Marrangaroo is a village in the Central West of

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

in the

City of Lithgow The City of Lithgow is a local government area in the Central West region of New South Wales, Australia. The area is located adjacent to the Great Western Highway and the Main Western railway line. The Mayor of the City of Lithgow Council is ...

Overview

Marrangaroo is located a few kilometres west of Lithgow. It is accessible from the

Great Western Highway Great Western Highway (also known as Broadway from to , Parramatta Road from Chippendale to , and Church Street through Parramatta) is a state highway in New South Wales, Australia. From east to west, the highway links Sydney with Bathurst, ...

, and has no railway station and little bus services. Lithgow Buslines, run buses between Lithgow and Bathurst, which makes limited stops at Marrangaroo on the Great Western Highway. A main feature of Marrangaroo was the Trout Farm which was opposite the

Lithgow Correctional Centre Lithgow Correctional Centre is a prison near Lithgow, Australia, operated by Corrective Services NSW, an agency of the New South Wales state government. The prison houses sentenced male inmates with a maximum security classification. History D ...

. At the

2016 census Sixteen or 16 may refer to: *16 (number), the natural number following 15 and preceding 17 *one of the years 16 BC, AD 16, 1916, 2016 Films * ''Pathinaaru'' or ''Sixteen'', a 2010 Tamil film * ''Sixteen'' (1943 film), a 1943 Argentine film dir ...

, Marrangaroo had a population of 909.

Military

Marrangaroo Army Camp situated at the end of Reserve Road used to be a major ammunition depot from 1941 to the late 1980s. It was served by a three kilometres siding that branched off from the

Main Western railway line The Main Western Railway is a major railway in New South Wales, Australia. It runs through the Blue Mountains, Central West, North West Slopes and the Far West regions. It is with operational & under construction & repairs. Description o ...

from March 1942 until May 1988. It is now used for demolitions and various training by all three

Australian Defence Force The Australian Defence Force (ADF) is the military organisation responsible for the defence of the Commonwealth of Australia and its national interests. It consists of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), Australian Army, Royal Australian Air Forc ...

services. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

it housed chemical warfare facilities; at the time, one of Australia's best kept secrets. Marrangaroo was the administration headquarters for all of the

Royal Australian Air Force "Through Adversity to the Stars" , colours = , colours_label = , march = , mascot = , anniversaries = RAAF Anniversary Commemoration ...

Chemical Weapon Stores which were kept in tunnels and sidings at Marrangaroo (old tunnel and siding near correctional centre), Glenbrook Tunnel in the Blue Mountains,

Clarence Tunnel The Clarence Tunnel is a railway tunnel that was originally part of the Main Western railway line across the Blue Mountains, New South Wales, Australia. It is long. History and description The tunnel, located to the west of Clarence, was buil ...

(that is now part of the

Lithgow Zig Zag The Lithgow Zig Zag is a heritage-listed former zig zag railway line built near Lithgow on the Great Western Line of New South Wales in Australia. The zig zag line operated between 1869 and 1910, to overcome an otherwise insurmountable c ...

) and Picton tunnel in Sydney's south. During an interview with Plunkett in 2005, chemical warfare armourer, Geoff Burn mentioned he had been involved in the burial of phosgene bombs near the entrance to the headquarters in 1943. He was subsequently recalled from

Cairns Cairns (, ) is a city in Queensland, Australia, on the tropical north east coast of Far North Queensland. The population in June 2019 was 153,952, having grown on average 1.02% annually over the preceding five years. The city is the 5th-most-p ...

in 1944 to identify the site but was unsure as to whether and if the bombs had been extracted. After Burn marked the site on an aerial map a ground search revealed they were still there. The legacy of these weapons remains with several hundred empty chemical munition containers being found buried at Marrangaroo Army Camp from May 2008 to February 2009. A remediation project to remove heavy metal contamination started in November 2008 with a secondary task to remove any more buried chemical munitions. The revelation of Marrangaroo's history sparked significant local media interest. The Department of Defence established a website for community consultation and feedback on the decontamination.

Transport

Railway Station - Marrangaroo (2826732226)

A railway station opened at Marrangaroo on the Main Western line in 1878 and closed in 1974. Little trace of it remains. Also, it has been suggested as the western terminus for the proposed Bells Line Expressway. But this now unlikely to proceed.

Shale oil

During the calendar years 1943 to 1945 inclusive, Lithgow Oil Proprietary Ltd, at Marangaroo, produced around 2,000,000 gallons of crude shale oil. Under wartime conditions, that company had designed and constructed its own NTU retorts based on information from a Bureau of Mines publication. The crude shale oil was refined at the

Glen Davis Shale Oil Works The Glen Davis Shale Oil Works was a shale oil extraction plant, in the Capertee Valley, at Glen Davis, New South Wales, Australia, which operated from 1940 until 1952. It was the last oil-shale operation in Australia, until the Stuart Oil Shale ...

. The Marangaroo oil shale deposit was small but exceptionally rich, assaying 237 gallons per long ton.

Heritage listings

Marrangaroo has a number of heritage-listed sites, including: * Main Western railway: Marrangaroo railway viaduct

References

External links

Media in Wikimedia Commons under Marrangaroo, New South Wales {{authority control Towns in New South Wales Mining towns in New South Wales Shale oil towns in New South Wales