the same
stadiums in the city and its suburbs. The first ever official cricket Test match was played at
the Melbourne Cricket Ground in March 1877. The first Australian rules football matches
were played in Melbourne in 1859 and the Australian Football League is headquartered at
Docklands Stadium. Nine of its teams are based in the Melbourne metropolitan area and the
five Melbourne AFL matches per week attract an average 40,000 people per game.[145]
Additionally, the city annually hosts the AFL Grand Final.
The city is also home to several professional franchises/teams in national competitions
including Cricket clubs Melbourne Stars, Melbourne Renegades and Victorian Bushrangers
who play in the Big Bash League and other domestic cricket competitions, Football (Soccer)
clubs Melbourne Victory and Melbourne Heart who play in the A-league competition, the
rugby league club Melbourne Storm[146] who play in the NRL competition, the rugby union
club Melbourne Rebels who play in the Super Rugby competition, the netball club Melbourne
Vixens who play in the trans-Tasman trophy ANZ Championship, and the basketball club
Melbourne Tigers who play in the NBL competition and the Bulleen Boomers and
Dandenong Rangers who play in the WNBL and the baseball club Melbourne Aces who play
in the Australian Baseball League. A second Melbourne-based NBL team may be established
for the 2011–2012 season.[147] In November 2008, it was announced that the Victorian Major
Events Company had informed the Australian Olympic Committee that Melbourne was
considering making bids for either the 2024 or 2028 Summer Olympics.[148]
[edit] Economy
Melbourne's entertainment and conference precinct (Crown Casino and Convention Centre) make
substantial annual contributions to the Victorian economy ($2 billion[149] and $3 billion respectively)
Melbourne has a highly diversified economy with particular strengths in finance,
manufacturing, research, IT, education, logistics and transportation, conventions and
tourism.[citation needed] Melbourne is headquarters for many of Australia's largest corporations,
including five of the ten largest in the country (based on revenue), and five of the largest six
in the country (based on market capitalisation)[150] (ANZ, BHP Billiton (the world's largest
mining company), the National Australia Bank, Rio Tinto and Telstra); as well as such
representative bodies and thinktanks as the Business Council of Australia and the Australian
Council of Trade Unions. The city is home to Australia's largest and busiest seaport which
handles more than $75 billion in trade every year and 39% of the nation's container
trade.[98][151][152] Melbourne Airport provides an entry point for national and international
visitors, and is Australia's second busiest airport.
Melbourne is also an important financial centre. Two of the big four banks, NAB and ANZ,
are headquartered in Melbourne. The city has carved out a niche as Australia’s leading centre
for superannuation (pension) funds, with 40% of the total, and 65% of industry super-funds
including the $40 billion-dollar Federal Government Future Fund. The city was rated 34th
within the top 50 financial cities as surveyed by the Mastercard Worldwide Centers of
Commerce Index (2007),[153] between Barcelona and Geneva, and second only to Sydney
(14th) in Australia.
Melbourne is Australia's industrial centre. It is the centre of Australia's automotive industry,
which includes Ford and Toyota manufacturing facilities, and the engine manufacturing
facility of Holden and parts suppliers. It has the Australian automotive headquarters and
design centres. It is also home to a very wide variety of other manufacturers, ranging from
petrochemicals, aircraft parts and pharmaceuticals to fashion garments, paper manufacturing
and food processing.[154]
It is a major international centre for biotechnology, and is the base of such companies as CSL
and Biota. Melbourne has an important ICT industry that employs over 60,000 people (one
third of Australia's ICT workforce), with a turnover of $19.8 billion and export revenues of
$615 million. In addition, tourism also plays an important role in Melbourne's economy, with
approximately 7.6 million domestic visitors and 1.88 million international visitors in 2004[155]
In 2008, Melbourne overtook Sydney with the amount of money that domestic tourists spent
in the city.[156] accounting for around $15.8 billion annually[157] Melbourne has been
attracting an increasing share of domestic and international conference markets. Construction
began in February 2006 of a $1 billion 5000-seat international convention centre, Hilton
Hotel and commercial precinct adjacent to the Melbourne Exhibition and Convention Centre
to link development along the Yarra River with the Southbank precinct and multi-billion
dollar Docklands redevelopment.[158]
Main article: Tourism in Melbourne
[edit] Demographics
Main article: Demographics of Melbourne
See also: Melbourne population growth
Chinese New Year celebrations in Chinatown. Melbourne has a large Chinese population, the oldest
continuous Chinese settlement in Australia and the second longest continuous Chinese settlement in
the western world
Melbourne is a diverse and multicultural city. In 2006, 35.8% of its population was born
overseas, exceeding the national average of 23.1%. In concordance with national data, Britain
is the most commonly reported overseas place of birth, with 4.7%, followed by Italy (2.1%),
Croatia (1.7%), Vietnam (1.6%), People's Republic of China (1.5%), and New Zealand
(1.5%).[159] Melbourne has the world's third largest Greek-speaking population after Athens
and Thessaloniki (Melbourne's Greek sister city), and the Vietnamese surname Nguyen is the
second most common in Melbourne's phone book.[160] The city also features substantial
Indian, Sri Lankan, and Malaysian-born communities, in addition to recent South African and
Sudanese influxes. The cultural diversity is reflected in the city's restaurants serving various
international cuisines.
Over two-thirds of Melburnians speak only English at home (68.1%). Chinese (mainly
Cantonese and Mandarin) is the second-most-common language spoken at home (3.6%), with
Greek third, Italian fourth and Vietnamese fifth, each with more than 100,000 speakers.[159]
Although Victoria's net interstate migration has fluctuated, the Melbourne statistical division
has grown by approximately 50,000 people a year since 2003. Melbourne has now attracted
the largest proportion of international overseas immigrants (48,000) finding it outpacing
Sydney's international migrant intake on percentage, along with having strong interstate
migration from Sydney and other capitals due to more affordable housing and cost of living,
which have been two recent key factors driving Melbourne's growth.[161]
In recent years, Melton, Wyndham and Casey, part of the Melbourne statistical division, have
recorded the highest growth rate of all local government areas in Australia. Despite a
demographic study stating that Melbourne could overtake Sydney in population by 2028,[162]
the ABS has projected in two scenarios that Sydney will remain larger than Melbourne
beyond 2056, albeit by a margin of less than 3% compared to a margin of 12% today.
However, the first scenario projects that Melbourne's population overtakes Sydney in 2039,
primarily due to larger levels of internal migration losses assumed for Sydney.[163]
After a trend of declining population density since World War II, the city has seen increased
density in the inner and western suburbs aided in part by Victorian Government planning
blueprints, such as Postcode 3000 and Melbourne 2030 which have aimed to curtail the urban
sprawl.[164][165]
[edit] Education
Main article: Education in Melbourne
Ormond College, part of the University of Melbourne
Melbourne was ranked the world's fourth top university city in 2008 after London, Boston
and Tokyo in a poll commissioned by the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.[166]
Melbourne is the home of the University of Melbourne, as well as Monash University, the
largest university in Australia. The University of Melbourne is the second oldest university in
Australia.[167] It was ranked first among Australian universities in the 2010 THES
international rankings.[168]
The 2011-2012 Times Higher Education Supplement ranked the University of Melbourne as
the 37th (30th by QS ranking) best university in the world. Monash University was ranked as
the 117th (60th by QS ranking) best university in the world. Both universities are members of
the Group of Eight.
Other universities located in Melbourne include La Trobe University, RMIT University,
Swinburne University of Technology, based in the inner city Melbourne suburb of Hawthorn,
Victoria University, which has nine campuses across Melbourne's western region, including
three in the heart of Melbourne's Central Business District (CBD) and another four within ten
kilometres of the CBD, and the St Patrick's campus of the Australian Catholic University.
Deakin University maintains two major campuses in Melbourne and Geelong, and is the third
largest university in Victoria. In recent years, the number of international students at
Melbourne's universities has risen rapidly, a result of an increasing number of places being
made available to full fee paying students.[169]
[edit] Media
Main article: Media in Melbourne
SBS studios at Federation Square
Three daily newspapers serve Melbourne: the Herald Sun (tabloid), The Age (broadsheet) and
The Australian (national broadsheet). The free mX is also distributed weekday afternoon at
railway stations and on the streets of central Melbourne.[170] Five television networks and a
community television station serve Melbourne: HSV-7, which broadcasts from the
Melbourne Docklands precinct; GTV-9, which broadcasts from their new Docklands studios;
and ATV-10, which broadcasts from the Como Complex in South Yarra. National stations
that broadcast into Melbourne include ABV-2 (branded ABC1) from the Australian
Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). The ABC has two studios, one at Ripponlea and another at
Southbank. SBS One from the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS), broadcasts from their
studios at Federation Square in central Melbourne.
New digital-only channels available in addition to ABC1, HSV-7 (Seven), GTV-9 (Nine),
ATV-10 (Ten) and SBS One include One HD, Eleven, ABC2, ABC3, ABC News 24, SBS
Two, 7Two, 7mate, GEM HD and GO!. C31 Melbourne is the only local community
television station in Melbourne, and its broadcast range also branches out to regional centre
Geelong. Melbourne also receives Pay TV, largely through cable and satellite services. Foxtel
and Optus are the main Pay TV providers. Various television programs are produced in
Melbourne, notably Neighbours, Kath & Kim, Winners and Losers, Offspring, The Project
and Underbelly.
A long list of AM and FM radio stations broadcast to greater Melbourne. These include
"public" (i.e. state owned ABC & SBS) and community stations. Many commercial stations
are networked-owned: DMG has Nova 100 and Classic Rock; ARN controls Gold and Mix;
and Southern Cross Austereo runs both Fox and Triple M. Stations from towns in regional
Victoria may also be heard (e.g. 93.9 Bay FM, Geelong ). Youth alternatives include ABC
Triple J and youth run SYN. Triple J, and similarly PBS and Triple R, strive to play under
represented music. JOY caters for gay and lesbian audiences. For fans of classical music
there are 3MBS and ABC Classic FM. Light FM is a contemporary Christian station. AM
stations include ABC: 774, Radio National, and News Radio; also Fairfax affiliates 3AW
(talk) and Magic (easy listening). For sport fans and enthusiasts there is SEN 1116.
Melbourne has many community run stations that serve alternative interests, such as 3CR and
3KND (Indigenous). Many suburbs have low powered community run stations serving local
audiences.[171]
[edit] Religion
St Paul's Anglican Cathedral
Melbourne is home to a wide range of religious faiths, the most widely held faith of which is
Christian (58.9%) with a large Catholic population (28.3%).[159] The large Christian
population is signified by the city's two large cathedrals—St Patrick's (Roman Catholic), and
St Paul's (Anglican). Both were built in the Victorian era and are of considerable heritage
significance as major landmarks of the city.[172]
Other categories include no religion (20.0%), Anglican (12.1%), Eastern Orthodox (5.9%)
and the Uniting Church (4.0%).[159] Buddhists, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and Sikhs collectively
account for 9.2% of the population.[173]
Melbourne has the largest Jewish population in Australia, the community currently
numbering approximately 60,000. The city is also home to the largest number of Holocaust
survivors of any Australian city,[174] indeed the highest per capita outside Israel itself.[175]
Reflecting this vibrant and growing community, Melbourne has a plethora of Jewish cultural,
religious and educational institutions, including over 40 synagogues and 7 full-time parochial
day schools,[176] along with a local Jewish newspaper.[177]
[edit] Governance
The Parliament of Victoria meets in Parliament House
The governance of Melbourne is split between the government of Victoria and the 26 cities
and five shires which comprise the metropolitan area. There is no ceremonial or political
head of Melbourne; however, the Lord Mayor of the City of Melbourne often fulfils such a
role as a first amongst equals,[178] particularly when interstate or overseas.
The local councils are responsible for providing the functions set out in the Local
Government Act 1989[179] such as urban planning and waste management. Most other
government services are provided or regulated by the Victorian state government, which
governs from Parliament House in Spring Street. These include services which are associated
with local government in other countries and include public transport, main roads, traffic
control, policing, education above preschool level, health and planning of major
infrastructure projects. The state government retains the right to override certain local
government decisions, including urban planning, and Melburnian issues often feature
prominently in state election.
[edit] Infrastructure
[edit] Health
Aerial view of Royal Melbourne Hospital in Parkville
The Government of Victoria's Department of Health oversees approximately 30 public
hospitals in the Melbourne metropolitan region, and 13 health services organisations.[180]
There are many major medical, neuroscience and biotechnology research institutions located
in Melbourne: St. Vincent's Institute of Medical Research, Australian Stem Cell Centre, the
Burnet Institute, Australian Regenerative Medicine Institute, Victorian Institute of Chemical
Sciences, Brain Research Institute, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, the Walter and Eliza
Hall Institute of Medical Research, and the Melbourne Neuropsychiatry Centre.
