Eddystone Point lies on the north-east coast of Tasmania, Australia at 40.994 S/148.349 E.
Eddystone Point lies on the north-east coast of Tasmania, Australia at 40.994 S/148.349 E.
The first European to sight Eddystone Point was the Dutch navigator, Abel Tasman. In December 1642, Tasman sailed along the entire east coast of Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania). [1] He recorded that he tried to follow the coast around this headland, but he could not penetrate the wind wall. [2] The howling westerly gale indicated that here was a strait, not a bay, so Tasman resumed his easterly course to continue his continent-hunting. [3]
The next European visitor was Tobias Furneaux in HMS Adventure during James Cook's second Pacific voyage, which took place during the period of intense Anglo-French rivalry that filled the twelve years between the Seven Years' War and the American Revolutionary War. In March 1773, Furneaux retraced Tasman's course up the east coast of the island to discover whether or not it was joined to New Holland. At 2 a.m. on 19 March, his ship was suddenly tossed 40 miles out to sea and lost its sails. Furneaux named the headland Eddystone Point, after the notorious Eddystone Rocks in the English Channel. [4]
Seal hunting took place here from at least 1827. [5]
Six applications were made to the colonial government to lease land for whaling stations at Eddystone Point in 1841. [6] It is uncertain how many of these leases were taken up.
In 1884, the adjacent colonies of Tasmania and Victoria were discussing the erection of a lighthouse at Eddystone Point, which was eventually built [7] in 1889. The lighthouse and keepers' cottages are made of granite, quarried from nearby. [8] Head of works and head mason was James Galloway from Glasgow, Scotland, who migrated to Tasmania to oversee the building program. His brother, Alexander Galloway, also migrated from Glasgow to work on the building of the lighthouse and cottages.[ citation needed ]
In the early 1920s, heavy storms damaged the buildings, jetties and equipment, and flooded the tower. [8]
In 1935, wireless communication was installed. [8]
In 1960, the First Order Chance Brothers lens that had been removed from the Cape du Couedic Lighthouse on Kangaroo Island in South Australia was shipped to Melbourne for installation at Eddystone Point Lighthouse. [9]
Abel Janszoon Tasman was a Dutch seafarer and explorer, best known for his voyages of 1642 and 1644 in the service of the Dutch East India Company (VOC).
The maritime European exploration of Australia consisted of several waves of European seafarers who sailed the edges of the Australian continent. Dutch navigators were the first Europeans known to have explored and mapped the Australian coastline. The first documented encounter was that of Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon, in 1606. Dutch seafarers also visited the west and north coasts of the continent, as did French explorers.
Bass Strait is a strait separating the island state of Tasmania from the Australian mainland. The strait provides the most direct waterway between the Great Australian Bight and the Tasman Sea, and is also the only maritime route into the economically prominent Port Phillip Bay.
The Tasman Sea is a marginal sea of the South Pacific Ocean, situated between Australia and New Zealand. It measures about 2,000 km (1,200 mi) across and about 2,800 km (1,700 mi) from north to south. The sea was named after the Dutch explorer Abel Janszoon Tasman, who in 1642 was the first known person to cross it. British explorer Lieutenant James Cook later extensively navigated the Tasman Sea in the 1770s during his three voyages of exploration.
The Tasman National Park is a national park in eastern Tasmania, Australia, approximately 56 kilometres (35 mi) east of Hobart. The 107.5-square-kilometre (41.5 sq mi) park is situated on part of both the Forestier and Tasman peninsulas and encompasses all of Tasman Island.
Bruny Island is a 362-square-kilometre (140 sq mi) island located off the southeastern coast of Tasmania, Australia. The island is separated from the Tasmanian mainland by the D'Entrecasteaux Channel, and its east coast lies within the Tasman Sea. Located to the island's northeast Storm Bay, is the river mouth to the Derwent River estuary, and serves as the main port of Hobart, Tasmania's capital city. Both the island and the channel are named after French explorer, Antoine Bruni d'Entrecasteaux. Its traditional Aboriginal name is lunawanna-allonah, which survives as the name of two island settlements, Alonnah and Lunawanna.
The Furneaux Group is a group of approximately 100 islands located at the eastern end of Bass Strait, between Victoria and Tasmania, Australia. The islands were named after British navigator Tobias Furneaux, who sighted the eastern side of these islands after leaving Adventure Bay in 1773 on his way to New Zealand to rejoin Captain James Cook. Navigator Matthew Flinders was the first European to explore the Furneaux Islands group, in the Francis in 1798, and later that year in the Norfolk.
