List of Disasters in Australia By Death Toll - 100 or More Deaths

100 or More Deaths

Disaster Location Deaths Date Notes
Australian frontier wars Australia-wide 22,500+ 1788–1930 Australian frontier wars; approximate death toll on both sides.
Epidemic Australia-wide 12,000+ 1918–1919 1918 Spanish Influenza epidemic; approximate death toll. Sydney was the worst affected area.
Epidemic Australia-wide 1,013 1946–1955 Polio epidemic.
Sea battle Indian Ocean, near Shark Bay 727 19 November 1941 Battle between HMAS Sydney and German auxiliary cruiser Kormoran. Both ships sank; all 645 aboard Sydney were killed, along with 82 personnel from Kormoran.
Epidemic Australia-wide 550 1900–1910 Bubonic plague.
Heat wave Victoria 438 Dec 1938-Feb 1939 Heatwave killed 438 and sparked the Black Friday bushfires (see below).
Heat wave South-eastern Australia 437 1895–1896 Widespread heatwave killed 437, including 47 in Bourke, New South Wales.
Cyclone Bathurst Bay, Queensland 410 4 March 1899 Cyclone Mahina; estimated toll.
Shipwreck King Island, Tasmania 406 1845 Cataraqui. Australia's worst maritime civil disaster incident.
Heatwave South-eastern Australia 374 25 January to 9 February 2009 2009 Southeastern Australia heat wave. A nine day heatwave with Adelaide recording six consecutive days over 40 °C (104 °F), a high of 45.7 °C (114.3 °F) and a record overnight minimum of 33.9 °C (93.0 °F) on 28 January. Sparked the Black Saturday bushfires (see below). Health authorities attribute 374 deaths to the Heatwave
Shipwreck coast near Murchison River, Western Australia 286 April 1712 Sinking of Dutch ship Zuytdorp. There has been speculation that there were survivors, who may have been assisted by local Aborigines.
Sinking Off North Stradbroke Island, Queensland 268 14 May 1943 Sinking of AHS Centaur. Hospital ship torpedoed by a Japanese submarine.
Heat wave Southern states 246 December 1907-January 1908
Air raids Darwin, Northern Territory 243 19 February 1942 First bombings of Darwin. The first Japanese air raids against Australia. The toll may have been higher, itinerants and Aboriginal persons may be under-represented in the official count.
Prison break Cowra, New South Wales 235-238 5 August 1944 Cowra breakout. Escape by Japanese POWs.
Shipwreck King Island, Tasmania 224 13 May 1835 Neva
Shipwreck Western Australia 212 1726 Aagtekerke. Possibly WA, but there is some doubt on this.
Shipwreck Ledge Point, Western Australia 186 April 1656 Vergulde Draeck
Bushfires Victoria 173 February 2009 Black Saturday bushfires
Cyclone/Sinking Western Australia 149 1 March 1912 SS Koombana
Heatwaves Australia-wide 147 1920–1921
Heatwaves Australia-wide 143+ 1911–1912
Cyclone Broome, Western Australia 141 March 1935 Pearling fleet devastated
Cyclone Eighty Mile Beach, Western Australia 140 1884 Pearling fleet sunk
Shipwreck D'Entrecasteaux Channel, Tasmania 133 12 April 1835 George III
Shipwreck Cape York, Queensland 133 28 February 1890 RMS Quetta
Heatwave Southern states 130 1926–1927
Shipwreck/mutiny/
massacre		 Abrolhos Islands, Western Australia 125+ June–July 1629 Sinking of the Dutch ship Batavia, after which mutineers murdered 125 other passengers. The death toll of 125 does not include the mutineers, of whom seven were immediately hanged and two cast away when the passengers were rescued. Most of the remaining mutineers were later executed.
Heatwave Australia-wide 122+ 1913–1914
Cyclone/Sinking North-eastern Queensland 122 16 March 1911 SS Yongala
Shipwreck Sydney, New South Wales 121 20 August 1857 Dunbar. 1 survivor.
Heatwave Australia-wide 112 1939–1940
Heatwave Australia-wide 109 1909–1910
Heatwave Southern regions, Australia 105+ 1959 One source puts death toll at 145
Cyclone/sinking Ayr, Queensland 102-112 24 February 1875 SS Gothenburg. Records of passengers vary

  • The Centaur memorial, in Point Danger, Coolangatta, Queensland, commemorates the sinking of the hospital ship AHS Centaur in 1943, which claimed 268 lives.

  • At least 243 people died in the Japanese air raids on Darwin in 1942.

  • Japanese prisoners of war practice baseball on the sports ground near their quarters, several weeks before the 1944 Cowra breakout, in which at least 235 people died.

Read more about this topic:  List Of Disasters In Australia By Death Toll

Famous quotes containing the word deaths:

    “As deaths have accumulated I have begun to think of life and death as a set of balance scales. When one is young, the scale is heavily tipped toward the living. With the first death, the first consciousness of death, the counter scale begins to fall. Death by death, the scales shift weight until what was unthinkable becomes merely a matter of gravity and the fall into death becomes an easy step.”
    —Alison Hawthorne Deming (b. 1946)