Other institutions include the Howard Florey Institute, the Murdoch Children's Research
Institute, Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute and the Australian Synchrotron.[181] Many of
these institutions are associated with and are located near universities.
Among Australian capital cities, Melbourne ties equal 1st with Canberra for the highest male
life expectancy (80.0 years) and ranks second behind Perth in female life expectancy (84.1
years).[182]
[edit] Transport
Main article: Transport in Melbourne
The Bolte Bridge is part of the CityLink tollway system.
Melbourne has a very high dependency on the automobile for transport,[183] particularly in the
outer suburban areas where the largest number of cars are bought,[184] with a total of
3.6 million private vehicles using 22,320 km (13,870 mi) of road, and one of the highest
lengths of road per capita in the world.[183] The early 20th century saw an increase in
popularity of automobiles, resulting in large-scale suburban expansion,[185] and today it has an
extensive network of freeways and arterial roadways used by private vehicles including
freight as well as public transport systems including bus and taxis. Major highways feeding
into the city include the Eastern Freeway, Monash Freeway and West Gate Freeway (which
spans the large West Gate Bridge), whilst other freeways circumnavigate the city or lead to
other major cities, including CityLink (which spans the large Bolte Bridge), Eastlink, the
Western Ring Road, Calder Freeway, Tullamarine Freeway (main airport link) and the Hume
Freeway which links Melbourne and Sydney.[186]
Southern Cross Station, Melbourne's main inter-urban train and bus interchange
A C2 class Melbourne tram in Transdev TSL livery on La Trobe Street
Melbourne has an integrated public transport system based around extensive train, tram, bus
and taxi systems. In the 1940s, 25% of travellers used public transport but by 2003 it had
declined to just 7.6%.[187] The public transport system was privatised in 1999, symbolising
the peak of the decline.[188] Despite privatisation and successive governments persisting with
auto-centric urban development into the 21st century,[189] there have since been large
increases in public transport patronage, with the mode share for commuters increasing to
14.8% and 8.4% of all trips.[190] A target of 20% public transport mode share for Melbourne
by 2020 was set by the state government in 2006.[191] Since 2006 public transport patronage
has grown by over 20%.[191] There have also been recent developments with the introduction
with reusable card system, Myki.
[edit] Rail
The Melbourne rail network has its origins in privately built lines from the 1850s gold rush
era, and today the suburban network consists of 200 suburban stations on 16 lines which
radiate from the City Loop, a partially underground metro section of the network beneath the
Central Business District (Hoddle Grid). Flinders Street Station is Melbourne's busiest
railway station, and was the world's busiest passenger station in 1926. It remains a prominent
Melbourne landmark and meeting place.[192] The city has rail connections with regional
Victorian cities, as well as direct interstate rail services to Sydney and Adelaide and beyond
which depart from Melbourne's other major rail terminus, Southern Cross Station in Spencer
Street. In the 2008–2009 financial year, the Melbourne rail network recorded 213.9 million
passenger trips, the highest in its history.[193] Many rail lines, along with dedicated lines and
rail yards are also used for freight.
[edit] Melbourne Metro[194]
The Melbourne Metro Project, is a planned development consisting of a new railway line
running north-south under the city centre. This line will be installed in two stages:
Stage 1 from Arden Metro (Dynon Rd) to Parkville Metro, to CBD North Metro (Carlton) to
CBD South, to Domain (St Kilda)
Stage 2 from Domain to Caulfield.
[edit] Trams
Main article: Trams in Melbourne
Melbourne has the largest tram network in the world[31][195] which had its origins in the city's
1880s land boom. In the 2010-2011 year 182.7 million passenger trips were made by
tram.[196] Melbourne's is Australia's only tram network to comprise more than a single line
and consists of 250 km (155.3 mi) of track, 487 trams, 28 routes, and 1,773 tram stops.[197]
Sections of the tram network are on roads,[197] while others are separated or are light rail
routes.[198] Melbourne's trams are recognised as iconic cultural assets and a tourist attraction.
Heritage trams operate on the free City Circle route, intended for visitors to Melbourne, and
heritage restaurant trams travel through the city and surrounding areas during the evening.[199]
[edit] Buses
Main article: Buses in Melbourne
Melbourne's bus network consists of almost 300 routes which mainly service the outer
suburbs fill the gaps in the network between rail and light rail services.[199][200] 86.7 million
passenger trips were recorded on Melbourne’s buses in 2007.[201]
[edit] Port
Ship transport is an important component of Melbourne's transport system. The Port of
Melbourne is Australia's largest container and general cargo port and also its busiest. The port
handled two million shipping containers in a 12 month period during 2007, making it one of
the top five ports in the Southern Hemisphere.[151] Station Pier on Port Phillip Bay is the main
passenger ship terminal with cruise ships and the Spirit of Tasmania ferries which cross Bass
Strait to Tasmania docking there.[202] Ferries and water taxis run from berths along the Yarra
River as far upstream as South Yarra and across Port Phillip Bay.
[edit] Air
Melbourne has four airports. Melbourne Airport, at Tullamarine, is the city's main
international and domestic gateway and second busiest in Australia. The airport is home base
for passenger airlines Jetstar Airways and Tiger Airways Australia and cargo airlines
Australian air Express and Toll Priority; and is a major hub for Qantas and Virgin Australia.
Avalon Airport, located between Melbourne and Geelong, is a secondary hub of Jetstar. It is
also used as a freight and maintenance facility. Buses and taxis are the only forms of public
transport currently available to and from the city's main airports. Air Ambulance facilities are
available for domestic and international transportation of patients.[203] Melbourne also has a
significant general aviation airport, Moorabbin Airport in the city's south east as well as
handling a limited number of passenger flights. Essendon Airport, which was once the city's
main airport also handles passenger flights, general aviation and some cargo flights.[204]
[edit] Cycling
Main article: Cycling in Melbourne
Melbourne has a bicycle sharing system. It was established in 2010[205] and utilises a network
of marked road lanes and segregated cycle facilities.
[edit] Utilities
Sugarloaf Reservoir (in 2007) at Christmas Hills in the metropolitan area is one of Melbourne's
closest water supplies.
Main article: Energy in Victoria
Water storage and supply for Melbourne is managed by Melbourne Water, which is owned
by the Victorian Government. The organisation is also responsible for management of
sewerage and the major water catchments in the region and will be responsible for the
Wonthaggi desalination plant and North–South Pipeline. Water is stored in a series of
reservoirs located within and outside the Greater Melbourne area. The largest dam, the
Thomson River Dam, located in the Victorian Alps, is capable of holding around 60% of
Melbourne's water capacity,[206] while smaller dams such as the Upper Yarra Dam and the
Cardinia Reservoir carry secondary supplies.
Gas is provided state wide by SP Ausnet. Electricity is provided by 5 distribution companies:
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Citipower which provides power to Melbourne's CBD, and some inner suburbs
Powercor which provides power to the outer western suburbs as well as all of western
Victoria (Citipower and Powercor are owned by the same entity)
Jemena which provides power to the northern and inner western suburbs
United Energy which provides power to the inner eastern, south-eastern suburbs and the
Mornington Peninsula
SP AusNet which provides power to the outer eastern suburbs and all of the north and east
of Victoria.
Numerous telecommunications companies provide Melbourne with terrestrial and mobile
telecommunications services and wireless internet services.
Joanne Lees
Http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joanne_Lees
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Joanne Rachael Lees, (born September 25, 1973[1] in Huddersfield, England), is a British
woman who is most notable for being the girlfriend of Peter Falconio at the time of his
disappearance on a remote stretch of highway near Barrow Creek in outback Northern
Territory, Australia on July 14, 2001. Lees was the chief crown witness in the subsequent
murder trial of Bradley John Murdoch conducted in Darwin.
Lees met Falconio in a nightclub in Huddersfield, Yorkshire, England in 1996, and began
living with him the following year in Brighton, England, where Falconio was studying at
university. In the year 2000, the couple embarked on a world tour to Thailand, Singapore, and
Australia.
The disappearance of Peter Falconio
Lees told investigators that while travelling at night along the Stuart Highway near Barrow
Creek (between Alice Springs and Tennant Creek) in the Northern Territory on 14 July 2001,
a man had asked them to stop, claiming engine troubles, and he suddenly took both of them
and that she heard a shot fired. The man then tied her up and covered her head, but she
escaped, hiding for 5 hours in the bush. The aboriginal trackers could find no evidence of a
mans foot prints or a dogs foot prints, only Lees's. The blood found at the scene was
described by the aboriginal trackers as very old.
Falconio's body was never found, but Lees went to great lengths to (inaccurately) describe
her alleged attacker, his vehicle, and his dog. These descriptions were used to conduct an
extensive Australia-wide manhunt in which over 200 people were interviewed. An extensive
search by Australian federal police was unable to uncover any resident of the Northern
Territory who precisely fit the description given by Joanne Lees, nor any vehicle that was
registered in the Northern Territory that fit her description. However, video footage from a
roadstation surveillance camera showed what appeared to be a man who might fit the
description given by Lees. Due to their similar appearances to that which Lees gave, some of
the interviewees were arrested and briefly held in custody, but none were charged because
they had not been in Barrow Creek at the time of the alleged offence.
The Prime suspect
Bradley John Murdoch was arrested primarily because he was found to have left Alice
Springs at a time and in a direction that may have led to him being at or about Barrow Creek
at the time of the alleged offence. Expert testimony presented at the trial indicated that
Bradley John Murdoch was the man captured in the CCTV footage at the service station.
Furthermore, the identikit drawings of the attacker and his vehicle bore a slight resemblance
to Murdoch and his vehicle. Joanne Lees claimed she identified Murdoch, first via a UK
website in late 2002 where he was declared a suspect in the case, then from police
photographs shown to Lees in November 2002 by NT Police, and fiinally face-to-face during
the trial on October 18, 2005. This, combined with the DNA match on Joanne Lees' t-shirt,
formed the basis for Murdoch being charged with the offence. The NT Police placed great
emphasis on the specific LC (Low Copy Number) DNA testing procedure and this DNA
result greatly assisted in the conviction of Murdoch. In December of 2007 the Northern
Ireland police have announced the suspension of the use of the same specific DNA technique
in the light of criticism by a trial judge who commented that there would be "profound
implications for all those convicted utilising the same DNA testing procedure".[citation needed]
The Crown Prosecution Service also announced it was reviewing upcoming cases in which
the so-called low copy number DNA was part of the prosecution; Murdoch's conviction needs
to be reviewed.
Initial public perception in some of the Australian media implied that Lees was in some way
responsible for Falconio's murder, and as a result, she received a lot of hostility during her
time in Australia following the disappearance[citation needed]. Lees has reportedly attempted to
sue a number of Australian citizens in relation to their libellous claims about her in the
Australian media[citation needed], but withdrew all applications[citation needed].
The investigation continues
As the investigations went on, Lees admitted to use of ecstasy and marijuana, and to having
sex with another man, Nick Riley, in Sydney during their trip through Australia. During the
trial, Joanne Lees' credibility was attacked by the defence, which claimed to find
inconsistencies in her story. These matters did not relate to the offence under investigation,
and were perceived as essentially irrelevant, although voyeuristically interesting to the public.
Strategy of the defence
Murdoch's defence argued during the trial that the minute DNA match on Joanne Lees' Tshirt could be due to accidental blood transfer in an Alice Springs Red Rooster restaurant
prior to the alleged offence or simply planted by persons unknown, further samples were
found to be to contaminated and were not presented as evidence . Murdoch had given
evidence that he had stopped at that restaurant to buy chicken for himself and his dog,
"chicken roll, box of nuggets for Jack...full chicken for the trip". During the committal
hearing, Lees at one stage mentioned that she and Falconio had stopped at Red Rooster.
Media interviews
Lees has also appeared on British media since the event, talking not only about her
boyfriend's disappearance and the man who killed him, but also about the way that she was
treated in the Australian press[citation needed], and by Australian citizens[citation needed].
Lees also agreed to an interview with Martin Bashir, which was later televised in Australia,
for which she was paid £50,000. She later testified in court she agreed to this interview to
raise awareness of the case in Australia, as she felt the public profile of the case had
diminished.