Tasmania, the largest island of Australia, has a landmass of 68,401 km2 (26,410 sq mi) and is located directly in the pathway of the notorious "Roaring Forties" wind that encircles the globe. To its north, it is separated from mainland Australia by Bass Strait. Tasmania is the only Australian state that is not located on the Australian mainland. About 2,500 kilometres south of Tasmania island lies the George V Coast of Antarctica. Depending on which borders of the oceans are used, the island can be said to be either surrounded by the Southern Ocean, or to have the Pacific on its east and the Indian to its west. Still other definitions of the ocean boundaries would have Tasmania with the Great Australian Bight to the west, and the Tasman Sea to the east. The southernmost point on mainland Tasmania is approximately 43°38′37″S146°49′38″E at South East Cape, and the northernmost point on mainland Tasmania is approximately 40°38′26″S144°43′33″E in Woolnorth / Temdudheker near Cape Grim / Kennaook. Tasmania lies at similar latitudes to Te Waipounamu / South Island of New Zealand, and parts of Patagonia in South America, and relative to the Northern Hemisphere, it lies at similar latitudes to Hokkaido in Japan, Northeast China (Manchuria), the north Mediterranean in Europe, and the Canada-United States border.
Maria Island or wukaluwikiwayna in palawa kani is a mountainous island located in the Tasman Sea, off the east coast of Tasmania, Australia. The 115.5-square-kilometre (44.6 sq mi) island is contained within the Maria Island National Park, which includes a marine area of 18.78 square kilometres (7.25 sq mi) off the island's northwest coast. The island is about 20 kilometres (12 mi) in length from north to south and, at its widest, is about 13 kilometres (8.1 mi) west to east. At its closest point, Point Lesueur, the island lies approximately 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) off the east coast of Tasmania.
Point Hicks, is a coastal headland in the East Gippsland region of Victoria, Australia, located within the Croajingolong National Park. The point is marked by the Point Hicks Lighthouse that faces the Tasman Sea.
Eddystone is a tower-shaped rock or small island, located in the Southern Ocean, off the southern coast of Tasmania, Australia. The island is situated approximately 27 km (17 mi) from the South East Cape on a bearing of 149° and is contained within the Southwest National Park, part of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Site. An erosional remnant of the Tasmanian mainland with an elevation of 30 m (98 ft) above sea level, the island is estimated to have separated from the Tasmanian mainland at least 15,000 years ago.
Frederick Henry Bay is a body of water in the southeast of Tasmania, Australia. It is located to the east of the South Arm Peninsula, and west of the Tasman Peninsula. Towns on the coast of the bay include Lauderdale, Seven Mile Beach, Dodges Ferry and Primrose Sands. The bay is accessible via Storm Bay from the south, and provides further access to Norfolk Bay to its east.
Cartographic censorship is the deliberate modification of publicly available maps in order to disguise, remove, or obfuscate potentially strategic locations or buildings, such as military bases, power plants or transmitters. Sensitive objects and places have been removed from maps since historic times, sometimes as a disinformation tactic in times of war, and also to serve competitive political and economic interests, such as during the Age of Discovery when strategic geographic information was highly sought after. In modern times requests for censorship are sent to Google Earth for certain sites that are deemed to pose security risks for national governments.
Samphire Island is a small shell-grit island, with an area of 3.3 ha, in south-eastern Australia. It is part of Tasmania’s Great Dog Island Group, lying in eastern Bass Strait between Flinders and Cape Barren Islands in the Furneaux Group. It is surrounded by mudflats at low tide.
The Tasman Island, part of the Tasman Island Group, is an oval island with an area of 1.2 square kilometres (0.46 sq mi), lying close to the south-eastern coast of Tasmania, Australia. The island is located in the Tasman Sea, situated off the Tasman Peninsula and is contained within the Tasman National Park.
The Tasman Island Lighthouse is on Tasman Island off the coast of southeastern Tasmania, Australia. It was one of the most isolated lighthouses in Australia. It was first lit on 2 April 1906, automated in 1976 and demanned in 1977. Solar conversion occurred in 1991. Various light sources have been fitted to the lighthouse since low voltage solar was installed in 1991. The current light source is a Vega VRB25. It has a character of Flashing 7.5x - Flash 0.1s - Eclipse 7.4s and produces 63,000 candelas with a geographical range of 39 nautical miles and a nominal range of 18 nautical miles.
Sloping Island, incorporating the adjacent Sloping Reef, is an island nature reserve, with an area of 117 ha, in Tasmania in south-eastern Australia. It is part of the Sloping Island Group, lying close to the south-eastern coast of Tasmania around the Tasman and Forestier Peninsulas.
The Bay of Fires is a bay on the northeastern coast of Tasmania in Australia, extending from Binalong Bay to Eddystone Point. The bay was given its name in 1773 by Captain Tobias Furneaux in Adventure, who saw the fires of Aboriginal people on the beaches.
The Cape du Couedic Lighthouse is a lighthouse in South Australia located at Cape du Couedic on Kangaroo Island.
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