Australian Explorers
Wednesday, February 24, 1802. : Flinders discovers and names Port Lincoln in South Australia.
Matthew Flinders was born on 16 March 1774 in Lincolnshire, England. He became a sea explorer, and arrived in Australia in the 1790s. The western half of Australia was previously known as New Holland, and the eastern half was known as New South Wales: Flinders first proposed the name “Terra Australis”, which became “Australia”, the name adopted in 1824. Flinders, together with George Bass, did much sea exploration around Australia, adding to the knowledge of the coastline, and producing accurate maps.
Between December 1801 and June 1803, Flinders charted the entire coastline of Australia. On 24 February 1802, Flinders and his crew discovered Port Lincoln, on the southern end of what later became known as the Eyre Peninsula. Flinders wrote that he named it in honour of his native province. When the area was settled some years later, many of the pioneers lobbied to have Port Lincoln named the capital of South Australia, but the lack of fresh water prevented this from occurring. Even sinking wells did not yield enough drinkable water.
Australian History
Wednesday, February 24, 1875. : The steamship SS Gothenburg is wrecked off the north Queensland coast, with the loss of over 100 lives.
The SS Gothenburg was constructed at Lungley’s building yards in Millwall, London and commissioned in 1855. Weighing 501 tons, she was 60 metres in length and had a 120-horsepower coal-burning engine. Originally owned and operated by the North of Europe Steam Navigation Company, she was purchased by the Union Castle Line and renamed as RMS Celt. She made her way to Australia after being acquired by Melbourne trading company McMerkan, Blackwood and Co. in 1862, and worked both along the coastline of Australia, and across the Tasman Sea to New Zealand. The vessel underwent modifications in 1873 to allow her to carry more cargo and passengers, and her original name of SS Gothenburg was restored.
Following the successful overland expedition of explorer John McDouall Stuart from Adelaide to the north coast in 1862, ownership of the northern central part of Australia was transferred from New South Wales to South Australia. Thus, as settlement in the north developed following the discovery of gold at Pine Creek, and as Port Darwin became an increasingly important trading post with the Dutch East Indies, northern banks relied on shipping to send their money, gold, mail and important documents to Adelaide. In November 1874, a number of ship-owners were contracted by the South Australian government for this purpose, with an assured payment of 1000 pounds sterling per successful delivery.
The Gothenburg departed Port Darwin on 17 February 1875 under the command of experienced captain James Pearce. Varying records suggest the ship carried around 98 passengers, including government officials and a number of prisoners being sent to Adelaide, and 37 crew. After travelling some 1500km in fine conditions, the vessel encountered bad weather at Cape York, worsening as she headed south. With visibility reduced to just a few metres, the Gothenburg hit the Great Barrier Reef while sailing in more sheltered passage between the coast and the reef around 7pm on 24 February 1875.
A disastrous attempt to refloat the Gothenburg by reversing the engine hard failed when a huge hole was created and she was displaced in an even more precarious position on the reef. Because of the weather, the lifeboats could not be boarded or launched. By the next morning, approximately 100 passengers had drowned, many of them because they refused to relinquish their gold and money belts, the weight of which made it impossible for them to swim to safety. Others were taken by sharks. Two days later, some of those aboard had managed to salvage three of the lifeboats, making it to nearby islands at the entrance to Whitsunday Passage, where they were rescued by other ships. The Gothenburg was completely destroyed. Records vary, with some showing that between 98 and 112 people drowned, including many high-profile public servants, dignitaries and diplomats. Only 22 people survived – 12 crew and 10 passengers. All 25 women and children aboard were killed, along with all of the officers. Three survivors – passengers James Fitzgerald and John Cleland and crewman Robert Brazil – were hailed as heroes for their selfless attempts to assist others, and subsequently awarded medals for bravery.
Australian History
Friday, February 24, 1984. : Australia’s first completely successful heart transplant operation is performed, under the direction of Dr Victor Chang.