A lengthy interview with Lees was aired on Andrew Denton's show, Enough Rope on 9
October 2006.[2]
On October 9, 2006, Lees was interviewed on the Today programme on BBC Radio 4 by
John Humphrys. He proceeded to attack Lees for cashing in on the tragedy.[3]
TITANIC PASSENGER
Passenger facilities
The passenger facilities aboard Titanic aimed to meet the highest standards of luxury. The
ship could accommodate 739 First Class passengers, 674 in Second Class and 1,026 in Third
Class. Her crew numbered about 900 people; in all, she could carry about 3,339 people. Her
interior design was a departure from that of other passenger liners, which had typically been
decorated in the rather heavy style of a manor house or an English country house. Titanic was
laid out in a much lighter style similar to that of contemporary high-class hotels – the Ritz
Hotel was a reference point – with First Class cabins finished in the Empire style.[40] A
variety of other decorative styles, ranging from the Renaissance to Victorian style, were used
to decorate cabins and public rooms in First and Second Class areas of the ship. The aim was
to convey an impression that the passengers were in a floating hotel rather than a ship; as one
passenger recalled, on entering the ship's interior a passenger would "at once lose the feeling
that we are on board ship, and seem instead to be entering the hall of some great house on
shore."[41]
Passengers could use an on-board telephone system, a lending library and a large barber
shop.[42] The First Class section had a swimming pool, a gymnasium, squash court, Turkish
bath, electric bath and a Verandah Cafe.[41] First Class common rooms were adorned with
ornate wood panelling, expensive furniture and other decorations while the Third Class
general room had pine panelling and sturdy teak furniture.[43] The Café Parisien was located
on a sunlit veranda fitted with trellis decorations and offered the best French haute cuisine for
the First Class passengers.[44]
Titanic's First Class passenger facilities[45]
Titanic's gymnasium on the Boat Deck, which was equipped with the latest exercise machines.
Titanic's famous Grand Staircase, which provided access between the Boat Deck and E Deck.
The A La Carte restaurant on B Deck, run as a concession by Italian-born chef Gaspare Gatti.
Third Class passengers were not treated as luxuriously as those in First Class, but even so
they were better off than their counterparts on many other ships of the time. They were
accommodated in cabins sleeping between two and ten people, with a further 164 open berths
provided for single young men on G Deck.[46] They were, however, much more limited than
First or Second Class passengers in their washing and bathing facilities. There were only two
bathrooms, one each for men and women, for the entire Third Class complement. They had to
wash their own clothes in washrooms equipped with iron tubs, whereas those travelling in
First and Second Class could use the ship's laundry.[47] There were also restrictions on which
parts of the ship they could enter; all three classes were segregated from each other, and
although in theory passengers from the higher classes could visit the lower-class areas of the
ship, in practice respect for social conventions meant that they did not do so.[48] The class
distinctions were reflected in the ship's fittings; the Third Class toilets were made of iron,
those in Second Class of porcelain and those in First Class were marble.[49]
Leisure facilities were provided for all three classes to pass the time. As well as making use
of the indoor amenities such as the library, smoking-rooms and gymnasium, it was also
customary for passengers to socialise on the open deck, promenading or relaxing in hired
deck chairs or wooden benches. A passenger list was published before the sailing to inform
the public which members of the great and good were on board, and it was not uncommon for
ambitious mothers to use the list to identify rich bachelors to whom they could introduce their
marriageable daughters during the voyage.[48]
One of Titanic's most distinctive features was her First Class staircase, known as the Grand
Staircase or Grand Stairway. This descended through seven decks of the ship, from the Boat
Deck to E deck in the elegant style depicted in photographs and movies, and then as a more
functional and less elegant staircase from there down to F deck.[50] It was capped with a dome
of wrought iron and glass that admitted natural light. Each landing off the staircase gave
access to ornate entrance halls lit by gold-plated light fixtures.[51] At the uppermost landing
was a large carved wooden panel containing a clock, with figures of "Honour and Glory
Crowning Time" flanking the clock face.[50] The Grand Staircase was destroyed in Titanic's
sinking and is now just a void in the ship which modern explorers have used to access the
lower decks.[52] During the filming of James Cameron's Titanic in 1997, his replica of the
Grand Staircase was ripped from its foundations by the force of the inrushing water on the
set. It has been suggested that during the real event, the entire Grand Staircase was ejected
upwards through the dome.[53]
Mail and cargo
Although Titanic was primarily a passenger liner, she also carried a substantial amount of
cargo. Her designation as a Royal Mail Ship (RMS) indicated that she carried mail under
contract with the Royal Mail (and also for the United States Post Office Department). 26,800
cubic feet (760 m3) of space in her holds was allocated for the storage of letters, parcels and
specie (bullion, coins and other valuables). The Sea Post Office on G Deck was manned by
five postal clerks, three Americans and two Britons, who worked thirteen hours a day, seven
days a week sorting up to 60,000 items daily.[54]
The ship's passengers brought with them a huge amount of baggage; another 19,455 cubic
feet (550.9 m3) was taken up by first- and second-class baggage. In addition, there was a
considerable quantity of regular cargo, ranging from furniture to foodstuffs and even motor
cars.[54] Despite later myths, the cargo on Titanic's maiden voyage was fairly mundane; there
was no gold, exotic minerals or diamonds, and one of the more famous items lost in the
shipwreck, a jewelled copy of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, was valued at only £405
(£29,717 today) – hardly the stuff of legends.[55] Titanic was equipped with eight electric
cranes, four electric winches and three steam winches to lift cargo and baggage in and out of
the hold. It is estimated that the ship used some 415 tons of coal whilst in Southampton,
simply generating steam to operate the cargo winches and provide heat and light.[56]
Lifeboats
Main article: Lifeboats of the RMS Titanic
A collapsible lifeboat, notice canvas side
Titanic carried a total of 20 lifeboats: 14 standard wooden Harland and Wolff lifeboats with a
capacity of 65 people each and four Englehardt "collapsible" lifeboats (identified as A to D)
with a capacity of 47 people each. In addition, she had two emergency cutters with a capacity
of 40 people each.[57][b] Olympic herself did not even carry the four collapsibles A-D in the
1911–12 season. All of the lifeboats were stowed securely on the boat deck and, except for
collapsible lifeboats A and B, connected to davits by ropes. Those on the starboard side were
odd-numbered 1–15 from bow to stern, while those on the port side were even-numbered 2–
16 from bow to stern. The two cutters were kept swung out, hanging from the davits, ready
for immediate use, while collapsible lifeboats C and D were stowed on the boat deck
(connected to davits) immediately inboard of boats 1 and 2 respectively. A and B were stored
on the roof of the officers' quarters, on either side of number 1 funnel. There were no davits
to lower them and their weight would make them challenging to launch.[58] Each boat carried
(among other things) food, water, blankets, and a spare lifebelt. Lifeline ropes on the boats'
sides enabled them to save additional people from the water if necessary.
Titanic had 16 sets of davits, each able to handle 4 lifeboats. This gave Titanic the ability to
carry up to 64 wooden lifeboats[59] which would have been enough for 4,000 people –
considerably more than her actual capacity. However, the White Star Line decided that only
16 wooden lifeboats and four collapsibles would be carried, which could accommodate
1,178 people, only one-third of Titanic's total capacity. At the time, the Board of Trade's
regulations required British vessels over 10,000 tons to carry 16 lifeboats with a capacity of
990 occupants.[57] Therefore, the White Star Line actually provided more lifeboat
accommodation than was legally required.[60][c] At the time, lifeboats were intended to ferry
survivors from a sinking ship to a rescuing ship – not keep afloat the whole population or
power them to shore. Had the SS Californian responded to the Titanic's distress calls, the
lifeboats would have been adequate to ferry the passengers to safety as planned.[62]
Sinking of the RMS Titanic
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
41°43′55″N 49°56′45″W41.73194°N 49.94583°W
Coordinates:
Sinking of the RMS Titanic
Untergang der Titanic by Willy Stöwer, 1912
Date
14–15 April 1912
Time
23:40 – 02:20[a]
Location
North Atlantic Ocean
Cause
Collision with iceberg
Key persons[show]
Participants
o

Outcome 

between 1,490 and 1,635 deaths
Improvements to navigational safety
Cultural impact
The sinking of the RMS Titanic occurred on the night of 14 April through to the morning of
15 April 1912 in the north Atlantic Ocean, four days into her maiden voyage from
Southampton to New York City. The largest passenger liner in service at the time, Titanic
had an estimated 2,224 people on board when she struck an iceberg at 23:40 (ship's time[a])
on Sunday, 14 April 1912. She sank two hours and forty minutes later at 02:20 (05:18 GMT)
on Monday, 15 April, resulting in the deaths of more than 1,500 people, making it one of the
deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in history.
Titanic had received several warnings of sea ice during 14 April but was travelling near her
maximum speed when she sighted the iceberg. Unable to turn quickly enough, the ship
suffered a glancing blow that buckled her starboard (right) side and opened five of her sixteen
compartments to the sea. Titanic had been designed to stay afloat with four flooded
compartments but not more, and the crew soon realised that the ship was going to sink. They
used rocket flares and radio (wireless) messages to attract help as the passengers were put
into lifeboats. However, although not unlawfully, there were far too few lifeboats available
and many were not filled to their capacity due to a poorly managed evacuation.
The ship broke up as she sank with over a thousand passengers and crew members still
aboard. Almost all those who jumped or fell into the water died from hypothermia within
minutes. RMS Carpathia arrived on the scene about an hour and a half after the sinking and
had rescued the last of the survivors in the lifeboats by 09:15 on 15 April, little more than
24 hours after Titanic's crew had received their first warnings of drifting ice. The disaster
caused widespread public outrage over the lack of lifeboats, lax shipping regulations, and the
unequal treatment of the different passenger classes aboard the ship. Inquiries set up in the
wake of the disaster recommended sweeping changes to maritime regulations. This led in
1914 to the establishment of the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea
(SOLAS), which still governs maritime safety today.
Contents
[hide]
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1 Background
2 14 April 1912
o 2.1 Iceberg warnings (09:00–23:39)
o 2.2 "Iceberg, right ahead!" (23:39)
 2.2.1 Meeting with the iceberg
 2.2.2 Effects of the collision
3 15 April 1912
o 3.1 Preparing to evacuate (00:05–00:45)
o 3.2 Departure of the lifeboats (00:45–02:05)
 3.2.1 Launching of the last lifeboats
o 3.3 Last minutes of sinking (02:15–02:20)
o 3.4 Passengers and crew in the water (02:20–04:10)
o 3.5 Rescue and departure (04:10–09:15)
4 Aftermath
5 Casualties and survivors
6 See also
7 Notes
8 References
9 Bibliography
10 External links
[edit] Background
At the time of her entry into service on 2 April 1912, RMS Titanic was the largest ship in the
world: she and her sister Olympic had almost half again as much gross register tonnage as
Cunard's Lusitania and Mauretania, the previous record holders, and were nearly 100 feet
(30 m) longer.[2] Titanic could carry 3,547 people in speed and comfort,[3] and was built on a
hitherto unprecedented scale. Her reciprocating engines were the largest that had ever been
built, standing 40 feet (12 m) high and with cylinders 9 feet (2.7 m) in diameter, and she
could generate more steam than any previous ship, requiring the burning of 600 long tons
(610 t) of coal per day.[3]
A modern artist's impression of Titanic on her sea trials, 2 April 1912
Her passenger accommodation was said to be "of unrivalled extent and magnificence"[4]. First
Class accommodation included the most expensive seagoing real estate ever, with promenade
suites costing $4,350 ($104,760 at 2012 prices) for a one-way passage. Even Third Class was
unusually comfortable by contemporary standards and was supplied with plentiful quantities
of good food, providing its passengers with better conditions than many of them had
experienced at home.[4]
Titanic's maiden voyage began shortly after noon on 10 April 1912 when she left
Southampton on the first leg of her journey to New York.[5] A few hours later she reached
Cherbourg in France, a journey of 80 nautical miles (92 mi/148 km), where she took on
passengers.[6] Her next port of call was Queenstown (now Cobh) in Ireland, which she
reached around midday on 11 April.[7] She left in the afternoon after taking on more
passengers and stores.[8]
By the time she departed westwards across the Atlantic she was carrying 892 crew members
and 1,320 passengers. This was only about half of her full passenger capacity of 2,435,[9] as it
was the low season and shipping from the UK had been disrupted by a coal miners' strike.[10]
Her passengers were a cross-section of Edwardian society, from millionaires such as John
Jacob Astor and Benjamin Guggenheim,[11] to poor emigrants from countries as disparate as
Armenia, Ireland, Italy, Sweden, Syria and Russia seeking a new life in America.[12]
Route of Titanic's maiden voyage from Southampton to New York
The ship was commanded by 62-year-old Captain Edward John Smith, the most senior of the
White Star Line's captains. He had four decades of seafaring experience and had previously
served as captain of Titanic's sister ship, RMS Olympic, from which he was transferred to
command Titanic.[13] The vast majority of the crew who served under him were not trained
sailors, but were either engineers, firemen, or stokers, responsible for looking after the
engines; or stewards and galley staff, responsible for the passengers. The 6 watch officers and
39 able-bodied seamen constituted only around 5 per cent of the crew,[9] and most of these
had been taken on at Southampton so had not had time to familiarise themselves with the
ship.[14]
The ice conditions were attributed to a mild winter that caused large numbers of icebergs to
break away from the west coast of Greenland.[15] In addition, it is now known that in January
1912, the Moon came closer to the Earth than at any time in the previous 1,400 years, at the
same time as the Earth made its closest annual approach to the Sun. This caused
exceptionally high tides that may have resulted in a larger number of icebergs than usual
reaching the shipping lanes a few months later.[16][17] The weather improved significantly
during the course of the day, from brisk winds and moderate seas in the morning to a crystalclear calm by evening, as the ship entered an arctic high pressure system.[18] There was no
moon on the clear night.
