Events
- 11 January – Nine people are killed in bushfires in South Australia, making them the worst fires seen in Australia since Ash Wednesday, and until the Black Saturday bushfires in February 2009.
- 25 February – Parts of the Sydney suburb of Macquarie Fields erupt into rioting following the death of a 19-year-old in a police pursuit.
- 26 February – The ALP government of Geoff Gallop is re-elected in Western Australia for a second term.
- 2 April – The Shark 02 Royal Australian Navy Westland Sea King helicopter crashes off the coast of Nias, killing nine people.
- 17 April – The Bali Nine are arrested for drug smuggling in Indonesia
- 2 May – Douglas Wood is taken hostage in Iraq. He is later rescued on 15 June.
- 6 May – The scandal concerning the 2001 deportation the Philippines of Australian resident Vivian Solon first came to light.
- 26 May – National Sorry Day is renamed National Day of Healing.
- 27 May – Schapelle Corby convicted of drug smuggling by an Indonesian court, and sentenced to 20 years in prison (later reduced to 15 and then reverted to 20 years).
- 1 June – The Indonesian embassy is subjected to a bioterrorism hoax.
- 27 July – After ten years in power, Bob Carr resigns as Premier of New South Wales. He is replaced by Morris Iemma on 3 August.
- 21 August – Michelle Leslie is arrested in Bali after being found with two ecstasy pills in her handbag at an open-air dance party just outside of Kuta. She is found guilty, and sentenced to three months in prison on 18 November, but is released on 20 November as she had already served her sentence.
- 29 August – After describing Bob Carr's wife Helena as a "mail-order bride", NSW Opposition Leader John Brogden resigns. He attempts suicide on 30 August.
- 12 October – The Bali Memorial, Melbourne commemorating the victims of the 2002 Bali bombings is officially opened.
- 2 December – Van Tuong Nguyen is hanged in Singapore for drug offences. He is the first Australian to be executed since 1993.
- 11–12 December – The 2005 Cronulla riots take place, with the rioting centred around Cronulla and other beachside suburbs. There is also rioting in the Greater Western Suburbs area of Sydney. Attacks on people of Middle Eastern appearance are also reported in Perth and Adelaide.
- 31 December – Sections of the Trans-Australian Railway near Nurina on the Nullarbor Plain were washed away by flooding, halting passenger and freight services for up to five days.
Read more about this topic: 2005 In Australia
Famous quotes containing the word events:
“This is certainly not the place for a discourse about what festivals are for. Discussions on this theme were plentiful during that phase of preparation and on the whole were fruitless. My experience is that discussion is fruitless. What sets forth and demonstrates is the sight of events in action, is living through these events and understanding them.”
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)
“One cannot be a good historian of the outward, visible world without giving some thought to the hidden, private life of ordinary people; and on the other hand one cannot be a good historian of this inner life without taking into account outward events where these are relevant. They are two orders of fact which reflect each other, which are always linked and which sometimes provoke each other.”
—Victor Hugo (1802–1885)
“Nothing that grieves us can be called little: by the eternal laws of proportion a child’s loss of a doll and a king’s loss of a crown are events of the same size.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)