The twentieth century saw amazing advances in medical technology. The world’s first heart transplant was performed in South Africa in 1967, by Christiaan Barnard. The patient lived for 18 days after the procedure before dying of pneumonia.
In Australia, the first heart transplant occurred under the direction of Dr Harry Windsor. The patient died within just a few days after his body rejected the new organ. The era of successful heart transplants in Australia can be attributed largely to the influence of Dr Victor Chang.
Victor Peter Chang Yam Him was born in Shanghai, China, on 21 November 1936. Chang’s mother died of cancer when he was just twelve years old, and this was a deciding factor in his choice to become a doctor. He came to Australia to complete his secondary schooling in 1953, then studied medicine at the University of Sydney, graduating with a Bachelor of Medical Science with first class honours in 1960, and a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery in 1962. After further study in England, and becoming a Fellow of both the Royal College of Surgeons and American College of Surgeons, he joined the cardiothoracic team at St Vincent’s Hospital in 1972.
Chang was instrumental in raising funds to establish a heart transplant programme at St Vincent’s. The first successful transplant under the programme was performed on a 39-year-old shearer from Armidale on 24 February 1984, who survived several months longer than he would have otherwise.
Arguably, Chang’s best-known success was when he operated on Fiona Coote, a 14-year-old schoolgirl, on 7-8 April 1984. Over the next six years, the unit at St Vincent’s performed over 197 heart transplants and 14 heart-lung transplants, achieving a 90% success rate for recipients in the first year. To compensate for the lack of heart donors, Chang developed an artificial heart valve and worked on designing an artificial heart.
Victor Chang was murdered on 4 July 1991, after an extortion attempt on his family. The murder was related to transplant waiting lists. Within less than two weeks, Chiew Seng Liew was charged with the murder, and Jimmy Tan was charged as an accessory. The Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute, to enable research into the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of heart muscle diseases, was launched in honour of Victor Chang on 15 February 1994.
World History
Tuesday, February 24, 1942. : The US Army defends southern California from a weather balloon.
Tensions were high along the Pacific coast of the United States early in 1942. The attack on Pearl Harbor had occurred two months earlier, and the US had entered fully into WWII. On 23 February 1942, a Japanese submarine shelled an oil field in southern California. The following day, naval intelligence issued an alert, stating that an attack was imminent.
Shortly afterwards, an unidentified radar signature was detected approximately 190km off the coast of Los Angeles, California. Panic ensued when the unidentified object, looking like a weather balloon, came within sight. During the night of 24 February 1942, the US Army fired several thousand anti-aircraft shells at the unidentified target. By the time dawn came on the 25th, damage on the ground was determined to have been caused by US artillery, not by Japanese bombs. At least seven people died in the fray; three from being trampled in panic by others, three in car accidents and one known death from heart failure. The Japanese denied they had launched any attack in the area, and the target was later officially determined to be a lost weather balloon, although this was never confirmed.
World History
Sunday, February 24, 1991. : The Gulf War ground offensive of the Allied forces against Iraq begins.
In the early hours of 2 August 1990, 100,000 Iraqi troops backed by 300 tanks invaded Kuwait, in the Persian Gulf. US economic aid to Iraq had inadvertently allowed Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to amass weaponry which was then deployed for the invasion. Hussein’s motivation for the invasion was that it was a response to overproduction of oil in Kuwait, which had cost Iraq an estimated $14 billion a year when oil prices fell. The United Nations acted immediately to implement economic sanctions against Iraq. Iraq, however, would not retreat.
On 17 January 1991, a coalition force of armies from 34 nations, led by the United States, set out to free Kuwait. The initial operation was nicknamed ‘Operation Desert Storm’. The initial offensive involved aerial bombing of Iraq and its armed forces. On 24 February 1991, the Gulf War ground offensive began. Iraq lacked the weaponry and equipment to maintain its defences, and within four days, Kuwait had been liberated and most of Iraq’s armed forces either destroyed, surrendered, or retreated.