Just before the centennial of the sinking, Tim Maltin, an amateur historian, published a book
of research, conducted with the aid of an academic expert,[17][19] concluding that the weather
conditions also favoured the creation of a mirage effect over the calm sea known as the Fata
Morgana or cold water mirage optical phenomenon, and that this facilitated the tragedy. It
allegedly would have limited the ability of the ship's lookouts to see an approaching iceberg,
and the ability of observers on the nearby ship, the SS Californian, which could see the
Titanic in the critical hours, to recognise the distress the Titanic was in due to the collision,
and the ability of both ships to recognise the Morse signals they tried to send to each other.
The scientific world has not weighed in on this new theory.[17][20]
[edit] 14 April 1912
[edit] Iceberg warnings (09:00–23:39)
The iceberg thought to have been hit by Titanic, reported to have been streaked, along its waterline
on one side, with red paint from a ship's hull (photographed by the chief steward of the liner Prinz
Adelbert on the morning of 15 April 1912)
During 14 April 1912, Titanic's radio[b] operators received six messages from other ships
warning of drifting ice, which passengers on Titanic had begun to notice during the
afternoon. The ice conditions in the North Atlantic were the worst for any April in the
previous 50 years (which was the reason why the lookouts were unaware that they were about
to steam into a line of drifting ice several miles wide and many miles long).[21] Not all of
these messages were relayed by the radio operators.
The first warning came at 09:00 from RMS Caronia reporting "bergs, growlers and field
ice".[22] Captain Smith acknowledged receipt of the message. At 13:42, RMS Baltic relayed a
report from the Greek ship Athenia that she had been "passing icebergs and large quantities of
field ice".[22] This too was acknowledged by Smith, who showed the report to J. Bruce Ismay,
the chairman of the White Star Line, aboard Titanic for her maiden voyage.[22] Smith ordered
a new course to be set, to take the ship farther south.[23]
At 13:45, the German ship SS Amerika, which was a short distance to the south, reported she
had "passed two large icebergs".[24] This message never reached Captain Smith or the other
officers on Titanic's bridge. The reason is unclear, but it may have been forgotten because the
radio operators had to fix faulty equipment.[24]
SS Californian reported "three large bergs" at 19:30, and at 21:40, the steamer Mesaba
reported: "Saw much heavy pack ice and great number large icebergs. Also field ice."[25] This
message, too, never left the Titanic's radio room. The radio operator, Jack Phillips, may have
failed to grasp its significance because he was preoccupied with transmitting messages for
passengers via the relay station at Cape Race, Newfoundland; the radio set had broken down
the day before, resulting in a backlog of messages that the two operators were trying to
clear.[24] A final warning was received at 22:30 from operator Cyril Evans of the Californian,
which had halted for the night in an ice field some miles away, but Phillips cut it off and
signalled back: "Shut up! Shut up! I'm working Cape Race."[25]
Although the crew were aware of ice in the vicinity, the ship's speed was not reduced, and she
continued to steam at 22 knots (41 km/h; 25 mph), only 2 knots (3.7 km/h; 2.3 mph) short of
her maximum speed of 24 knots (44 km/h; 28 mph).[24][c] Titanic's high speed in waters where
ice had been reported was later criticised as reckless, but it reflected standard maritime
practice at the time. According to Fifth Officer Harold Lowe, the custom was "to go ahead
and depend upon the lookouts in the crow's nest and the watch on the bridge to pick up the
ice in time to avoid hitting it."[27]
The North Atlantic liners prioritised time-keeping above all other considerations, sticking
rigidly to a schedule that would guarantee their arrival at an advertised time. They were
constantly driven at close to their full speed, treating hazard warnings as advisories rather
than calls to action. It was widely believed that ice posed little risk; close calls were not
uncommon, and even head-on collisions had not been disastrous. In 1907 SS Kronprinz
Wilhelm, a German liner, had rammed an iceberg and suffered a crushed bow, but was still
able to complete her voyage. That same year, Titanic's future captain, Edward Smith,
declared in an interview that he could not "imagine any condition which would cause a ship
to founder. Modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that."[28]
[edit] "Iceberg, right ahead!" (23:39)
[edit] Meeting with the iceberg
For more details on the missing binoculars, see David Blair (mariner).
As Titanic approached her fatal crash, most passengers had gone to bed and command of the
bridge had passed from Second Officer Charles Lightoller to First Officer William Murdoch.
Lookouts Frederick Fleet and Reginald Lee were occupying the crow's nest 29 metres (95 ft)
above the deck. The air temperature had dropped to near freezing and the ocean was
completely calm. Colonel Archibald Gracie, one of the survivors of the disaster, later wrote
that "the sea was like glass, so smooth that the stars were clearly reflected."[29] It is now
known that such exceptionally calm water is a sign of nearby pack ice.[30]
Although the air was clear, there was no moon, and with the sea so calm, there was nothing to
give away the position of the nearby icebergs; had the sea been rougher, waves breaking
against the icebergs would have made them more visible.[31] Because of a mix-up at
Southampton the lookouts had no binoculars; but reportedly binoculars would not have
helped in a darkness which was total except for starlight and the ship's own lights.[32]. The
lookouts were nonetheless well aware of the ice hazard, as Lightoller had ordered them and
other crew members to "keep a sharp look-out for ice, particularly small ice and growlers".[33]
Diagram of Titanic's course at the time of the collision with the iceberg.
(Blue: path of bow. Red: path of stern.)
At 23:39, Fleet spotted an iceberg in Titanic's path. He rang the lookout bell three times and
telephoned the bridge to inform Sixth Officer James Moody, who asked: "What do you see?"
Fleet replied: "Iceberg right ahead."[34] After thanking Fleet, Moody relayed the message to
Murdoch, who ordered Quartermaster Robert Hichens to change the ship's course.[35]
Murdoch is generally believed to have given the order "Hard a'starboard" which would result
in the ship's tiller being moved all the way to starboard (the right side of the ship) in an
attempt to turn the ship to port (left).[32] He also rang "Full Astern" on the ship's telegraphs.[23]
According to Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall, Murdoch told Captain Smith that he was
attempting to "hard-a-port around [the iceberg]", suggesting that he was attempting a "port
around" manoeuvre – to first swing the bow around the obstacle, then swing the stern so that
both ends of the ship would avoid a collision. There was a delay before either order went into
effect; the steam-powered steering mechanism took up to 30 seconds to turn the ship's
tiller,[23] and the complex task of setting the engines into reverse would also have taken some
time to accomplish.[36] Because the centre turbine could not be reversed, it and the centre
propeller, positioned directly forward of the ship's rudder, were simply stopped. This greatly
reduced the rudder's effectiveness, thus handicapping the turning ability of the ship. Had
Murdoch simply turned the ship while maintaining her forward speed, Titanic might have
missed the iceberg with feet to spare.[37]
In the event, Titanic's heading changed just in time to avoid a head-on collision, but the
change in direction caused the ship to strike the iceberg with a glancing blow. An underwater
spur of ice scraped along the starboard side of the ship for about seven seconds; chunks of ice
dislodged from upper parts of the berg fell onto her forward decks.[38] A few minutes later, all
of Titanic's engines were stopped, leaving the ship facing north and drifting in the Labrador
Current.[39]
[edit] Effects of the collision
The iceberg buckled the plates, popping rivets and damaging a sequence of compartments. Contrary
to widespread assumption, the iceberg did not slice the hull.
The impact with the iceberg was long thought to have produced a huge tear in Titanic's hull,
"not less than 300 feet (91 m) in length, 10 feet (3.0 m) above the level of the keel", as one
writer later put it.[40] However, ultrasound surveys of the wreck have found that the damage
consisted of six narrow openings in an area of the hull covering only about 12 to 13 square
feet (1.1 to 1.2 m2) in total. According to Paul K. Matthias, who made the measurements, the
damage consisted of a "series of deformations in the starboard side that start and stop along
the hull ... about 10 feet [3.0 m] above the bottom of the ship."[41]
The gaps, the longest of which measures about 39 feet (12 m) long, appear to have followed
the line of the hull plates. This suggests that the iron rivets along the plate seams snapped off
or popped open to create narrow gaps through which water flooded. An engineer from
Titanic's builders, Harland and Wolff, suggested this scenario at the British Wreck
Commissioner's inquiry following the disaster but his view was discounted.[41] Titanic's
discoverer Robert Ballard has commented that the assumption that the ship had suffered a
massive breach was "a byproduct of the mystique of the Titanic. No one could believe that
the great ship was sunk by a little sliver."[42] Faults in the ship's hull may have been a
contributing factor. Recovered pieces of Titanic's hull plates appear to have shattered on
impact with the iceberg, without bending.[43]
The plates in the central 60% of the hull were held together with triple rows of mild steel
rivets, but the plates in the bow and stern were held together with double rows of wrought
iron rivets which were – according to material scientists Foecke and McCarty – near their
stress limits even before the collision.[44][45] These "Best" or No. 3 iron rivets had a high level
of slag inclusions, making them more brittle than the more usual "Best-Best" No. 4 iron
rivets, and more prone to snapping when put under stress, particularly in extreme cold.[46][47]
But Tom McCluskie, a retired archivist of Harland & Wolff, pointed out that Olympic,
Titanic's sister ship, was riveted with the same iron and served without incident for nearly 25
years, surviving several major collisions, including being rammed by a British cruiser.[48] The
Olympic even rammed and sank the U boat U-103 with her bow. Thereby, the stem was
twisted and hull plates on the starboard side were buckled without impairing the hull's
integrity.[48][49]
Above the waterline, there was little evidence of the collision. The stewards in the First Class
Dining Room noticed a shudder, which they thought might have been caused by the ship
shedding a propeller blade. Many of the passengers felt a bump or shudder but did not know
what it was.[50] Those on the lowest decks, nearest the site of the collision, felt it much more
directly. Engine Oiler Walter Hurst recalled being "awakened by a grinding crash along the
starboard side. No one was very much alarmed but knew we had struck something".[51]
Fireman George Kemish heard a "heavy thud and grinding tearing sound" from the starboard
hull.[52]
The ship began to flood immediately, with water pouring in at an estimated rate of 7 long
tons (7.1 t)[53] per second, fifteen times faster than it could be pumped out.[54] Second
Engineer J. H. Hesketh and Leading Stoker Frederick Barrett were hit by a jet of icy water in
No. 6 boiler room and escaped just before the room's watertight door closed.[55] This was an
extremely dangerous situation for the engineering staff; the boilers were still full of hot highpressure steam and there was a substantial risk that they would explode if they came into
contact with the cold seawater flooding into the boiler rooms. The stokers and firemen were
ordered to draw down the fires and vent the boilers, sending great quantities of steam up the
funnel venting pipes. They were waist-deep in freezing water by the time they finished their
work.[56]
Annotated diagram of RMS Titanic showing the arrangement of the bulkheads. The areas of damage
are shown in green. The compartments in the engineering area at the bottom of the ship are noted
in blue. The scale's smallest unit is 10 feet (3.0 m) and its total length is 400 feet (120 m).
Titanic's lower decks were divided into sixteen compartments. Each was separated from its
neighbour by a bulkhead running the width of the ship; there were fifteen bulkheads in all.
Every bulkhead extended at least to the underside of E Deck, nominally one deck above the
waterline, or about 11 feet (3.4 m). The two nearest the bow and the six nearest the stern went
one deck further up.[57]
Each bulkhead could be sealed by watertight doors. The engine rooms and boiler rooms on
the Tank Top deck had vertically closing doors that could be controlled remotely from the
bridge, lowered automatically by a float if water was present, or closed manually by the crew.
These took about 30 seconds to close; warning bells and alternate escape routes were
provided so that the crew would not be trapped by the doors. Above the Tank Top level, on
the Orlop Deck, F Deck and E Deck, the doors closed horizontally and were manually
operated. They could be closed at the door itself or from the deck above.[57]
Although the watertight bulkheads extended well above the water line, they were not sealed
at the top. If too many compartments were flooded, the ship's bow would settle deeper in the
water, and water would spill from one compartment to the next in sequence, rather like water
spilling across the top of an ice cube tray. This was what happened to Titanic, which had
suffered damage to the forepeak tank, the three forward holds and No. 6 boiler room, a total
of five compartments. Titanic was only designed to float with any two compartments flooded,
but it could remain afloat with certain combinations of three or even four compartments (the
first four) open to the ocean. With five compartments, however, the tops of the bulkheads
would be submerged and the ship would continue to flood.[57][58]
Animation showing the course of Titanic's sinking
Captain Smith felt the collision in his cabin and came immediately to the bridge. Informed of
the situation, he summoned Thomas Andrews, Titanic's builder, who was among a party of
engineers from Harland and Wolff observing the ship's first passenger voyage.[59] The ship
was listing five degrees to starboard and was two degrees down by the head within only a few
minutes of the collision.[60] Smith and Andrews went below and found that the forward cargo
holds, the mailroom and the squash court were flooded, while No. 6 boiler room was already
filled to a depth of 14 feet (4.3 m). Water was spilling over into No. 5 boiler room,[60] and
crewmen there were battling to pump it out.[61]
Within only 45 minutes of the collision, at least 13,500 long tons (13,700 t) of water had
entered the ship. This was far too much for Titanic's ballast and bilge pumps to handle; the
total pumping capacity of all the pumps combined was only 1,700 long tons (1,700 t) per
hour.[62] Seawater was pouring into Titanic 15 times faster than it could be pumped out.
Andrews informed the captain that the ship was doomed and that she could remain afloat for
no longer than about two hours.[63]
From the time of the collision to the moment of her sinking, at least 35,000 long tons (36,000
t) of water flooded into Titanic, causing her displacement to nearly double from 48,300 long
tons (49,100 t) to over 83,000 long tons (84,000 t).[64] The flooding did not proceed at a
constant pace, nor was it distributed evenly throughout the ship, due to the configuration of
the flooded compartments. Her initial list to starboard was caused by asymmetrical flooding
of the starboard side as water poured down a passageway at the bottom of the ship.[65] When
the passageway was fully flooded, the list corrected itself but the ship later began to list to
port by up to 10° as that side also flooded asymmetrically.[66]
Titanic's down angle altered fairly rapidly from 0° to about 4.5° during the first hour after the
collision, but the rate at which the ship went down slowed greatly for the second hour,
worsening only to about 5°.[67] This gave many of those aboard a false sense of hope that the
ship might stay afloat long enough for them to be rescued. By 1:30, however, the sinking rate
of the front section increased until Titanic reached a down angle of about 10°.[66]
[edit] 15 April 1912
[edit] Preparing to evacuate (00:05–00:45)
Edward J. Smith, captain of Titanic, in 1911
At 00:05 on 15 April, Captain Smith ordered the ship's lifeboats to be uncovered and the
passengers to be mustered.[58] He also ordered the radio operators to begin sending distress
calls, which wrongly placed the ship on the west side of the ice belt and directed rescuers to a
position that turned out to be inaccurate by about 13.5 nautical miles (15.5 mi / 25 km).[21][68]
Below decks, water was pouring into the lowest levels of the ship. As the mail room flooded,
the mail sorters made an ultimately futile attempt to save the 400,000 items of mail being
carried aboard Titanic. Elsewhere, air could be heard being forced out by inrushing water.[69]
Above them, stewards went from door to door, rousing sleeping passengers and crew –
Titanic did not have a public address system – and told them to go to the Boat Deck.[70]
The thoroughness of the muster was heavily dependent on the class of the passengers; the
first-class stewards were in charge of only a few cabins, while those responsible for the
second- and third-class passengers had to manage large numbers of people. The first-class
stewards provided hands-on assistance, helping their charges to get dressed and bringing
them out onto the deck. With far more people to deal with, the second- and third-class
stewards mostly confined their efforts to throwing open doors and telling passengers to put on
lifebelts and come up top. In third class, passengers were largely left to their own devices
after being informed of the need to come on deck.[71]
Many passengers and crew were reluctant to comply, either refusing to believe that there was
a problem or preferring the warmth of the ship's interior to the bitterly cold night air. The
passengers were not told that the ship was sinking, though a few noticed that she was
listing.[70] Around 00:15, the stewards began ordering the passengers to put on their
lifebelts,[72] though again, many passengers treated the order as a joke.[70] Some set about
playing an impromptu game of football (soccer) with the ice chunks that were now strewn
across the foredeck.[73]
It was difficult to hear anything over the noise of high-pressure steam being vented from the
boilers. Lawrence Beesley described the sound as "a harsh, deafening boom that made
conversation difficult; if one imagines 20 locomotives blowing off steam in a low key it
would give some idea of the unpleasant sound that met us as we climbed out on the top
deck."[74] The noise was so great that the crew had to rely on hand signals to communicate on
the deck.[75]
Captain Smith was faced with the fact that there were too few lifeboats to save everyone
onboard. Titanic had a total of 20 lifeboats, comprising 16 wooden boats on davits, 8 on
either side of the ship, and 4 collapsible boats with wooden bottoms and canvas sides.[70] The
collapsibles were stored upside down with the sides folded in, and would have to be erected
and moved to the davits for launching.[76] Two were stored under the wooden boats and the
other two were lashed atop the officers' quarters.[77] The position of the latter would make
them extremely difficult to launch, as they weighed several tons each and had to be
manhandled down to the boat deck.[78]
On average, the lifeboats could take up to 68 people each, and collectively they could
accommodate 1,178 – barely half the number of people on board and only a third of the
number the ship was licensed to carry. The shortage of lifeboats was not because of a lack of
space – Titanic had been designed to accommodate up to 68 lifeboats[79] – nor was it because
of cost, as the price of an extra 32 lifeboats would only have been some $16,000, a tiny
fraction of the $7.5 million that the company had spent on Titanic. The White Star Line had,
rather, wished to have a wide promenade deck with uninterrupted views of the sea, which
would have been obstructed by a continuous row of lifeboats.[80]
The company never envisaged that all of the crew and passengers would have to be evacuated
at once, as Titanic was considered almost unsinkable. The lifeboats were instead intended to
be used in the event of an emergency to transfer passengers off the ship and onto a nearby
vessel providing assistance.[81][d] It was commonplace for liners to have far fewer lifeboats
than needed to accommodate all their passengers and crew, and Titanic had more lifeboats
than the outdated British regulations required. Out of 39 British liners of the time of over
10,000 long tons (10,000 t), 33 had too few lifeboat places to accommodate everyone on
board.[83]
Smith was an experienced sailor who had served for 40 years at sea, with 27 years in
command. He would certainly have known that even if the boats were fully occupied, a
thousand people would remain on the ship as she went down.[58] As the enormity of what was
about to happen sank in, he appears to have become paralysed by indecision. He did not issue
a general call for evacuation, failed to order his officers to load the lifeboats, did not
adequately organise the crew, withheld crucial information from his officers and crewmen,
and gave sometimes ambiguous and impractical orders. Even some of his bridge officers
were unaware for some time after the collision that the ship was sinking; Fourth Officer
Joseph Boxhall did not find out until 01:15, barely an hour before the ship went down,[84]
while Quartermaster George Rowe was so unaware of the emergency that after the
evacuation had started, he phoned the bridge from his watch station to ask why he had just
seen a lifeboat go past.[85] Smith did not advise his officers that the ship did not have enough
lifeboats to save everyone. He did not supervise the loading of the lifeboats and seemingly
made no effort to find out if his orders were being followed.[84][86]
The crew was likewise unprepared for the emergency, as lifeboat training had been minimal.
Only one lifeboat drill had been carried out while the ship was docked. It was a cursory
effort, consisting of two boats being lowered, each manned by one officer and four men who
merely rowed around the dock for a few minutes before returning to the ship. The boats were
supposed to be stocked with emergency supplies but Titanic's passengers later found that they
had only been partially provisioned.[87] No lifeboat or fire drills had been carried out since
Titanic left Southampton.[87] A lifeboat drill had been scheduled for the morning before the
ship sank, but was cancelled for unknown reasons by Captain Smith.[88]
Lists had been posted on the ship allocating crew members to particular lifeboat stations, but
few appeared to have read them or to have known what they were supposed to do. Most of
the crew were, in any case, not seamen, and even some of those had no prior experience of
rowing a boat. They were now faced with the complex task of coordinating the lowering of
20 boats carrying a possible total of 1,100 people 70 feet (21 m) down the sides of the
ship.[78] Thomas E. Bonsall, a historian of the disaster, has commented that the evacuation
was so badly organised that "even if they had the number [of] lifeboats they needed, it is
impossible to see how they could have launched them" given the lack of time and poor
leadership.[89]
By about 00:20, 40 minutes after the collision, the loading of the lifeboats was under way,
though it was perhaps symptomatic of Captain Smith's apparent indecisiveness that it was at
the suggestion of Second Officer Lightoller. As the latter recalled afterwards, "I yelled at the
top of my voice, 'Hadn't we better get the women and children into the boats, sir?' He heard
me and nodded reply."[90] Smith ordered Lightoller to put the "women and children in and
lower away".[91] Lightoller took charge of the boats on the port side and Murdoch took those
on the starboard side. The two officers interpreted the evacuation order differently; Murdoch
took it to mean women and children first while Lightoller thought it meant women and
children only. Lightoller lowered lifeboats with empty seats if there were no women and
children waiting to board, while Murdoch allowed a limited number of men to board if all the
nearby women and children had embarked.[77] Neither officer knew how many people could
safely be carried in the boats as they were lowered and erred on the side of caution by not
filling them. They could have been lowered quite safely with their full complement of
68 people.[77] Had this been done, an extra 500 people could have been saved; instead,
hundreds of people, predominantly men, were left on board as lifeboats were launched with
many seats empty.[75][89]
Few passengers at first were willing to board the lifeboats and the officers in charge of the
evacuation found it hard to persuade them. The millionaire John Jacob Astor declared: "We
are safer here than in that little boat."[92] Some passengers refused flatly to embark. J. Bruce
Ismay, realising the need for urgency, roamed the starboard deck and urged passengers and
crew to evacuate. A trickle of women, couples and single men were persuaded to board
starboard lifeboat No. 7, which became the first lifeboat to be lowered.[92]
[edit] Departure of the lifeboats (00:45–02:05)
Further information: Lifeboats of the RMS Titanic
"The Sad Parting", illustration of 1912
At 00:45 lifeboat No. 7 was rowed away from Titanic with 28 passengers on board (despite a
capacity of 65). Lifeboat No. 6, on the port side, was the next to be lowered at 00:55. It also
had 28 people on board, among them the "unsinkable" Margaret "Molly" Brown. Lightoller
realised there was only one seaman on board and called for volunteers. Major Arthur Godfrey
Peuchen of the Royal Canadian Yacht Club stepped forward and climbed down a rope into
the lifeboat; he was the only male passenger whom Lightoller allowed to board during the
port side evacuation.[93] Peuchen's role highlighted a key problem during the evacuation:
there were hardly any seamen to man the boats. Some had been sent below to open gangway
doors to allow more passengers to be evacuated, but they never returned. They were
presumably trapped and drowned by the rising water below decks.[94]
Other crewmen fought for their lives as water continued to pour into the ship. The engineers
and firemen worked to vent steam from the boilers to prevent them from exploding on
contact with the cold water. They set up extra pumps in the forward compartments in a futile
bid to stem the torrent, and kept the electrical generators running to maintain lights and power
throughout the ship. Steward F. Dent Ray narrowly avoided being swept away when a
wooden wall between his quarters and the third-class accommodation on E deck collapsed,
leaving him waist-deep in water.[95] Two engineers died in boiler room No. 5 when, at around
00:45, the bunker door separating it from the flooded No. 6 boiler room collapsed and they
were swept away by "a wave of green foam".[96]
In boiler room No. 4, at around 01:20, water began flooding in from below, possibly
indicating that the bottom of the ship had also been holed by the iceberg. The flow of water
soon overwhelmed the pumps and forced the firemen to evacuate the forward boiler
rooms.[97] Further aft, Chief Engineer William Bell, his engineering colleagues, and a handful
of volunteer firemen and greasers stayed behind in the unflooded No. 1, 2 and 3 boiler and
engine rooms. They continued working on the electrical generators in order to keep the ship's
lights on and to power the radio so that distress signals could be sent.[42] They apparently
remained at their posts until the very end, ensuring that Titanic remained lit until the final
minutes of the sinking. None of the ship's engineers survived.[98] Titanic's five postal clerks
were last seen struggling to save the mail bags they had rescued from the flooded mail room.
They were caught by the rising water somewhere on D deck.[99]
Many of the third-class passengers were also confronted with the sight of water pouring into
their quarters on E, F and G decks. Carl Jansson, one of the relatively small number of thirdclass survivors, later recalled:
Then I run down to my cabin to bring my other clothes, watch and bag but only had time to
take the watch and coat when water with enormous force came into the cabin and I had to
rush up to the deck again where I found my friends standing with lifebelts on and with terror
painted on their faces. What should I do now, with no lifebelt and no shoes and no cap?[100]
The lifeboats were lowered every few minutes on each side, but most of the boats were
greatly under-filled. No. 5 left with 41 aboard, No. 3 had 32 aboard, No. 8 left with 39[101]
and No. 1 left with just 12 out of a capacity of 40.[101] The evacuation did not go smoothly
and passengers suffered accidents and injuries as it progressed. One woman fell between
lifeboat No. 10 and the side of the ship but someone caught her by the ankle and hauled her
back onto the promenade deck, where she made a second successful attempt at boarding.[102]
First-class passenger Annie Stengel broke several ribs when an overweight GermanAmerican doctor and his brother jumped into No. 5, squashing her and knocking her
unconscious.[103][104] The lifeboats' descent was likewise risky. No. 6 was nearly flooded
during the descent by water discharging out of the ship's side, but successfully made it away
from the ship.[101][105] No. 3 came close to disaster when, for a time, one of the davits jammed,
threatening to pitch the passengers out of the lifeboat and into the sea.[106]
By 01:20, the seriousness of the situation was now apparent to the passengers above decks,
who began saying their goodbyes, with husbands escorting their wives and children to the
lifeboats. Distress rockets were fired every few minutes to attract the attention of any ships
nearby and the radio operators repeatedly sent the distress signal CQD. Radio operator
Harold Bride suggested to his colleague Jack Phillips that he should use the new SOS signal,
as it "may be your last chance to send it". The two radio operators contacted other ships to
ask for assistance. Several responded, of which RMS Carpathia was the closest, at 58 miles
(93 km) away.[107] She was a much slower vessel than Titanic and, even driven at her
maximum speed of 17 kn (20 mph; 31 km/h), would have taken four hours to reach the
sinking ship.[108]
Much nearer was the SS Californian, which had warned Titanic of ice a few hours earlier.
Apprehensive at his ship being caught in a large field of drift ice, the Californian's captain,
Stanley Lord, had decided at about 22:00 to halt for the night and wait for daylight to find a
way through the ice field.[109] At 23:30, only 10 minutes before Titanic hit the iceberg,
Californian's sole radio operator, Cyril Evans, shut his set down for the night and went to
bed.[110] On the bridge her Third Officer, Charles Groves, saw a large vessel to starboard
around 10 mi (16 km) to 12 mi (19 km) away. It made a sudden turn to port and stopped. If
the radio operator of the Californian had stayed at his post fifteen minutes longer, hundreds
of lives might have been saved.[111] A little over an hour later, Second Officer Herbert Stone
saw five white rockets exploding above the stopped ship. Unsure what the rockets meant, he
called Captain Lord, who was resting in the chartroom, and reported the sighting.[112] Lord
did not act on the report, but Stone was perturbed: "A ship is not going to fire rockets at sea
for nothing," he told a colleague.[113]
Distress signal sent at about 01:40 by Titanic's radio operator, Jack Phillips, to the Russian ship SS
Birma. This was one of Titanic's last intelligible radio messages.
By this time it was clear to those on Titanic that the ship was indeed sinking and there would
not be enough lifeboat places for everyone. Some still clung to the hope that the worst would
not happen: Lucien Smith told his wife, "It is only a matter of form to have women and
children first. The ship is thoroughly equipped and everyone on her will be saved."[114]
Charlotte Colyer's husband Harvey called to his wife as she was put in a lifeboat, "Go, Lottie!
For God's sake, be brave and go! I'll get a seat in another boat!"[114]
Other couples refused to be separated. Ida Straus, the wife of Macy's department store coowner Isidor Straus, told her husband: "We have been living together for many years. Where
you go, I go."[114] They sat down in a pair of deck chairs and waited for the end.[115] The
industrialist Benjamin Guggenheim changed out of his life vest and sweater into top hat and
evening dress, and declared his wish to go down with the ship like a gentleman.[42]
At this point, the vast majority of those who had boarded lifeboats were first- and secondclass passengers. Few third-class (steerage) passengers had made it up onto the deck, and
most were still lost in the maze of corridors or trapped behind barriers and partitions that
segregated the accommodation for the steerage passengers from the first- and second-class
areas.[116] This segregation was not simply for social reasons, but was a requirement of United
States immigration laws, which mandated that third-class passengers be segregated to control
immigration and prevent the spread of infectious diseases. First- and second-class passengers
on transatlantic liners disembarked at the main piers on Manhattan Island, but steerage
passengers had to go through health checks and processing at Ellis Island.[117] In at least some
places, Titanic's crew appear to have actively hindered the steerage passengers' escape. Some
of the barriers were locked and guarded by crew members, apparently to prevent the steerage
passengers rushing the lifeboats.[116] Irish survivor Margaret Murphy wrote in May 1912:
Before all the steerage passengers had even a chance of their lives, the Titanic's sailors
fastened the doors and companionways leading up from the third-class section ... A crowd of
men was trying to get up to a higher deck and were fighting the sailors; all striking and
scuffling and swearing. Women and some children were there praying and crying. Then the
sailors fastened down the hatchways leading to the third-class section. They said they wanted
to keep the air down there so the vessel could stay up longer. It meant all hope was gone for
those still down there.[116]
A long and winding route had to be taken to reach topside; the steerage-class
accommodation, located on decks C through G, was at the extreme ends of the decks, and so
was furthest away from the lifeboats. By contrast, the first-class accommodation was located
on the upper decks and so was nearest. Proximity to the lifeboats thus became a key factor in
determining who got in them. To add to the difficulty, many of the steerage passengers did
not understand English. It was perhaps no coincidence that English-speaking Irish immigrants
were disproportionately represented among the steerage passengers who survived.[12] Many
of those who did survive owed their lives to third-class steward John Edward Hart, who
organised three trips into the ship's interior to escort groups of third-class passengers up to the
boat deck. Others made their way through open barriers or climbed emergency ladders.[118]
Some, perhaps overwhelmed by it all, made no attempt to escape and stayed in their cabins or
congregated in prayer in the third-class dining room.[119] Leading Fireman Charles
Hendrickson saw crowds of third-class passengers below decks with their trunks and
possessions, as if waiting for someone to direct them.[120] Psychologist Wynn Craig Wade
attributes this to "stoic passivity" produced by generations of being told what to do by social
superiors.[99] August Wennerström, one of the relatively few male steerage passengers to
survive, commented later that many of his companions had made no effort to save
themselves. He wrote:
Hundreds were in a circle [in the third-class dining saloon] with a preacher in the middle,
praying, crying, asking God and Mary to help them. They lay there and yelled, never lifting a
hand to help themselves. They had lost their own will power and expected God to do all the
work for them.[121]
[edit] Launching of the last lifeboats
Lifeboat No. 15 was nearly lowered onto Lifeboat No. 13 (depicted by Charles Dixon).
By 01:30, Titanic's downward angle in the water was increasing and the ship was now listing
slightly more to port, but not more than 5 degrees. The deteriorating situation was reflected in
the messages sent from the ship, which carried a tone of increasing desperation: "We are
putting the women off in the boats" at 01:25, "Engine room getting flooded" at 01:35, and at
01:45, "Engine room full up to boilers."[122] This was Titanic's last intelligible signal, sent as
the ship's electrical system began to fail; subsequent messages were jumbled and broken. The
two radio operators nonetheless continued sending out distress messages almost to the very
end.[123]
The remaining boats were filled much closer to capacity and in an increasing rush. No. 11
was filled with five people more than its rated capacity. As it was lowered, it was nearly
flooded by water being pumped out of the ship, but made it safely to the sea. No. 13 narrowly
avoided the same problem but those aboard were unable to release the ropes from which the
boat had been lowered. It drifted astern, directly under No. 15 as it was being lowered. The
ropes were cut in time and both boats made it away safely.[124]
The first signs of panic were seen when a group of passengers attempted to rush port-side
lifeboat No. 14 as it was being lowered with 40 people aboard. Fifth Officer Lowe fired three
warning shots in the air to restrain the crowd, without causing injuries.[125] No. 16 was
lowered five minutes later. Among those aboard was stewardess Violet Jessop, who was to
repeat the experience four years later when she survived the sinking of one of Titanic's sister
ships, Britannic, in the First World War.[126] Collapsible boat C was launched at 01:40 from a
now largely deserted area of the deck, as most of those on deck had moved to the stern of the
ship. It was aboard this boat that J. Bruce Ismay, Titanic's most controversial survivor, made
his escape from the ship, an act later condemned as cowardice.[122]
At 01:45, lifeboat No. 2 was lowered.[127] While it was still at deck level, Lightoller had
found the boat occupied by a number of men who, he wrote later, "weren't British, nor of the
English-speaking race ... [but of] the broad category known to sailors as 'dagoes'."[128] After
he evicted them by threatening them with his revolver, he was unable to find enough women
and children to fill the boat[128] and lowered it with only 25 people on board out of a possible
capacity of 40.[127] John Jacob Astor saw his wife off to safety in No. 4 boat at 01:55 but was
refused entry by Lightoller, even though 20 of the 60 seats aboard were unoccupied.[127]
The last boat to be launched was collapsible D, which left at 02:05 with 44 people aboard.
The sea had reached the boat deck and the forecastle was deep underwater. Captain Smith
carried out a final tour of the deck, telling the radio operators and other crew members: "Now
it's every man for himself."[129]
As passengers and crew headed to the stern, where Father Thomas Byles was giving
absolutions and hearing confessions,[130] Titanic's band continued to play outside the
gymnasium. Part of the enduring folklore of the Titanic sinking is that the band played the
hymn "Nearer, My God, to Thee" as the ship sank, but this appears to be dubious.[131] The
claim surfaced among the earliest reports of the sinking,[132] and the hymn became so closely
associated with the Titanic disaster that its opening bars were carved on the grave monument
of Titanic's bandmaster, Wallace Hartley, one of those who perished.[133] Violet Jessop said in
her 1934 account of the disaster that she had heard the hymn being played.[131] In contrast,
Archibald Gracie emphatically denied it in his own account, written soon after the sinking,
and Radio Operator Harold Bride said that he had heard "Autumn",[134] by which he may
have meant Archibald Joyce's then-popular waltz "Songe d'Automne" (Autumn Dream).
George Orrell, the bandmaster of the rescue ship, Carpathia, who spoke with survivors,
related: "The ship's band in any emergency is expected to play to calm the passengers. After
Titanic struck the iceberg the band began to play bright music, dance music, comic songs –
anything that would prevent the passengers from becoming panic-stricken ... various awestricken passengers began to think of the death that faced them and asked the bandmaster to
play hymns. The one which appealed to all was 'Nearer My God to Thee'."[135] According to
Gracie, who was near the band until that section of deck went under, the tunes played by the
band were "cheerful" but that he didn't recognise any of them, claiming that if they had
played ‘Nearer, My God, to Thee’ as claimed in the newspaper "I assuredly should have
noticed it and regarded it as a tactless warning of immediate death to us all and one likely to
create panic."[136]
Bride heard the band as he left the radio cabin, which was by now awash, in the company of
the other radio operator, Jack Phillips. He had just had a fight with a man who Bride thought
was "a stoker, or someone from below decks", who had attempted to steal Phillips' lifebelt.
Bride wrote later: "I did my duty. I hope I finished [the man]. I don't know. We left him on
the cabin floor of the radio room, and he was not moving."[137] The two radio operators went
in opposite directions, Phillips aft and Bride forward towards collapsible lifeboat B.[137]
Archibald Gracie was also heading aft, but as he made his way towards the stern he found his
path blocked by "a mass of humanity several lines deep, covering the boat deck, facing
us"[138] – hundreds of steerage passengers, who had finally made it to the deck just as the last
lifeboats departed. He gave up on the idea of going aft and jumped into the water to get away
from the crowd.[138] Others made no attempt to escape. The ship's designer, Thomas
Andrews, was last seen in the first-class smoking room, without a lifebelt, staring at the
painting above the fireplace.[126] Captain Smith's fate is unclear, but he was reportedly seen
on the bridge as the ship went down.[139]
[edit] Last minutes of sinking (02:15–02:20)
"Nearer, My God, To Thee" – cartoon of 1912
At about 02:15, Titanic's angle in the water began to increase rapidly as water poured into
previously unflooded parts of the ship through deck hatches.[140] Her suddenly increasing
angle caused what one survivor called a "giant wave" to wash along the ship from the
forward end of the boat deck, sweeping many people into the sea.[141] Chief Officer Henry
Wilde, First Officer Murdoch, Second Officer Charles Lightoller and Colonel Archibald
Gracie were swept away along with collapsible lifeboat B, which floated away upside-down
with Harold Bride trapped underneath it. Bride, Gracie and Lightoller made it onto the boat,
but Murdoch and Wilde perished in the water.[142][143]
Lightoller opted to abandon his post to escape the growing crowds, and dived into the water.
He was sucked into the mouth of a ventilation shaft but was blown clear by "a terrific blast of
hot air" and emerged next to the capsized lifeboat.[144] The forward funnel collapsed under its
own weight, crushing several people as it fell into the water and only narrowly missing the
lifeboat.[145] It closely missed Lightoller and created a wave that washed the boat 50 yards
(46 m) clear of the sinking ship.[144] Those still on Titanic felt her structure shuddering as it
underwent immense stresses. As first-class passenger Jack Thayer[146] described it:
Occasionally there had been a muffled thud or deadened explosion within the ship. Now,
without warning she seemed to start forward, moving forward and into the water at an angle
of about fifteen degrees. This movement with the water rushing up toward us was
accompanied by a rumbling roar, mixed with more muffled explosions. It was like standing
under a steel railway bridge while an express train passes overhead mingled with the noise of
a pressed steel factory and wholesale breakage of china.[147]
Eyewitnesses saw Titanic's stern lifting high into the air as the ship tilted down in the water.
It was said to have reached an angle of 30–45 degrees,[148] "revolving apparently around a
centre of gravity just astern of midships," as Lawrence Beesley later put it.[149] Many
survivors described a great noise, which some attributed to the boilers exploding.[150] Beesley
described it as "partly a groan, partly a rattle, and partly a smash, and it was not a sudden roar
as an explosion would be: it went on successively for some seconds, possibly fifteen to
twenty". He attributed it to "the engines and machinery coming loose from their bolts and
bearings, and falling through the compartments, smashing everything in their way".[149]
After another minute, the lights flickered once and then permanently went out, plunging
Titanic into darkness. Jack Thayer recalled seeing "groups of the fifteen hundred people still
aboard, clinging in clusters or bunches, like swarming bees; only to fall in masses, pairs or
singly as the great afterpart of the ship, two hundred fifty feet of it, rose into the sky."[145] The
stern began to settle back before rising again to a nearly vertical 90 degree angle, where it
remained for a few moments.[151] Thayer reported that it rotated on the surface, "gradually
[turning] her deck away from us, as though to hide from our sight the awful spectacle ...
Then, with the deadened noise of the bursting of her last few gallant bulkheads, she slid
quietly away from us into the sea."[152]
"Sinking of the Titanic" by Henry Reuterdahl
Titanic was subjected to extreme opposing forces – the flooded bow pulling her down while
the air in the stern kept her to the surface – which were concentrated at one of the weakest
points in the structure, the area of the engine room hatch. Shortly after the lights went out, the
ship split apart from side to side across No. 1 boiler room, just behind the third funnel. The
submerged bow may have remained attached to the stern by the keel for a short time, pulling
the stern to a high angle before separating and leaving the stern to float for a few minutes
longer. The forward part of the stern would have flooded very rapidly, causing it to tilt until it
reached its final near-vertical position.[153]
Titanic's surviving officers and a number of prominent survivors later testified that the ship
had sunk in one piece, a belief that was affirmed by the British and American inquiries into
the disaster. Archibald Gracie, who was on the promenade deck with the band (by the second
funnel), stated that "Titanic's decks were intact at the time she sank, and when I sank with
her, there was over seven-sixteenths of the ship already under water, and there was no
indication then of any impending break of the deck or ship".[154] However, Ballard argued
that many other survivors' accounts indicated that the ship had broken in two as it was
sinking.[155] As the engines are now known to have stayed in place along with most of the
boilers, the "great noise" heard by witnesses and the momentary settling of the stern were
presumably caused by the break-up of the ship rather than the loosening of her fittings or
boiler explosions.[156]
After they went under, the bow and stern took only a few minutes to sink 3,795 metres
(12,451 ft), spilling a trail of heavy machinery, tons of coal and great quantities of debris
from Titanic's interior. The two parts of the ship landed about 600 metres (2,000 ft) apart on a
gently undulating area of the seabed.[157] The streamlined bow section continued to descend at
about the angle it had taken on the surface, striking the seabed prow-first at a shallow
angle[158] at an estimated speed of 25–30 mph (40–48 km/h). Its momentum caused it to dig a
deep gouge into the seabed and buried the section up to 20 metres (66 ft) deep in sediment
before it came to an abrupt halt. The sudden deceleration caused the bow's structure to buckle
downwards by several degrees just forward of the bridge. The decks at the rear end of the
bow section, which had already been weakened during the break-up, collapsed one atop
another.[159]
The stern section seems to have descended almost vertically, probably rotating as it fell.[158]
Pockets of air still trapped in the hull imploded as it descended, tearing open the structure and
ripping off the poop deck.[160] The section landed with such force that it buried itself about 15
metres (49 ft) deep at the rudder. The decks pancaked down on top of each other and the hull
plating splayed out to the sides. Debris continued to rain down across the seabed for several
hours after the sinking.[159]
[edit] Passengers and crew in the water (02:20–04:10)
Pocket watch retrieved from an unknown victim of the disaster. It is stopped at 02:28, a few minutes
after the sinking and after its owner went into the water.
Colonel Archibald Gracie, one of the survivors who made it to collapsible lifeboat B. He never
recovered from his ordeal and died eight months after the sinking.
In the immediate aftermath of the sinking, hundreds of passengers and crew were left dying
in the icy sea, surrounded by debris from the ship. An unknown number of people had gone
down with the ship, trapped below decks or sucked down and drowned as the ship sank[citation
needed]
. Titanic's disintegration during her descent to the seabed caused buoyant chunks of
debris – timber beams, wooden doors, furniture, panelling and chunks of cork from the
bulkheads – to rocket to the surface. This injured and possibly killed some of the swimmers;
others used the debris to try to keep themselves afloat.[161]
The water was lethally cold, with a temperature of 28 °F (−2 °C). Second Officer Lightoller
described the feeling of "a thousand knives" being driven into his body as he entered the
sea.[160] Some of those in the water would have died almost immediately from heart attacks
caused by the sudden stress on their cardiovascular systems. Others progressed through the
classic symptoms of hypothermia: extreme shivering at first, followed by a slowing and
weakening pulse as body temperature dropped, before finally losing consciousness and
dying.[162]
Those in the lifeboats were horrified to hear the sound of what Lawrence Beesley called
"every possible emotion of human fear, despair, agony, fierce resentment and blind anger
mingled – I am certain of those – with notes of infinite surprise, as though each one were
saying, 'How is it possible that this awful thing is happening to me? That I should be caught
in this death trap?'"[163] Jack Thayer compared it to the sound of "locusts on a summer night",
while George Rheims, who jumped moments before Titanic sank, described it as "a dismal
moaning sound which I won't ever forget; it came from those poor people who were floating
around, calling for help. It was horrifying, mysterious, supernatural."[164]
The noise of the people in the water screaming, yelling, and crying was a tremendous shock
to the occupants of the lifeboats, many of whom had up to that moment believed that
everyone had escaped before the ship sank. As Beesley later wrote, the cries "came as a
thunderbolt, unexpected, inconceivable, incredible. No one in any of the boats standing off a
few hundred yards away can have escaped the paralysing shock of knowing that so short a
distance away a tragedy, unbelievable in its magnitude, was being enacted, which we,
helpless, could in no way avert or diminish."[163]
Only a few of those in the water survived. Among them were Archibald Gracie, Jack Thayer
and Charles Lightoller, who made it to the capsized collapsible boat B. Collapsible B
originally had around 12 crew on board who rescued those they could until some 35 men
were clinging precariously to the upturned hull. Realising the risk to the boat of being
swamped by the mass of swimmers around them, they paddled slowly away, ignoring the
pleas of dozens of swimmers to be allowed on board. In his account, Gracie wrote of the
admiration he had for those in the water; "In no instance, I am happy to say, did I hear any
word of rebuke from a swimmer because of a refusal to grant assistance...[one refusal] was
met with the manly voice of a powerful man...'All right boys, good luck and God bless
you'."[165] Collapsible boat A was upright but partly flooded, as its sides had not been
properly raised, and its 30 or more occupants had to sit for hours in a foot of freezing
water.[139]
Farther out, the other eighteen lifeboats – most of which had empty seats – drifted as the
occupants debated what, if anything, they should do to rescue the swimmers. No. 4 boat
seems to have been closest to the site of the sinking at around 50 metres away; this enabled
three people to swim over and be picked up before the ship sank. Five more were pulled from
the water after the sinking, though two later died. In all of the other boats, the occupants
eventually decided against returning, probably out of fear that they would be capsized in the
attempt. Some put their objections more bluntly; Quartermaster Hitchens, commanding
lifeboat No. 6, told the women aboard his boat that there was no point returning as there were
"only a lot of stiffs there."[166]
After about twenty minutes, the cries began to fade as the swimmers lapsed into
unconsciousness and death.[167] Fifth Officer Lowe, in charge of No. 14 lifeboat, "waited until
the yells and shrieks had subsided for the people to thin out" before mounting the night's sole
attempt to rescue those in the water.[168] He gathered together five of the lifeboats and
transferred the occupants between them to free up space in No. 14. Lowe then took a crew of
seven crewmen and one male passenger who volunteered to help, and then rowed back to the
site of the sinking. The whole operation took about three-quarters of an hour. By the time
No. 14 headed back to the site of the sinking, almost all of those in the water were already
dead and only a few voices could still be heard.[169]
Lucy, Lady Duff-Gordon, recalled after the disaster that "the very last cry was that of a man
who had been calling loudly: 'My God! My God!' He cried monotonously, in a dull, hopeless
way. For an entire hour there had been an awful chorus of shrieks, gradually dying into a
hopeless moan, until this last cry that I speak of. Then all was silent."[170] Lowe and his crew
found four men still alive, one of whom died shortly afterwards. Otherwise all they could see
were "hundreds of bodies and lifebelts"; the dead "seemed as if they had perished with the
cold as their limbs were all cramped up."[168]
In the other boats, there was nothing the survivors could do but await the arrival of rescue
ships. The air was bitterly cold and several of the boats had taken on water. The survivors
could not find any food or drinkable water in the boats, and most had no lights.[171] The
situation was particularly bad aboard collapsible B, which was only kept afloat by a
diminishing air pocket in the upturned hull. As dawn approached, the wind rose and the sea
became increasingly choppy, forcing those on the collapsible boat to stand up to balance it.
Some, exhausted by the ordeal, fell off into the sea and were drowned.[172] It became steadily
harder for the rest to keep their balance on the hull, with waves washing across it.[173]
Archibald Gracie later wrote of how he and the other survivors sitting on the upturned hull
were struck by "the utter helplessness of our position."[174]
[edit] Rescue and departure (04:10–09:15)
Collapsible lifeboat D photographed from the deck of Carpathia on the morning of 15 April 1912.
Titanic's survivors were finally rescued around 04:00 on 15 April by the RMS Carpathia,
which had steamed through the night at high speed and at considerable risk, as the ship had to
dodge numerous icebergs en route.[173] Carpathia's lights were first spotted around 03:30,[173]
which greatly cheered the survivors, though it took several more hours for everyone to be
brought aboard. The men on collapsible B finally managed to board two other lifeboats, but
one survivor died just before the transfer was made.[175] Collapsible A was also in trouble and
was now nearly awash; more than half of those aboard had died overnight.[160] The remainder
were transferred into another lifeboat, leaving behind three bodies in the boat, which was left
to drift away. It was recovered a month later by the White Star liner Oceanic, with the bodies
still aboard.[175]
Those on Carpathia were startled by the scene that greeted them as the sun came up: "fields
of ice on which, like points on the landscape, rested innumerable pyramids of ice."[176]
Captain Arthur Rostron of Carpathia saw ice all around, including 20 large bergs measuring
up to 200 feet (61 m) high and numerous smaller bergs, as well as ice floes and debris from
Titanic.[176] It appeared to Carpathia's passengers that their ship was in the middle of a vast
white plain of ice, studded with icebergs appearing like hills in the distance.[177]
As the lifeboats were brought alongside Carpathia, the survivors came aboard the ship by
various means. Some were strong enough to climb up rope ladders; others were hoisted up in
slings, and the children were hoisted in mail sacks.[178] The last lifeboat to reach the ship was
Lightoller's boat No. 12, with 74 people aboard a boat designed to carry 65. They were all on
Carpathia by 09:00.[179] There were some scenes of joy as families and friends were reunited,
but in most cases hopes died as loved ones failed to reappear.[180]
At 09:15, two more ships appeared on the scene – Mount Temple and Californian, which had
finally learned of the disaster when her radio operator returned to duty – but by then there
were no more survivors to be rescued. Carpathia had been bound for Fiume, AustriaHungary, (now Rijeka, Croatia) but as she had neither the stores nor the medical facilities to
cater for the survivors, Rostron ordered that a course be calculated to return the ship to New
York, where the survivors could be properly looked after.[179] Carpathia departed the area,
leaving the other ships to carry out a final, fruitless, two-hour search.[181][182]
[edit] Aftermath
Further information: Changes in safety practices after the sinking of the RMS Titanic and RMS Titanic
in popular culture
According to an eyewitness report, there "were many pathetic scenes" when Titanic's survivors
disembarked at New York.
Carpathia arrived at Pier 34 in New York on the evening of 18 April after a difficult voyage
through pack ice, fog, thunderstorms and rough seas.[183][184] Some 40,000 people stood on
the waterfront, alerted to the disaster by a stream of radio messages from Carpathia and other
ships. Due to communications difficulties, it was only after Carpathia docked – a full three
days after Titanic's sinking – that the full scope of the disaster became public knowledge.[184]
The heaviest loss was in Southampton, home to most of the crew; 699 members of the crew
gave Southampton addresses,[185] and 549 Southampton residents, almost all crew, were lost
in the disaster.[186]
Even before Carpathia arrived in New York, efforts were getting underway to retrieve the
dead. Four ships chartered by the White Star Line succeeded in retrieving 328 bodies; 119
were buried at sea, while the remaining 209 were brought ashore to the Canadian port of
Halifax, Nova Scotia,[183] where 150 of them were buried.[187] Memorials were raised in
various places – New York, Washington, Southampton, Liverpool, Belfast and Lichfield,
among others[188] – and ceremonies were held on both sides of the Atlantic to commemorate
the dead and raise funds to aid the survivors.[189] The bodies of most of Titanic's victims were
never recovered, and the only evidence of their deaths was found 73 years later among the
debris on the seabed: pairs of shoes lying side by side, where bodies had once lain before
eventually decomposing in the sea waters.[42]
The prevailing public reaction to the disaster was one of shock and outrage, directed against a
number of issues and people: why were there so few lifeboats? Why had Ismay saved his own
life when so many others died? Why did Titanic proceed into the icefield at full speed?[190]
The outrage was driven not least by the survivors themselves; even while they were aboard
Carpathia on their way to New York, Beesley and other survivors determined to "awaken
public opinion to safeguard ocean travel in the future" and wrote a public letter to The Times
urging changes to maritime safety.[191]
In places closely associated with Titanic, there was a deep sense of grief. Crowds of weeping
women, the wives, sisters and mothers of crew members, gathered outside the White Star
Line's offices in Southampton to find out what had happened to their loved ones – most of
whom had perished.[192] Churches in Belfast were packed and shipyard workers wept in the
streets after the news was announced. The ship had been a symbol of Belfast's industrial
achievements and there was not only a sense of grief but also of guilt, as those who had built
Titanic came to feel that they had in some way been responsible for her loss.[193]
"Time to get busy" by "Fisher", 1912. Public outrage at the disaster led politicians to impose new
regulations on the shipping industry.
In the aftermath of the sinking, public inquiries were set up in Britain and the United States.
The US inquiry began on 19 April under the chairmanship of Senator William Alden
Smith,[194] while the British inquiry commenced in London under Lord Mersey on 2 May
1912.[195] They reached broadly similar conclusions: the regulations on the number of
lifeboats that ships had to carry were out of date and inadequate;[196] Captain Smith had failed
to take proper heed of ice warnings;[197] the lifeboats had not been properly filled or crewed;
and the collision was the direct result of steaming into a danger area at too high a speed.[196]
Captain Lord of the Californian was strongly criticised by both inquiries for failing to render
assistance to Titanic.[198]
The disaster led to major changes in maritime regulations to implement new safety measures,
such as ensuring that more lifeboats were provided, that lifeboat drills were properly carried
out and that radio equipment on passenger ships was manned around the clock.[199] An
International Ice Patrol was set up to monitor the presence of icebergs in the North Atlantic,
and maritime safety regulations were harmonised internationally through the International
Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea; both measures are still in force today.[200]
Titanic's sinking became a cultural phenomenon, commemorated by numerous artists, filmmakers, writers, composers, musicians and dancers from the time immediately after the
sinking to the present day.[201] On 1 September 1985 a joint US-French expedition led by
Robert Ballard found the wreck of Titanic,[202] and the ship's rediscovery led to an explosion
of interest in Titanic's story.[203] In 1997, James Cameron's eponymous film became the first
movie ever to take $1 billion at the box office, and the film's soundtrack became the best
selling soundtrack recording of all time.[204] Numerous expeditions have been launched to
film the wreck and, controversially, to salvage objects from the debris field.[200]
Although many artefacts have been recovered and conserved, the wreck itself is steadily
decaying, as iron-eating microbes consume the hull at an estimated rate of 100 kilograms
(220 lb) a day.[205] In time, Titanic's structure will collapse into a pile of iron and steel
fragments. Eventually she will be reduced to a patch of rust on the seabed, with the remaining
scraps of the ship's hull mingled with her more durable fittings.[206]
[edit] Casualties and survivors
Further information: Passengers of the RMS Titanic and Crew of the RMS Titanic
The number of casualties of the sinking is unclear, due to a number of factors, including
confusion over the passenger list, which included some names of people who cancelled their
trip at the last minute, and the fact that several passengers travelled under aliases for various
reasons and were double-counted on the casualty lists.[207] The death toll has been put at
between 1,490 and 1,635 people.[208] The figures below are from the British Board of Trade
report on the disaster.[209]
Passengers Category
Number
aboard
Number
saved
Number
lost
Percentage
saved
Percentage
lost
Children
First Class
6
5
1
83.4%
16.6%
Children
Second
Class
24
24
0
100%
0%
Children
Third Class
79
27
52
34%
66%
Women
First Class
144
140
4
97%
3%
Women
Second
Class
93
80
13
86%
14%
Women
Third Class
165
76
89
46%
54%
Women
Crew
23
20
3
87%
13%
Passengers Category
Number
aboard
Number
saved
Number
lost
Percentage
saved
Percentage
lost
Men
First Class
175
57
118
33%
67%
Men
Second
Class
168
14
154
8%
92%
Men
Third Class
462
75
387
16%
84%
Men
Crew
885
192
693
22%
78%
2224
710
1514
32%
68%
Total
Less than a third of those aboard Titanic survived the disaster. Some survivors died shortly
afterwards; injuries and the effects of exposure caused the deaths of several of those brought
aboard Carpathia.[210] Of the groups shown in the table, 49% of the children, 26% of the
female passengers, 82% of the male passengers and 78% of the crew died. The figures show
stark differences in the survival rates of the different classes aboard Titanic. Although only
3 percent of first-class women were lost, 54% of those in third class died. Similarly, five of
six first-class and all second-class children survived, but 52 of the 79 in third class
perished.[211] The only first-class child to perish was Loraine Allison, aged 2. Proportionately,
the heaviest losses were suffered by the second-class men, of whom 92% died. Additionally,
among the pets brought aboard three survived the sinking.[212]
[edit] See also
Disasters portal

List of disasters in Great Britain and Ireland
[edit] Notes
1. ^ a b At the time of the collision, Titanic's clocks were set to 2 hours 2 minutes ahead of
Eastern Time Zone (UTC−05:00) and 2 hours 58 minutes behind Greenwich Mean Time.[1] In
other words, her time was close to UTC-3 (only 2 minutes ahead).
2. ^ Radio telegraphy was known as "wireless" in the British English of the period.
3. ^ Despite later myth, featured for example in the 1997 film Titanic, the ship Titanic was not
attempting to set a transatlantic speed record; the White Star Line had made a conscious
decision not to compete with their rivals Cunard on speed, but instead to focus on size and
luxury.[26]
4. ^ An incident confirmed this philosophy while Titanic was under construction: the White Star
liner Republic was involved in a collision and sank. Even though she did not have enough
lifeboats for all passengers, they were all saved because the ship was able to stay afloat long
enough for them to be ferried to ships coming to assist.[82]
The Tibetan Monk
(Palden Gyatso)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palden_Gyatso
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Palden Gyatso (born 1933 in Panam, Tibet) is a Buddhist monk who was born in Tibet in
1933. During the Chinese invasion in Tibet he was arrested and he spent 33 years in Chinese
prison. After his release in 1992 he went to Dharamsala, (North India) in exile. Since then he
is practicing his Buddhistic religion as a free monk.
Life
Palden Gyatso was born in the Tibetan village Panam in 1933. This place is located at
Nyangchu river between Gyantse and Shigatse. In 1943 he entered Gadong monastery as a
novice monk. During the Chinese invasion he was nominated as a fully ordained monk of the
Gelug school. Later he studied in Drepung monastery which is close to Lhasa.
After the Tibetan uprising in 1959, Palden Gyatso was arrested by Chinese officials. He spent
the following 33 years in different Chinese prisons and labour camps. He was forced to
participate in barbarous reeducation classes and was brutally tortured, leading to irreversible
physical damage. During this time, he continued to abide by the Dharma (Buddha's
teachings).
1992 Palden Gyatso was released. He escaped to Dharamsala in India, the place of the
Tibetan exile government. There he wrote his autobiography Fire Under The Snow which has
been translated in many other languages.
During his following visits in America and Europe he became politically active as an opposer
of the Chinese occupation in Tibet and as a witness of many years under Chinese
confinement. In 1995 he was heard by the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva.
These days Palden Gyatso is living in Dharamsala and following his Buddhistic studies.
www.amazon.com/Autobiography-Tibetan-Monk-Palden-Gyatso/dp/0802116213
The Autobiography of a Tibetan Monk (Hardcover)
by Palden Gyatso (Author), Tsering Shakya
If you've ever wondered what it's like to walk in the shoes of a Tibetan monk, you're in for a
shocker. Palden Gyatso followed his heart into the monastery at the age of 10 to study under
his uncle, also a monk. By his mid-20s, when he should have been preparing for a higher
degree, he instead found himself behind the bars of a Chinese communist prison. For the
next 30 years, he would endure interrogations, deprivation, starvation, beatings, and
psychological torture. When he was finally released in 1992, he fled the country, managing
to smuggle out not only the names of his fellow prisoners but Chinese instruments of torture
to show the world.
With the help of translator Tsering Shakya, Palden Gyatso has crafted his story into a fluid
yet surprisingly dispassionate account of his time in prison. Still, it is almost impossible not to
be swept along on waves of pity, horror, and compassion as he suffers unspeakably at the
hands of his tormentors. To understand the plight of one Tibetan monk is to step behind the
eyes of an entire people. --Brian Bruya
The New York Times Book Review, Judith Shapiro
Tibet's suffering exerts a profound claim on the world's compassion, but this suffering is
often romanticized by outsiders. With this memoir by a "simple monk" who spent 33 years in
prisons and labor camps for resisting the Chinese, a rare Tibetan voice is heard. Palden
Gyatso's Autobiography of a Tibetan Monk ... provides a devastating rebuttal to China's
reports of having improved the lives of Tibetans, and a deeply disturbing look at terror and
repression within the Chinese prison system.
This review is from: The
Autobiography of a Tibetan Monk (Paperback)
Ven. Palden Gyatso was the longest held prisoner in Chinese camps since the occupation of
Tibet. This memoir, told in clean, plain prose (a kudo to the translator) is horrifying in its
matter-of-fact detailing of the horrors of Tibetan prisons. The graphic descriptions of the
tortures that Ven. Gyataso endured left me queasy, and yet a thread of hope continue
throughout the book. From group re-education to starvation to penal camp labor and
extreme torture [one of which left him, unconscious for an indeterminate time, in a pool of
blood, urine, faeces and 20 of his teeth], Ven. Palden Gyatso somehow emerged from this,
then escaped to Dharmasala, India the home of the Dalai lama (the story of his meeting the
Dalai lama and the frontpiece poem are lovely). I was left with the feeling of awe, actual awe
at this man, and how he emerged WITHOUT BITTERNESS. Astonishing. Read this book.
Give it to another. It, like its author, is extraordinary